Psychometric Properties

The Heartland Forgiveness Scale (HFS):

  • Measures a person’s dispositional forgiveness of self, others, and situations beyond anyone’s control (e.g., a natural disaster or illness).

  • Is a self-report questionnaire.

  • Can be completed with paper and pencil or on the computer.

  • Has 18 items.

  • Consists of the 3 subscales and the total scale;

    • Forgiveness of Self (6 items)

    • Forgiveness of Others (6 items)

    • Forgiveness of Situations (6 items)

    • Total HFS (18 items)

  • Subscale scores should always be reported.

Construct Validity

There is evidence to support HFS and HFS subscale construct validity with university student and nonstudent samples. (Shepherd & Belicki, 2008; Thompson et al., 2005)

Predictive Validity

There is evidence to support HFS and HFS subscale predictive validity with university student, non-student, clinical, and geriatric samples. (Cheavens, Cukrowicz, Hansen, & Mitchell, 2016; Thompson et al., 2005; Weinberg, Gil, and Gilbar, 2014)

Discriminant Validity (Social Desirability)

Although HFS subscales have correlated positively with the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (Crowne & Marlowe, 1960), the overlap of only 9% to 10% (as R2 for shared variance; Thompson et al., 2005) indicates that these constructs are distinct and that participants’ scores on the HFS are not unduly affected by their desire to endorse socially desirable behaviors.

Factor Structure

  • Confirmatory factor analyses of the HFS items indicated that a three-factor solution corresponding only to type of forgiveness (i.e., self, other, and situation) did not fit adequately. (Thompson et al., 2005).

  • Adding uncorrelated method factors related to item wording (i.e., positive and negative wording) did result in an acceptably fitting model, and factor loadings related to forgiveness type were greater than those related to wording (Thompson et al., 2005).

  • Thus, the HFS measures three aspects of forgiveness (i.e., forgiveness of self, others, and situations) through two methods of wording (positive/ forgiving and negative/ unforgiving).

  • It is therefore recommended that HFS subscale scores should always be reported.

  • This finding also suggests that it may be important for forgiveness measures to contain items worded in both a forgiving and an unforgiving manner.

Other Language Versions

The HFS has been translated into many languages. (see translations)