Development and Validation of Ashtanga Yoga Scale for Wellness of Adolescents

Abstract

The major objective of the thesis, Ashtanga Yoga Scale development to assess ashtanga yoga wellbeing benefits in adolescents. Typically, the benefits are like concentration, memory, values, academic performance, physical and fitness etc. This scale is derived from the ancient Indian classical yoga text, Patanjal Yoga Sutra. The proposed scale is based on eight limbs of ashtanga yoga with 39 qualitative parameters. To test and validate this scale a study has been conducted initially selected 2040 out of 6000 students. With inclusion and exclusion criteria we have selected finally a sample size 510 secondary and senior secondary students, from the Kendriya Vidyalaya of Bhopal region, Madhya Pradesh, India. The alpha value is found to be 0.93. The sample adequacy, KMO and Bartley s significance test values were 0.94 at plt0.0001. On detailed statistical analysis of EFA and CFA using SPSS AMOS version 25, the promax rotation factors were obtained as a pattern matrix. The study fitness indices (absolute, incremental and parsimonious) matched well with the accepted levels of overall fitness. The one factor regression coefficient was found to be 0.82. These results indicated that the proposed scale is a better predictor of wellness benefits of ashtanga yoga in terms of both reliability and validation. The new scale was also tested and cross-validated well with the existing scales with the same sample population. In addition, proposed scale s test-retest reliability and concurrent validity was observed within the acceptable ranges. With new Patanjali ashtanga yoga frame of reference, we show that Ashtanga Yoga Scale could well be transliterated into modern psychometric assessment tool for adolescent measurements. newline