I have 14 questions all touching on the concept of "social consequences".

Cronbach's alpha for all 14 was low, .41.Rotated factor analysis showed 5 factors,these are listed below with the number of variables that composed each. Factor loadings for all variables on their respective component were high, all above .70. friends 4 family 3 belief 3 disorder 2 comm 2

I want to make these into 5 scales/indices. I would like to analyze them as DVs seperately and also combined. I have been taking the standardized z-scores for all the values for each variable and averaging them for each factor, for example:

zfriends = (z1 + z2 + z3 + z4)/4 and so on...

QUESTION:

If I wanted to use all 5 scales back under the heading of "social control," I can just add the average standardized scores (zfriends + zfamily . . .)? there will be no trouble because of the different numbers of variables in each factor?

I am sure that the SAGE book on scale development would have a section on this, but all three copies are checked out!

thanks Matt