The Brief Lexington Attachment to Pets Scale: measurement invariance in India, Italy, Poland, and Russia

Abstract

Pet attachment is a phenomenon widely studied in various cultures, but little attention has been devoted to whether it varies across cultures. This topic requires a valid invariant instrument to measure pet attachment. Thus, the aim of this study was cross-cultural examination of the Lexington Attachment to Pets Scale (LAPS). A total of 906 respondents from India, Italy, Poland, and Russia took part in the study. The initial version of LAPS has 23 items and three factors: General attachment, People substitution, and Animal rights/welfare. We expected that (1) LAPS retains its structure across the four countries studied, and that (2) the level of pet attachment varies from country to country. The confirmatory factor analysis did not support the original three-factor structure in all the countries, with specific deviations from the initial structure in each participating country. After many iterations, we decided to investigate a new optimal structure of LAPS. The final one-factor model consisted of eleven items was supported, and this modification was labelled the Brief Lexington Attachment to Pets Scale (B-LAPS). B-LAPS had high omega internal consistency (0.84–0.88), and has demonstrated configural, full metric, and partial scalar measurement invariance across countries. It was shown that the highest score in pet attachment was found in Poland, followed by India, Italy, and Russia. Future research is needed to further validate the external validity of B-LAPS and assess its usefulness in research, animal-assisted therapy, and education.