TY - JOUR
T1 - A test of the measurement invariance of a brief version of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire between American and Spanish older adults
AU - Nuevo, Roberto
AU - Mackintosh, Margaret-Anne
AU - Gatz, Margaret
AU - Montorio, Ignacio
AU - Wetherell, Julie Loebach
PY - 2007/2
Y1 - 2007/2
N2 - Background: Both anxiety disorders and subclinical anxiety symptoms are related to poorer health and functioning in later life. Because worry is an important component of anxiety, the accurate measurement of worry is crucial to studying the etiology, prevention and treatment of anxiety disorders. Assessment of the trait worry has emerged as the most widely used strategy to establish the presence and extent of pathological worry. However, the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ), the most widely used measure of the trait worry, has not been validated cross-culturally in groups outside of the U.S.A.Methods: We tested the psychometric properties and measurement invariance of an 8 item abbreviated version of the PSWQ (PSWQ-A) in American (N = 206) and Spanish (N = 137) older adult samples. Results: Internal consistency was high and analyses supported a unidimensional solution in both samples. Measurement invariance was tested using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and Rasch modelsResults of the CFA suggest that measurement invariance between the samples can be assumed for women but not for men. Rasch modeling results by gender suggested that three items have different endorsability levels in the two samples, suggesting that certain items may more closely represent the construct of the trait worry in American and Spanish older adults.Conclusions: Overall, the PSWQ-A appears appropriate for cross-cultural use, although deletion of one item (item 6) may improve the psychometric properties of the scale across different populations.
AB - Background: Both anxiety disorders and subclinical anxiety symptoms are related to poorer health and functioning in later life. Because worry is an important component of anxiety, the accurate measurement of worry is crucial to studying the etiology, prevention and treatment of anxiety disorders. Assessment of the trait worry has emerged as the most widely used strategy to establish the presence and extent of pathological worry. However, the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ), the most widely used measure of the trait worry, has not been validated cross-culturally in groups outside of the U.S.A.Methods: We tested the psychometric properties and measurement invariance of an 8 item abbreviated version of the PSWQ (PSWQ-A) in American (N = 206) and Spanish (N = 137) older adult samples. Results: Internal consistency was high and analyses supported a unidimensional solution in both samples. Measurement invariance was tested using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and Rasch modelsResults of the CFA suggest that measurement invariance between the samples can be assumed for women but not for men. Rasch modeling results by gender suggested that three items have different endorsability levels in the two samples, suggesting that certain items may more closely represent the construct of the trait worry in American and Spanish older adults.Conclusions: Overall, the PSWQ-A appears appropriate for cross-cultural use, although deletion of one item (item 6) may improve the psychometric properties of the scale across different populations.
KW - aged
KW - anxiety
KW - worry
KW - questionnaires
KW - factor analysis
KW - psychometrics
KW - foreign language translation
KW - CONFIRMATORY FACTOR-ANALYSIS
KW - ANXIETY
KW - LIFE
U2 - 10.1017/S1041610206003450
DO - 10.1017/S1041610206003450
M3 - Article (Academic Journal)
SN - 1041-6102
VL - 19
SP - 89
EP - 101
JO - International Psychogeriatrics
JF - International Psychogeriatrics
IS - 1
ER -