ORIGINAL ARTICLE Translation and Validation of Shame and Stigma Scale for Head and Neck Cancer into the Hindi Language Atul Kumar Goyal 1 · Jaimanti Bakshi 1 · Naresh K. Panda 1 · Rakesh Kapoor 2 · Dharam Vir 1 · Krishan Kumar 3 · Pankaj Aneja 4 · Balwinder Singh 5 · Meenu Gupta 6 · Sumittar Singh Walia 7 Received: 18 February 2021 / Accepted: 1 May 2021 © The Association of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeons of India 2021 Abstract Background At advanced stages, treatment procedure of head and neck cancer often leads to mutilation and evokes shame and stigma in patients. In the present work, we translated and validated the shame and stigma scale into the Hindi language and tested the translated scale in patients of head and neck cancer. Subject and Methods The English version of the scale was translated into the Hindi language. A validity and relia- bility study of the translated scale was carried out by taking 200 patients of head and neck cancer. Results For the translated Hindi version of the shame and stigma scale, the content validity score came to be 0.94. Four items of shame and stigma scale were found to have strong criterion validity. In construct validity testing, for- warded scored items in the shame and stigma scale were found to have strong convergent construct validity, and reversed scored items of the scale were found to exhibit strong divergent construct validity. For internal consistent reliability testing, the value of Cronbach’s alpha was found to be 0.85. For test–retest reliability, the value of Pearson’s correlation coefficient was found to be 0.88. The value of the inter-rater agreement was found to be 0.8. Conclusions The translated Hindi version of the shame and stigma scale was found to exhibit strong reliability and validity. The translated scale can be used by the clinician to assess the shame and stigma in Indian patients of head and neck cancer. Keywords Shame · Stigma · Psychology · Cancer · Validity & Atul Kumar Goyal atlgyl@gmail.com Jaimanti Bakshi drjayabakshi@ymail.com Naresh K. Panda npanda59@yahoo.co.in Rakesh Kapoor drkapoor.r@gmail.com Dharam Vir vir486@gmail.com Krishan Kumar keshusony@rediffmail.com Pankaj Aneja drpankajaneja@rediffmail.com Balwinder Singh drbalvendrasingh@gmail.com Meenu Gupta mun110275@gmail.com Sumittar Singh Walia shsumittarsinghwalia@gmail.com 1 Department of Otolaryngology and Head and Neck Surgery, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India 2 Homi Bhabha Cancer Hospital & Research Center, Punjab, India 3 Department of Psychiatry, Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India 4 Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research, Chandigarh, India 5 Department of Hindi, DAV College, Jalandhar, India 6 Department of English and Cultural Studies, Panjab University, Chandigarh, India 7 Department of English, DAV College, Chandigarh, India 123 J. Maxillofac. Oral Surg. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12663-021-01588-z