A-02 The development of a questionnaire to measure the perception of marital dissatisfaction among Nigerian immigrants in North America: Immigrant Marital Disruption Questionnaire (IMDQ)

The process of acculturalization of Nigerian immigrants is laden with challenges, including marital disruptions; however, we could not find any culturally sensitive tool available to measure marital disruption among this population. Therefore, we developed a tool to measure culturally sensitive factors leading to marital disruptions among Nigerians Immigrants in North America (NINA). A 17-item questionnaire was developed and tested on 160 subjects. Five constructs derived from the analysis were Financial Stressors, Marital Relationship Deficits, Intercultural Conflicts, Spiritual Systems, and Others. The overall Questionnaire has high construct validity. However, the validity of the individual constructs ranged from Cronbach’s alpha of .54 to .74. The purpose of this follow-up study is to further validate the IMDQ with larger sample size and with a marital satisfaction tool. We will conduct an in-depth interview of subjects for relevant themes to refine the tool further. Methods: Mix-methods design. 15 participants were approached for in-depth interviews via zoom. IMDQ will be refined using the results of the qualitative data. The refined IMDQ and the Kansas Marital Satisfaction Scale (KMS) will be administered electronically to 450 subjects recruited by snowball technique via social media and Nigerian social gatherings/organizations. Analysis: Content analysis of the qualitative data is being conducted for relevant themes. Descriptive statistics, factor analysis, and parametric tests will be utilized for the quantitative data. Expected Results: Relevant themes to refine or affirm IMDQ will be identified. KMS will validate IMDQ. Factor analysis will reveal moderate to high Cronbach’s alpha for the refined IMDQ