The Argumentativeness (ARG) and Verbal Aggressiveness (VA) scales have been used in hundreds of studies since their development. Numerous researchers have employed these scales in studies designed to explore differences in aggressive communication within and across cultures. Both scales have been translated into several languages, including Chinese, Korean, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Romanian, and Slovakian, among others and have been found to be reliable and valid. However, neither scale had yet been translated or tested in the Spanish-language. In a globalized world community in which technological advances have made it possible to communicate instantly, it seems both logical and necessary to translate the two scales into a language that arguably has the second largest number of speakers in the world (329 million), is spoken in more than 44 countries, and has an overwhelmingly increasing population in the United States.
The purpose of this study was to develop Spanish-language versions of the VA and ARG scales, and to test their validity and reliability in a Spanish-speaking country with native Spanish-language speakers. A total of 744 participants from three different universities in a northern state of Mexico took part in the study. The data analyses yielded a both valid and reliable Spanish-language VA and ARG scales. The universal characteristics of trait verbal aggressiveness and trait argumentativeness were supported.