Objective.

To design and validate an instrument to assess the perceived risk of contracting COVID-19 in the Colombian population.

Materials and methods.

Cross-sectional observational study of psychometric type with a sample of 2350 people between 16 and 65 years of age. The dimensions and items were proposed based the review of previous studies on the evaluation of risk perception of disease and disasters, by integrating the guidelines issued by the World Health Organization regarding self-protection measures and biosecurity protocols to avoid COVID-19 transmission. The validation process was carried out in two stages; the first stage included a review by expert judges who evaluated the clarity, sufficiency, and relevance of each item in relation to the variable and its dimension; in the second stage we carried out a confirmatory factor analysis and estimated internal consistency with the Cronbach’s Alpha (α) and McDonald’s omega (ω) indexes.

Results.

The designed instrument had adequate psychometric properties to evaluate the risk perception of contracting COVID-19 (α=0.924), with four dimensions: cognitive vulnerability (α=0.873), emotional vulnerability (α=0.882), severity (α=0.893) and risk-protective behaviors (α=0.941).

Conclusions.

These findings show that the instrument to evaluate the risk perception of contracting COVID-19 (PCR-CV19) is a valid and reliable tool to assess contagion risk perception and can be adapted to different population groups and contexts.

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