Instruments to Assess Doctoral Supervisory Styles: Development and Validation in Spanish-Speaking Samples

Abstract

Aim: To develop and validate psychometric scales to assess supervisory styles in doctoral education – directive, guiding, and hands-off – from both supervisor and student perspectives (SSS-S and SSS-s). Background: Doctoral supervision critically shapes students’ progress, well-being, and completion; yet, most studies rely on qualitative or conceptual typologies, and there is no standardized, validated instrument to quantify supervisory styles. Address ing this gap can help programs diagnose practices and align expectations be tween supervisors and candidates. Methodology: Two complementary studies were conducted with multi-country, Spanish speaking doctoral programs. Study 1 established content validity with the assis tance of expert judges. Study 2 used online, non-probability sampling to survey 333 supervisors and 510 doctoral students. Instruments were administered, and factor-analytic models (oblique and bifactor) and reliability coefficients were used to evaluate internal structure and consistency. Contribution: This study introduces the first psychometrically validated instruments to quantify directive, guiding, and hands-off supervisory styles through brief, parallel supervisor and student scales, providing a standardized, scalable approach for programs to diagnose and improve doctoral supervision.Findings: Our results indicate that supervisory styles are one-dimensional. The internal consistency coefficients estimated for each style were satisfactory. Two instruments were developed, each tailored to assess the three supervisory styles, comprising three subscales with twelve items in each.