INITIAL DEVELOPMENT OF ASSERTIVE BEHAVIOR INVENTORY

Abstract

To excel in contemporary society, one needs social finesse. Assertiveness is a beautiful social skill enabling one to express one’s essence in such a manner as to achieve desired outcome. However, having suitable assertiveness scale that will facilitate comparative research across ages is the challenge this work addresses. Therefore, this work presents an assertiveness scale – Assertive Behavior Inventory (ABI) – that is suitable for use with youths and adults of all ages.  The ABI was validated on persons aged 11-56 years. Cronbach’s Alpha is 0.84; Split-half reliability is 0.80. The ABI correlates significantly with social anxiety. The reliable and valid ABI is useful for research and clinical purposes.