The Mexican version of Beck Anxiety Inventory: Psychometric properties

The Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) is one of the most widely used instruments to assess severity of anxiety symptoms. The purpose of the present study w as to translate, adapt and establish the psychometric properties of the BAI with a Mexican population. Four successive studies led to such endeavor. I n the first, the BAI was translated and pilot-tested with a sample of 350 u niversity students. The second replicated the initial internal consistency and factor validity findings using a general population sample of one thous and participants. The third study determined the BAI's test-retest reliabil ity and convergent validity using the Mexican standardized State-Trait Anxi ety Inventory. Finally, a comparison differentiated mean BAI scores of pati ents formally diagnosed with anxiety disorders with those of comparable nor mal volunteers. The Mexican BAI attained high internal consistency with Alp ha coefficients of .83 and .84 for students and adults respectively, as wel l as high test-retest reliability (r = .75). It also showed acceptable conv ergent validity reflected by positive and moderate (p < 0.05) correlations between the BAI and the STAI, and a factorial structure of four main factor s consistent with that reported by other authors in terms of the original E nglish version. These findings, in addition to notable differences between the BAI scores of healthy versus diagnosed patients (t=-19.11, p < 0.05) de picts the Mexican BAI as a highly useful measure of anxiety symptomatology for Mexican populations.