The reliability and validity study of the reasonability of prosocial lie test – child form

Abstract

Children’s perceptions of lying behaviors and their evaluations about different types of lies are among the topics discussed in the field. It is seen that the studies conducted on this subject focus on the lies that are told with antisocial and prosocial intentions that are opposite to each other. Besides, only a few studies have addressed children’s assessments of lies which are told for prosocial reasons. In these studies, it is also known that the researchers used various stories while examining the extent to which children perceive lies as reasonable through different stories. In the current study, it is aimed to conduct the validity and reliability study of the “Reasonability of Prosocial Lie Test-Child Form” in order to see whether the stories whether the stories measure the concept in Turkish sample. In addition, it was investigated for which reasons prosocial lies are more appropriate by focusing on the prosocial type of lying. A total of 277 children, 144 girls and 133 boys, aged between 8 and 13 years, participated in the study. Within the scope of validity studies, an exploratory factor analysis was performed, and it was founded that the final version of the test has an 11-item structure, 6 of which are “politeness lies”, 3 of which are "collaborative lies" emerging after someone else's request, and 2 of which are “negative lies” told for own benefit. In addition, the internal consistency coefficients of the test and the test-retest reliability coefficients revealed that the test was also reliable. The results of the analysis showed that the Reasonability of Prosocial Lie Test-Child Form is a valid and reliable measurement tool that can be used to evaluate which types of lies are more appropriate for children in primary and secondary school.