Self-Care Entitlement: Conceptualization and Psychometric Evaluation of a New Scale

Self-care is widely recognized as essential for health and everyday functioning, yet individuals vary substantially in their engagement in self-care, partly due to internal beliefs regarding the legitimacy of caring for oneself. The present research developed and provided an initial psychometric evaluation of the Self-Care Entitlement Scale (SCES), a self-report measure assessing perceived entitlement to allocate time, energy, and resources to one’s own well-being. The scale was theoretically grounded and developed through adapting established entitlement measures. Study 1 (N = 221) involved item development and exploratory factor analysis with parallel analysis, supporting a two-factor structure reflecting active and restricted self-care entitlement, with high internal consistency and good test-retest reliability. Study 2 (N = 407) employed confirmatory factor analysis, supporting the two-factor model, and examined construct validity. Active entitlement was positively associated with general entitlement, self-care behaviors, and life satisfaction. Restricted entitlement was negatively associated with self-care behaviors and life satisfaction. Findings support the SCES as a reliable and valid measure capturing internal authorization processes underlying self-care engagement.