Reliability and validity analyses were conducted using the
full sample. Reliability for the two factors was acceptable:
Cronbach's alphas for the oppressed self factor and
oppressed group factor were .81 and .78, respectively.
Cronbach's alpha for the full 12-item scale was .81.
Predicted patterns of mean differences were found that
argued for subscale validity. As can be seen from the data
in Tables 4 and 5, older nurses had lower scores on NWS
factors than younger nurses (P b.001). As expected, both
nurses specializing in institutional based critical care and
nurses in a staff nurse role had higher scores than nurses
working in other specialties in a non-staff nurse role (P b
.05). Intuitively, one could hypothesize that (a) having a
union represent the voices of nurses, (b) higher levels of
nursing education (BS and above), (c) more years of
experience in health care, and (d) being Roman Catholic
(a hierarchical culture that is dominated by men in
power) would yield significantly less internalized sexism
and minimization of self in the case of unions, education,
and experience and more internalized sexism and
minimization of self in the case of religious influence.
However, this was not the case in this analysis