Assessing Individual Variation in Action Identification: Translation, Validation, and Shortening of the Polish Behavior Identification Form (BIF)

Authors:

• Aleksandra Pilarska

Abstract

Action identification theory asserts that level of action identification holds implications for important aspects of personality, including self-regulation, self-concept, and vulnerability to social influence. Vallacher and Wegner’s Behavior Identification Form is a 25-item forced-choice instrument that assesses individual differences in characteristic level of action identification and is widely used in social and psychological research. This article presents studies that evaluated the psychometric properties of the Polish version of the Behavior Identification Form, further modified it into a shortened version, and investigated several predicted conceptual relationships between the Behavior Identification Form and other personality measures. A total of 1153 Polish university students in three samples took part in the research. Psychometrically, the Polish Behavior Identification Form proved to be reasonably sound, with good internal consistency (avg. α =.83 and α =.72 for the full and short form, respectively). The predictive abilities of the full and short Polish Behavior Identification Form were consistently comparable, although not all of the expected associations were found.