Page 290 - Encyclopedia of Nursing Research

InSTRUMenT TRanSLaTIon n 257

The consent form must contain a state- many nurse scientists need expertise in
ment that the study is research along with the instrument translation prior to conducting
purposes of the research, the expected length cross-cultural research. I
of participation, and details of the procedure Instrument translation is defined as a
(elements of a consent form; 45, CFR 46.116). process of adapting an instrument devel-
There is a description of the foreseeable risks oped in one language (source language; SL)
and expected benefits, and details of alter- into another language (target language; TL)
nate procedures are given if appropriate. with sensitivity to the culture being stud-
Information related to confidentiality of the ied (Geisinger, 1994). The aim of translation
data, as well as details of compensation in is not merely to achieve literal or syntactic
the event of injuries, are provided. The con- equivalence, but to maintain the original
sent form also contains information related meanings (denotation and connotation) of
to voluntary participation, and withdrawal the instrument items or questions (Tang &
from the study without penalty. Contact Dixon, 2002). Therefore, an instrument
information for answers to any questions is translation is not a simple word-for-word
also contained on the form. translation process. Rather, it is a multistep
The written consent form must be process involving rigorous and scientific
approved by the IRB. Prior to participation procedures.
in the research study, the subject or the sub- Many researchers (Jones, Lee, Philips,
ject’s legal representative will sign the con- Zhang, & Jaceldo, 2001; McDermott &
sent form. The information on the consent Palchanes, 1994; Tang & Dixon, 2002;
form can be read to the subject or the sub- Willgerodt, Kataoka-Yahiro, Kim, & Ceria,
ject’s legal representative. also, they must be 2005; Yu, Lee, & Woo, 2004) recommended
given sufficient time to read the consent form and used Brislin’s (1970, 1980, 1986) transla-
before they sign it. a copy of the consent tion method as the most reliable method for
form is given to the signee (documentation of developing an equivalent translated instru-
informed consent; 45, CFR 46.117). ment. This method includes the following
five steps: (1) forward (one way) translation—
Mary T. Quinn Griffin translation of the original instrument, the
SL version, into a TL version by a bilingual
person; (2) review of the TL version by a
monolingual reviewer of the TL for wordings
Instrument translatIon that are ambiguous or difficult to understand;
(3) backward translation (back-translation)—
the reviewed TL version (step 2) is translated
With the growing cross-cultural and interna- back into the source language (BT) version by
tional collaboration in nursing research, and another bilingual person, who is “blinded” to
with the emphasis on identifying differences the SL version; (4) comparison of the original
and similarities among people’s ethnic- and SL and BT versions, as well as the TL version,
culture-related health status outcomes, the for linguistic congruence through identifica-
need for culturally sensitive instruments has tion and correction of discrepancies; and (5)
also increased. Yet, being able to systemati- a pretest of the TL versions on monolingual
cally account for health-related perceptions individuals and/or the SL and TL version on
and health behaviors is strongly associated bilingual individuals, to ensure the linguis-
with the majority of well-established mea- tic equivalence and cultural relevancy of
surements developed in english that are tar- the translated instrument. When translation
geted for the Western culture, particularly errors that lead to differences in meaning are
for people in the United States. Consequently, identified, these steps need to be repeated so