EFFECTS OF REPEATED ADMINISTRATION OF THE BECK DEPRESSION INVENTORY AND OTHER MEASURES OF NEGATIVE MOOD STATES

A methodological problem that has not been given serious attention by researchers using repeated administrations of mood or ''state'' measur es is the potential for testing effects. The occurrence of testing eff ects in these cases makes interpretation of results difficult. The dan ger of not being aware of these effects is that a researcher may mista kenly identify a testing effect as an effect of treatment or as eviden ce of change. Such an effect has been observed in past research with t he Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) and other measures of negative mood s. The present study addressed this issue by examining the effects of repeated administration of the BDI and other popular state measures. R esults indicated that testing effects occurred for several of the meas ures. These findings have implications for treatment effectiveness res earch and research design considerations. Hypotheses concerning the na ture of the testing effect are offered, including socially desirable r esponding, mood-congruent associative processing and self-monitoring. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.