Validity evidence of the Brazilian version of the Perceived Motivational Climate in Sports Questionnaire-2 (PMCSQ-2BR)

In sports context, the motivational climate has been widely studied since 2000, when the Perceived Motivational Climate in Sports Questionnaire-2 (PMCSQ-2) was published. Evaluating athletes’ perceptions of the motivational climate created by the coach, this questionnaire has been validated and adapted for different countries, including Brazil. However, important psychometric properties of the Brazilian version present problems, such as poor fit indices and the almost exclusively male samples, make it unfeasible for use in future research. Thus, this study aimed to achieve a new process of cross-cultural adaptation, and search for validity evidence of the PMCSQ-2 for the Brazilian sports context to correct distortions, expand the sources of evidence of validity and ecological validity, and make it suitable for application in future research. The sample consisted of 501 athletes (349 males, 152 females) from different sports. The findings of the current study support the multidimensional hierarchical characteristic of the instrument, its factorial structure, and internal consistency. We concluded that the 33-item PMCSQ-2BR, distributed in two high-order scales (ego-involving and task-involving) with three subscales each, can be used to assess athletes’ perceived motivational climate in the Brazilian sports context.