The DOI matches its Crossref record; 6 of the 6 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Coefficient Alpha: A Reliability Coefficient for the 21st Century?
Abstract
Coefficient alpha is almost universally applied to assess reliability of scales in psychology. We argue that researchers should consider alternatives to coefficient alpha. Our preference is for structural equation modeling (SEM) estimates of reliability because they are informative and allow for an empirical evaluation of the assumptions underlying them. An example is presented to illustrate the advantages of SEM estimates of reliability.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cites
Coefficient Alpha and the Internal Structure of Tests
Cronbach, L. J. (1951) · Psychometrika · doi:10.1007/bf02310555 · Cited by 43,931
What is coefficient alpha? An examination of theory and applications
Cortina, J. M. (1993) · Journal of Applied Psychology · doi:10.1037/0021-9010.78.1.98 · Cited by 8,810 · cited 4×
“We adopt the distinction made by Cortina (1993), Green, Lissitz, and Mulaik (1977), and Schmitt (1996) in discussing coefficient alpha that internal consistency is the interrelatedness among items (i.e., the average interitem correlation), whereas homogeneity is the degree that items are…”
BackgroundMethodInfluentialFactor analysis and scale revision.
Reise, S. P., Waller, N. G., & Comrey, A. L. (2000) · Psychological Assessment · doi:10.1037/1040-3590.12.3.287 · Cited by 855
The role of the bifactor model in resolving dimensionality issues in health outcomes measures
Reise, S. P., Morizot, J., & Hays, R. D. (2007) · Quality of Life Research · doi:10.1007/s11136-007-9183-7 · Cited by 747
Measurement error in psychological research: Lessons from 26 research scenarios.
Schmidt, F. L., & Hunter, J. E. (1996) · Psychological Methods · doi:10.1037/1082-989x.1.2.199 · Cited by 567 · cited 1×
“It allows for the assessment of transient errors (e.g., amount of noise during administration of a scale or amount of sleep prior to taking a test) that have differential effects for the two administrations of a test (Becker, 2000; Hunter & Schmidt, 1996).”
BackgroundLimitations of Coefficient Alpha as an Index of Test Unidimensionality1
Green, S. B., Lissitz, R. W., & Mulaik, S. A. (1977) · Educational and Psychological Measurement · doi:10.1177/001316447703700403 · Cited by 522
Self-citation
Research works printed but not linked: 55
- 10.1177/0013164497057006001 · DOI
- 10.1037/1082-989X.5.3.370 · DOI
- 10.1007/s11336-008-9100-1 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1177/001316447703700402 · DOI
- 10.1177/001316447703700325 · doi:10.1177/001316447703700325
- 10.1111/j.1745-3984.1979.tb00090.x · DOI
- 10.1177/0013164404266386 · DOI · Paper page
- Cronbach, L.J., 1965, Psychological tests and personnel decisions
- Embretson, S.E., 2000, Item response theory for psychologists
- 10.1207/s15324818ame0903_5 · DOI
- Finney, S. & DiStefano, C. ( 2006). Non-normal and categorical data in structural equation modeling. In G. R. Hancock & R. O. Mueller (Eds.), Structural equation modeling: A second course (pp. 269-314). Greenwich, CT: Information Age.
- 10.1177/0013164487474008 · DOI
- 10.1037/1082-989X.9.4.466 · DOI · Paper page
- George, D., 2003, SPSS for Windows step by step: A simple guide and reference, 11.0 update
- 10.1177/014662168300700202 · DOI
- 10.1037/1082-989X.8.1.88 · DOI
- 10.1080/10705519709540064 · DOI
- 10.1207/S15328007SEM0702_6 · DOI
- 10.1002/9780470756980.ch8 · DOI
- Green, S.B., Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of American Education Research Association
- 10.1007/s11336-008-9098-4 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/s11336-008-9099-3 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/BF02288892 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1177/00131640021970691 · DOI · Paper page
- Kaplan, R.M., 2009, Psychological testing: Principles, applications, and issues
- 10.1177/01466216970214004 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/s11135-007-9133-z · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/BF02288956 · DOI
- 10.1177/001316446802800309 · DOI
- 10.1177/001316447803800111 · DOI · Paper page
- McDonald, R.P., 1999, Test theory: A unified treatment
- 10.1080/10705519509540013 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1111/j.2044-8317.1992.tb00975.x · DOI · Paper page
- Muthén, L.K., 1998, Mplus user’s guide
- 10.1007/BF02289400 · DOI · Paper page
- Nunnally, J.C., 1978, Psychometric theory
- 10.1037/1082-989X.5.3.343 · doi:10.1037/1082-989x.5.3.343 · Paper page
- 10.1086/209405 · DOI · Paper page
- Raju, N.S., Proceedings of the Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association
- 10.1177/01466216970212006 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1207/s15327906mbr3204_2 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1177/014662169802200407 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1207/S15328007SEM0902_3 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/s11336-008-9102-z · DOI · Paper page
- Rozeboom, W.W., 1966, Foundations of the theory of prediction
- 10.1037/1040-3590.8.4.350 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1007/s11336-008-9101-0 · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1037/0022-3514.81.2.332 · DOI
- 10.1037/1082-989X.1.1.81 · DOI
- 10.1177/0013164409355688 · DOI
- 10.1111/j.1745-3984.1987.tb00274.x · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1080/10705510903438963 · DOI
- Yang, Y., Paper presented at Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association
- 10.1111/j.1745-3984.1993.tb00423.x · DOI · Paper page
- 10.1177/0013164493053001003 · DOI
Cited by
Use Omega Rather than Cronbach’s Alpha for Estimating Reliability. But…
Hayes, A. F., & Coutts, J. J. (2020) · Communication Methods and Measures · doi:10.1080/19312458.2020.1718629 · Cited by 2,675
Thanks coefficient alpha, we’ll take it from here.
McNeish, D. (2018) · Psychological Methods · doi:10.1037/met0000144 · Cited by 2,533
Un viaje alrededor de alfa y omega para estimar la fiabilidad de consistencia interna
Viladrich, C., Angulo-Brunet, A., & Doval, E. (2017) · Anales de Psicología · doi:10.6018/analesps.33.3.268401 · Cited by 699
Construct Validation in Social and Personality Research: Current Practice and Recommendations
Flake, J. K., Pek, J., & Hehman, E. (2017) · Social Psychological and Personality Science · doi:10.1177/1948550617693063 · Cited by 697
Sass, D. A. (2011) · Journal of Psychoeducational Assessment · doi:10.1177/0734282911406661 · Cited by 531
Metadata
- Authors
- Yang, Y., & Green, S. B.
- Venue
- Journal of Psychoeducational Assessment
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2011-05-19
- Volume
- 29
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 377-392
- ISSN
- 0734-2829 (ISSN-L)
- 1557-5144
- OpenAlex
- W1966691167
- Cited by
- 479
- References
- 6
- FWCI
- 26.01
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- journals.sagepub.com/page/policies/text-and-data-mining-license (tdm)
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
How to cite
Cite CoChat for the checks on this page, and the paper for its own findings.
- This page
- CoChat. (2026). Citation check: Coefficient Alpha: A Reliability Coefficient for the 21st Century? https://app.cochat.ai/papers/10.1177/0734282911406668
- The paper
- Yang, Y., & Green, S. B. (2011). Coefficient Alpha: A Reliability Coefficient for the 21st Century? Journal of Psychoeducational Assessment. https://doi.org/10.1177/0734282911406668
Data sources
Bibliographic data: Semantic Scholar, OpenAlex, Crossref.
Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
Semantic Scholar’s data is described in: Kinney, R., et al. (2023). The Semantic Scholar Open Data Platform. arXiv:2301.10140.