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. 2025 Oct:153:106794.
doi: 10.1016/j.nedt.2025.106794. Epub 2025 May 31.

Psychometric evaluation of the Collaboration for Leadership and Innovation in Mentoring survey: An instrument of PhD student mentorship quality

Josephine R Granner  1 , Clayton J Shuman  2 , Asa B Smith  3 , Elizabeth E Umberfield  4 , Ellen M L Smith  5
Affiliations

Psychometric evaluation of the Collaboration for Leadership and Innovation in Mentoring survey: An instrument of PhD student mentorship quality

Josephine R Granner et al. Nurse Educ Today. 2025 Oct.

Abstract

Background: Quality mentorship plays a crucial role in shaping the intellectual and professional growth of PhD students and is therefore a pivotal component of their education. Despite the recognized importance of mentorship, few rigorously validated instruments exist to measure the multifaceted dimensions of mentorship quality. Our Collaboration for Leadership and Innovation in Mentoring (CLIM) survey, which comprehensively assesses PhD mentorship quality, was previously developed in a nursing student population yet has not been robustly validated.

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to conduct a psychometric evaluation of the CLIM Survey including 1) reducing the number of items and 2) identifying dimensions and testing reliability and validity in a diverse PhD student sample.

Design: This was cross sectional instrument development and validation study.

Participants: A total of 819 PhD students representing 19 departments at a large public university.

Methods: We administered the 44-item CLIM instrument via anonymous surveys. To reduce the number of items and assess structural validity, we used principal component analysis (PCA). We included components with eigenvalues >1.0 and items with component loadings >0.3 on one component. The instrument was reduced to 22 items across 6 components: 1) Working Together, 2) Mentor Availability, 3) Mentoring Teams and Goals, 4) Shared Research Interests, 5) Mutual Respect, and 6) Mentor Benefit.

Results: Strong internal consistency reliability of the resulting instrument (CLIM-22) was demonstrated by an α = 0.89; total scores ranged from 15 to 110 (mean = 81.57; SD = 15.42), with higher scores indicating higher mentorship quality.

Conclusions: These results support the reliability and validity of the new CLIM-22 instrument, offering a standardized tool to assess PhD mentorship experiences. Effectively measuring the quality of mentor-mentee relationships in PhD programs should be integrated with targeted interventions to enhance doctoral education, student experiences, and mentor-mentee relationships.

Keywords: Education; Graduate; Instrument development; Mentorship; Psychometrics.

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Conflict of interest statement

Declaration of competing interest The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests: The authors of this manuscript licensed the CLIM-22 instrument as an invention through the University of Michigan Office of Innovation Partnerships. Invention number: #2024-613 Landing page: https://available-inventions.umich.edu/product/collaboration-for-innovation-in-mentoring-scale-clim-scale-an-instrument-to-measure-phd-mentorship-quality.

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