The creation and adaptation of scales or inventories assessing specific circadian typologies has been a predominant focus within the field of chronopsychology. The present study addressed the psychometric properties of two scales of morningness-eveningness: the Morningness Composite Scale (CS; Smith, Reilly, & Midkiff, 1989) and the Early/Late Preferences Scale (PS; Smith, Folkard, Schmieder, Parra, Spelten, & Almirall, 1993). Internal consistency and factor invariance of the CS and PS were analyzed in two samples: a group of 203 university students (age range = 19-30) and a group of 125 working adults (age range = 31-65). Results indicated satisfactory internal consistency for both full scales with each age group and confirmed the factor invariance across age for the two CS factors and one of the PS factors. A higher tendency in morningness on both scales was noted in the adult sample.

For a sample of 305 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students, of whom 95% was from economically disadvantaged Hispanic families and for whom English was their second language, evidence was sought regarding the reliability and construct validity of scores on a Spanish version of an academic self-concept measure entitled Dimensions of Self-Concept (DOSC), comprising five subscales bearing the same names as those of the five hypothesized constructs that they were intended to operationalize: Level of Aspiration, Anxiety, Academic Interest and Satisfaction, Leadership and Initiative, and Identification versus Alienation. Reliability estimates varying between .72 and .80 were judged to be reasonably satisfactory. Results from oblique factor analysis lent empirical support for the hypothesized constructs of Anxiety, Leadership and Initiative, and Identification versus Alienation. Scores associated with the subscales of Level of Aspiration and Academic Interest and Satisfaction generated a factor interpreted as a fusion of the two constructs of Level of Aspiration and Academic Interest and Satisfaction.

This paper introduces the validation of the Spanish adaptation of the White Bear Suppression Inventory (WBSI) by Wegner and Zanakos (1994). A sample of 833 people from the general population completed the WBSI along with other questionnaires. The exploratory factor analysis and the confirmatory factor analysis supported a two-factor solution accounting for 51.8% of the cumulative variance. This structure is comprised of the two following factors: unwanted intrusive thoughts (α = .87, r = .70) and actions of distraction and suppression of thoughts (α = .80, r = .60). Both internal consistency reliability (α = .89) and test-retest reliability (r = .71) showed adequate homogeneity, sound consistency, and stability over time. The results are discussed bearing in mind both isolated factors and the possible relationships of the suppression factor with automatic negative thoughts and insomnia.

This paper presents the Nursing Motives for Helping Scale (N-MHS), an instrument designed for the evaluation of three of the four motives for helping derived from Batson's helping pathway theory. Dimensionality was analyzed by means of principal component analysis (n = 113), followed by confirmatory factor analysis. A 3-factor structure (corresponding to Batson's differentiation among altruistic motivation, reward-seeking motivation, and punishment-avoidance motivation, respectively), with 9 items distributed in three latent variables, revealed an acceptable fit to the data. Alpha values (.60 - .74) showed that internal consistency was acceptable for a newly developed subscale with a small number of items. Convergence validity was evaluated with correlations between N-MHS subscales scores and scores on the Professional Expectations Scale (Garrosa, Moreno-Jiménez, Rodríguez-Carvajal, & Morante, 2005). The three resulting subscales are a promising instrument for the evaluation of three nursing motives for helping that can contribute to reduce the potential risks and to improve the potential benefits both for the nurse and the patient.

The aim of the present study was to examine the internal reliability, content validity, construct validity, and concurrent validity of the Persian translation/Farsi version of the Oxford Happiness Inventory. The Oxford Happiness Inventory and Fordyce Happiness Inventory were completed by a sample of 727 Iranian university students. Findings confirmed the internal reliability, construct, and concurrent validity of the Oxford Happiness Inventory. Thus, it can be recommended for use as a trait-measure of happiness among Iranian samples.

This is the first study that provides normative, reliability, factor validity and discriminant validity data of the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI; Beck, Epstein, Brown, & Steer, 1988) in the Spanish general population. Sanz and Navarro's (2003) Spanish version of the BAI was administered to 249 adults. Factor analyses suggested that the BAI taps a general anxiety dimension comprising two related factors (somatic and affective-cognitive symptoms), but these factors hardly explained any additional variance and, therefore, little information is lost in considering only full-scale scores. Internal consistency estimate for the BAI was high (α = .93). The BAI was correlated .63 with the BDI-II and .32 with the Trait-Anger scale of the STAXI 2, but a factor analysis of their items revealed three factors, suggesting that the correlations between the instruments may be better accounted for by relationships between anxiety, depression, and anger, than by problems of discriminant validity. The mean BAI total score and the distribution of BAI scores were similar to those found in other countries. BAI norm scores for the community sample were provided from the total sample and from the male and female subsamples, as females scored higher than males. The utility of these scores for assessing clinical significance of treatment outcomes for anxiety is discussed.

Anhedonia, a central dimension within the schizotypy construct, has been considered to be a promising vulnerability marker for schizophrenia-spectrum disorders. The Revised Physical Anhedonia Scale (RPhA) and Revised Social Anhedonia Scale (RSAS) are two self-reports widely used in the assessment of anhedonia; however, they psychometric characteristics have been scarcely investigated in Spanish population. The objective of the current work was to study the psychometric properties of the Revised Physical and Social Anhedonia Scales in non-clinical young adults. The sample was composed of 728 college students with a mean age of 20.1 years (SD=2.5. The data indicated that the scales showed adequate psychometric characteristics. The Cronbach alpha was 0.95 (RSAS) and 0.92 (RPhA) respectively. The confirmatory factor analysis carried out on the matrix of tetrachoric correlations showed that both scales presented an essentially unidimensional solution. The Revised Physical and Social Anhedonia Scales seem to be adequate for psychosis-risk assessment in non-clinical populations. Future research should further investigate the construct validity in other populations and cultures as well as study its relation to emotional aspects and cognitive endophenotypes.

The aim of this work was to update the validation of the Social Anxiety Screening Scale (SASS/EDAS) in a sample of Spanish adolescents. To achieve this, one study with a sample of 1489 students in secondary education, of ages 14 to 17 years, were carried out. The psychometric properties of EDAS were examined through confirmatory factor analysis, reliability (Cronbach's alpha), temporal stability (test-retest), and concurrent criterion validity. The results supported the three-independent-factor structure (avoidance, distress and interference), that showed best fit indices compared to alternative models. They also showed that the scores of participants on EDAS scales were reliable in terms of internal consistency (α > .80) and moderately reliable concerning temporal stability (r = .48-.60) over a five-week period. The correlations between the EDAS factors and other social anxiety measures were positive and significant. Data provide empirical evidence of the estimation of reliability and validity of this scale. Future work should extend the validation of the EDAS in clinical samples.

This paper focuses on the validation of the Spanish form of the Eating Attitudes Test (EAT-26; Garner, Olmsted, Bohr & Garfinkel, 1982) across two studies. Participants in Study 1 were 778 females recruited from community settings (aged 12-21). Study 2 included 86 females recruited from clinical and 86 females from community settings (aged 12-35). Results from Principal and Simultaneous Component Analyses showed a unidimensional structure of the EAT-26 item scores. Reliability analyses supported the internal consistency of the scale. Study 1 also explores the ability of the EAT-26 to discriminate between subjects with Eating Disorder (ED), Symptomatic or Asymptomatic by means of ROC analyses and using results from the Questionnaire for Eating Disorder Diagnoses (Q-EDD; Mintz, O'Halloran, Mulholland, & Schneider, 1997) as criterion. The EAT-26 demonstrated good specificity but insufficient sensitivity to detect a full or partial ED. Study 2 explores the ability of the questionnaire to discriminate between subjects with and without ED. The EAT-26 demonstrated good specificity and moderate sensitivity to detect ED. Clinical and theoretical implications of these results are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to analyze the psychometric properties of the Spanish version of the Parenting Stress Index-Short Form in a sample of 115 fathers of infants aged between ten and thirty-nine months old. The exploratory factor analysis revealed three reasonably distinct factors, as in the original version of the instrument. The three extracted factors: Parental Distress, Parent-Child Dysfunctional Interaction and Difficult Child accounted for 47.48 % of the variance. The internal consistency coefficients were high in each factor or subscale. These results provided empirical evidence in favour of the reliability and validity of the Parenting Stress Index-Short Form in Spanish fathers, and can be useful to elucidate the mechanisms through which stress impacts parenting and permitting to develop more targeted interventions for infants and their families.

The following study will present findings on the validity of the adaptation of the Burger and Cooper's Desirability of Control Scale into Spanish. Two samples are present: the first involving 1,999 people to study their psychometric properties. In the second sample, 111 people were included to estimate test/ retest reliability. Cultural adaptation was performed using the translation & back-translation method. Item analysis, internal consistency and test/re-test reliability were assessed, then evidence of the validity of the internal structure was determined by using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. Subject recruitment was performed to gather the 1,999 subjects stratified by age, gender quotas as designed in the sampling plan. Of the subjects, 51% were female, average age of 45 years old (SD = 17.5). All items from the original scale were understood correctly, while five items presented ceiling effect. Cronbach's alpha = .736 and a test-retest correlation r = .713 were obtained. The factor structure indicated the presence of four dimensions: forecast, autonomy, power and influence and reactance which were reassured in the confirmatory analysis (x2/df = 4.805, CFI =.932, TLI =.954, RMSEA = .062). The basic dimensions of the scale have shown to be stable and well-defined, though not perfect. The scope, possible applications of the scale and further research are later proposed and discussed.

Este artículo describe el desarrollo y la validación de un cuestionario que evalúa las opiniones de los familiares de los pacientes con esquizofrenia sobre las causas y las consecuencias sociales del trastorno. La versión final del cuestionario incluye 28 elementos, agrupados en cuatro subescalas (restricciones sociales, distancia social, utilidad de los tratamientos, causas biopsicosociales de la esquizofrenia), cuya fiabilidad intra-evaluador va de 0,36 a 0,84. El coeficiente alfa de Cronbach, que examina la validez de contenido de las subescalas, va de 0,56 a 0,66. El análisis factorial identifica dos factores (las opiniones sobre las consecuencias sociales y la utilidad de los tratamientos y las creencias sobre las causas de la esquizofrenia), que explican el 73% de la varianza total. Este cuestionario puede ser particularmente útil para evaluar las creencias de los familiares sobre la esquizofrenia y para llevar a cabo intervenciones psicosociales en las familias de los pacientes con esquizofrenia.

Se presenta la validación de la versión francesa de la Escala de Depresión Postnatal de Edimburgo (EPDS), realizada sobre una muestra de 87 mujeres en los 4 primeros meses de post- parto. El estudio de la sensibilidad, la especificidad y los valores predictivos frente a los Criterios para el estudio diagnóstico (RDC) proporcionan la puntuación de corte de 10,5 como la mejor (sensibilidad: 0,80; especificidad: 0,92). La EPDS tuvo también una buena validez de criterio como índice de la gravedad de la depresión postnatal, en comparación con la evaluación del psiquiatra. El análisis factorial muestra que la estructura interna de la EPDS se compone de dos subescalas que subrayan una descripción más precisa de la depresión postnatal. El estudio de la fiabilidad confirma la buena consistencia interna de la escala global (alfa de Cronbach: 0,76) y su buena fiabilidad test-retest a corto plazo (0,98).

Para evaluar la precisión de los diagnósticos de esquizofrenia para los estudios genéticos, identificamos a todos los pacientes de esquizofrenia (n = 492) en una comunidad aislada con un diagnóstico de esquizofrenia en el Registro de Altas de los Hospitales Finlandeses (HDR) entre 1969-1991. Para el estudio de precisión, identificamos a partir de los registros una muestra de 73 pacientes con diagnósticos del Manual Diagnóstico y Estadístico DSM-III-R para esquizofrenia (códigos 295.10. 295.30, 295.60, 295.90) (n = 62) o “espectro de la esquizofrenia” (295.40, 295.70, 297.10, 301.20, 301.22) (n = 11). Cuando dos investigadores experimentados aplicaron los criterios operacionales DSM III-R utilizando información procedente de los historiales originales de los hospitales mentales, 93% (68/73) de los casos cumplieron los criterios para esquizofrenia o espectro de la esquizofrenia. Los resultados demuestran que los diagnósticos de esquizofrenia de los registros son precisos cuando se aplica un concepto amplio de esquizofrenia. Al utilizar los criterios operacionales de esquizofrenia del DSM III-R, se encontraron ocho casos falsos positivos entre los 62 diagnósticos de esquizofrenia realizados en hospitales mentales. Por consiguiente, puede que sea necesario reevaluar los diagnósticos de esquizofrenia según el propósito del estudio. También encontramos un buen acuerdo entre el DSM III-R (kappa 0,93) y los diagnósticos del sistema diagnóstico de criterios operacionales (OPCRIT) (kappa 0,89), hechos por un investigador, en comparación con los diagnósticos operacionales. Esto indica la posibilidad de utilizar fiablemente uno de estos métodos sólo para la reevaluación diagnóstica. La información en el HDR sobre los diagnósticos primarios y sobre las fechas de admisión y alta se transfirió con precisión de los historiales hospitalarios.