Development and validation of the COVID-19 Anxiety Scale for Japanese elite athletes

Introduction: Japanese elite athletes were affected by the spread of COVID-19 infection. Four years after the pandemic, COVID-19 is still spreading and subsiding, and it is expected that some athletes are still concerned about COVID-19. Therefore, we developed the COVID-19 Anxiety Scale for Elite Athletes (CAS-EA) to measure COVID-19 anxiety among Japanese elite athletes and to examine its reliability and validity. Method: This is an observational cross-sectional study. In study 1, a 35-item anxiety questionnaire about COVID-19 was administered to 100 elite athletes on 8/18-9/1/2020. In study 2, 296 elite athletes were asked to respond to the CAS-EA, the Japanese version of State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI), and the Japanese version of the Fear of Coronavirus Virus Scale (FCV-19S) from 8/31-11/8/2022. Results: In study 1, an exploratory factor analysis was conducted to create CAS-EA, which consisted of 19 items with four factors: Restrictions, Sport, Practice and Athlete value. The reliability of the scales was examined, confirming a certain internal consistency. In addition, study 2 showed significant positive correlations with CAS-EA and related scales. In the COVID-19 disaster, psychological stress was more strongly associated with A-trait than physical stress, a result that could be explained by Spielberger’s Trait-state anxiety theory. Furthermore, CAS-EA scores were significantly higher for female than for male, which was consistent with the results of previous studies. Conclusion: An attempt was made to create a scale to measure anxiety about COVID-19 in Japanese elite athletes, and a 4-factor, 19-item CAS-EA was created. The reliability and validity of the scale were tested and confirmed successfully.