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of the underlying seven-scale factor structure was tested and measurement invariance was examined. Results For every country, omega values of all scales appeared to be good to high and the proposed latent structure was verified. An in-depth investigation of several aspects of measurement invariance showed equivalence of five of the seven scales across countries. The scales separation anxiety disorder and generalized anxiety disorder were not invariant, pointing out differences in means of these mental health problems between countries. Conclusions This study provided convincing evidence that the Dominic Interactive can be reliably and validly used for cross-country screening purposes, although cautiousness is warranted when comparing two of the anxiety scales.
Cross-country construct validity of the ‘Dominic Interactive’ Rowella Kuipers RCWM Kuijpers1, R Otten1, AA Vermulst1, O Pez2, A Bitfoi3, M Carta4, D Goelitz5, K Keyes6, C Koc¸7, S Lesinskiene8, Z Mihova9, RCM E Engels1,10, V Kovess2 1 Behavioural Science Institute, Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands 2´ Ecole des Hautes E´tudes en Sante´ Publique, Paris Descartes University, Paris, France 3 The Romanian League for Mental Health, Bucharest, Romania 4 Psychiatric Unit, Department of Public Health, University of Cagliari, Cagliari, Italy 5 Center for Applied Sciences of Health, Leuphana University of Lueneburg, Lueneburg, Germany 6 Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University, New York, USA 7 Yeniden Health and Education Society, Istanbul, Turkey 8 Clinic of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of Vilnius, Vilnius, Lithuania 9 New Bulgarian University, Sofia, Bulgaria 10 Trimbos Institute (Netherlands Institute of Mental Health and Addiction), Utrecht, The Netherlands Contact:
[email protected]
Background and aims The international monitoring, evaluation and improvement of children’s mental health has become increasingly important. Large-scale research studies are conducted to establish this, but few of them use child self-report as an additional instrument to parent and teacher report or to other available statistics. The Dominic Interactive is a computerized, DSM-IV-based questionnaire that because of its unique characteristics enables primary school children to report on their own mental health. However, to ensure adequate comparability across countries, it is essential to confirm the factor structure and determine measurement invariance. Methods In a sample of 8,135 children, aged 6 to 11 years old, across seven European countries the reliability (Omega) of the Dominic Interactive was determined, the construct validity
