Psychological Measures

Psychological Measures

Heidi Gearhart, Beverly Valentine, Heather Staab, Meghan Green, and Shiffon Hooper

PSY 475

January 24, 2011

Steven Brown

Psychological Measures

The Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II), is a domain test originally developed to assess depressive symptoms corresponding to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision’s (DSM-IV-TR) criteria for major depressive disorder (Hogan, 2007). The test is generally used to assess adults and adolescents. However, articles used for this analysis were only concerned with populations already diagnosed with major depressive disorder, and low-income, African Americans. The following analysis will summarize the articles, describe the uses of the measure, qualifications of administration and interpretation, and differentiate between the populations for which the measure is valid and invalid.

Article One: The Latent Symptom Structure of the Beck Depression Inventory–II in Outpatients with Major Depression

The BDI-II is a self-report instrument frequently used in clinical and research settings to assess depression severity. Although investigators have examined the factor structure of the BDI-II, an agreement on the best fitting model has not emerged, resulting in different recommendations regarding how to best score and interpret the results (Quilty, Zhang & Bagby, 2010). The study used a positive factor analysis to evaluate previously identified models of the dormant symptom structure of depression as assessed by the BDI-II. In contrast to previous investigations, only patients with diagnosed major depressive disorder were used. Characteristic validity was demonstrated through acceptance of the formal model composed of two first-factors, cognitive and somatic, which reflect the second factor, depression. The results also supported the use of the BDI-II total scale score (Quilty, Zhang & Bagby, 2010).

Article Two: Validation of the...