Conceptual and Analytic Development of a Civic Engagement Scale for Preadolescents

This paper presents the conceptual basis and statistical assessment of the Pre-Adolescent Civic Engagement Scale (PACES), a civic engagement measure developed for use with middle childhood and early adolescent young people. The authors expand the current work on civic engagement measured by contributing a parsimonious measure that has been subjected to more rigorous statistical assessments than other measures developed for preadolescents. Results of factor analyses, both exploratory and confirmatory, conducted with 2 samples (n=136; n=151) of children and youth (aged 7 to 14 years), yielded an 11-item, 2-component scale assessing foundations for civic ethics and community connection among preadolescents.