Measuring positive breast experience: Development and psychometric evaluation of the Breast Appreciation Scale (BrAS)

Existing measures of women’s breasted experiences have focused on negative experiences, which de-centres women’s meaning-making and relationships with their breasts. To rectify this, we developed a novel measure of women’s positive breasted experiences, the Breast Appreciation Scale (BrAS), and examined the psychometric properties of this novel measure across four studies. Study 1, with 307 United Kingdom women, led to the extraction of a 9-item, unidimensional model of BrAS scores that showed adequate composite reliability and 4-week test-retest reliability. Study 2, with 297 United Kingdom women, showed that the unidimensional model of BrAS scores had adequate fit and evidenced convergent, concurrent, discriminant, and incremental validity. Study 3, with 295 women from the United Kingdom, provided additional support for factorial validity and concurrent validity, and additionally provided evidence of known-groups validity insofar as mothers had greater breast appreciation than non-mothers. Study 4 showed that the BrAS was scalar invariant across women from Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States (N = 573) and provided additional evidence of concurrent validity. Based on these results, we conclude that the BrAS is a psychometrically valid measure of women’s positive breasted experiences that can be utilised in future research. •Scores on the novel, 9-item Breast Appreciation Scale (BrAS) are unidimensional.•BrAS scores have adequate composite reliability and 4-week test-retest reliability.•BrAS scores have good convergent, concurrent, discriminant, and incremental validity.•BrAS scores have good known-groups validity, with mothers having higher scores than non-mothers.•BrAS scores are invariant across women from Australia, the UK, and the USA.