Psychometric Properties of the Community Sense Scale in the Classroom in a sample of Chilean students

It is only recently that the sense of community in contexts other than the neighborhood has started to be studied, providing evidence on the associations between this variable in the school environment and various dimensions of integral development in childhood and adolescence. However, in the Latin American context, there are no validated scales to perform these measurements. The present study examined the structure, reliability and convergent validity of the Community Sense Scale in the Classroom (SCo-SC) proposed by Petrillo, Capone and Donizzetti. The participants of the study were 1065 students aged 10 to 12 from urban areas. The confirmatory factor analysis coincides with the authors' proposal; however, due to the high homogeneity indexes of the scale, a Bifactor analysis model was carried out. The results indicate that the SCo-SC is an adequate instrument to measure the Community Sense in the Classroom and that it is positively related to satisfaction with life and with school during childhood.