The personal disturbance scale (DSSI/sAD): structural cross-validation andproposed short forms

The Personal Disturbance Scale (DSSI/sAD) is administered to 132 consecutiv e first attenders at a psychiatric outpatient clinic in a District General Hospital. The principal components and axis analyses of their item scores a re compared with those of Bedford & Deary (1997) [Bedford, A.: & Deary, I. J. (1997). The personal Disturbance Scale (DSSI/sAD): development, use and structure. Personality and Individual Differences, 22, 493-510.]. From the congruent results of both data bases a subset of items is presented to give brief, factorially-purer independent measures of the clinical states of an xiety and depression as opposed to one general psychological distress score . Contrariwise, indication is given as to which items' scores should be sum mated if concern is for a global personal disturbance scale dependent on th e type of client group. The Shevlin, Brunsden and Miles (1998) [Shevlin, M. , Brunsden, V., & Miles, J. N. V. (1998). Alternative factor models of the Personal Disturbance Scale (DSSI/sAD). Personality: and Individual Differen ces, 25, 569-574.] alternative structural equation model of a single factor solution (general psychological distress) is tested and found to be inadeq uate when applied to these data. However, the Bedford and Deary (1997) nest ed, three factor model does provide a close and acceptable fit both to this and our previous data set. The question of the balance between psychometri c and clinical considerations in determining the length of scales is raised . (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.