Psychometric properties of the Arabic version of the 10-item State Shame and Guilt Scale

Background Guilt and shame are self-conscious emotions that affect behavior and mental health, with meanings that vary across cultures. In Arab society, shame is more related to social and moral values, while guilt is related to relational obligations. To date, no validated tool exists to assess both emotions in Arab populations, leading professionals to misrepresent how Arabs perceive guilt and shame. This limits clinical and research accuracy in understanding their relationship with psychological distress and other factors. Therefore, the present study aims to translate and validate the 10-Item State Shame and Guilt Scale into an Arabic version to provide an accurate tool for assessing guilt and shame among Arabs. Methods 611 adults from Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq were recruited via an anonymous self-administered Google Forms survey. All questions were mandatory, resulting in no missing data. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) was conducted using RStudio (R version 4.5.2), with the “lavaan” and “SemTools” packages, applying the Weighted Least Squares Mean and Variance Adjusted (WLSMV) estimator appropriate for ordinal data to perform on the full sample. Result The CFA showed that the two-factor model of the shame and guilt scale demonstrated acceptable to good fit indices (X 2 (34) = 175.62, p  < 0.001; RMSEA = 0.082, SRMR = 0.059; CFI = 0.993, TLI = 0.991). Internal consistency was excellent for both shame (McDonald’s ω  = 0.86; Cronbach’s α  = 0.87) and guilt (ω = 0.87; α = 0.87), with satisfactory convergent validity (AVE = 0.75). Configural, metric, and scalar invariance were supported with no significant differences observed between males and females or across countries in shame or guilt scores. Our results also show that both shame and guilt scores were significantly and moderately associated with external and internal shame, psychological distress, and perfectionism, supporting the scale’s validity in capturing self-conscious emotional processes related to mental health outcomes. Conclusion The Arabic version of the 10-item State Shame and Guilt Scale turned out to be a reliable, valid, and cost-effective psychometric scale to assess guilt and shame in the Arab culture. It shows meaningful associations with mental health outcomes, giving a valuable tool for researchers and clinicians to study self-conscious emotions and their impact on Arabic-speaking populations.