Abstract

Background: Children and adolescents are often exposed to traumatic events, which may lead to the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It is therefore important for clinicians to screen for potential symptoms that can be signs of PTSD onset. PTSD in youth is a worldwide problem, thus congruent screening tools in various languages are needed.

Objective: The aim of this study was to test the general psychometric properties of the Traumatic Stress Disorder Reaction Index for children and adolescents (UCLA PTSD) Reaction Index for DSM-5 (PTSD-RI-5) in adolescents, a self-report instrument intended to screen for trauma exposure and assess PTSD symptoms.

Method: Data was collected from 4201 adolescents in communities within eleven countries worldwide (i.e. Brazil, Bulgaria, Croatia, Indonesia, Montenegro, Nigeria, Palestine-Gaza, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, and Serbia). Internal consistency, discriminant validity, and a confirmatory factor analysis of a four-factor model representing the main DSM-5 symptoms of the PTSD-RI-5 were evaluated.

Results: The PTSD-RI-5 total score for the entire sample shows very good reliability (α = .92) as well as across all countries included (α ranged from .90 to .94). The correlations between anxiety/depressive symptoms and the PTSD-RI-5 scores were below .70 indicating on good discriminant validity. The four-factor structure of the scale was confirmed for the total sample and data from six countries. The standardized regression weights for all items varied markedly across the countries. The lack of a common acceptable model across all countries prevented us from direct testing of cross-cultural measurement invariance.

Conclusions: The four-factor structure of the PTSD-RI-5 likely represents the core PTSD symptoms as proposed by the DSM-5 criteria, but there could be items interpreted in a conceptually different manner by adolescents from different cultural/regional backgrounds and future cross-cultural evaluations need to consider this finding.

Details

Title
UCLA PTSD reaction index for DSM-5 (PTSD-RI-5): a psychometric study of adolescents sampled from communities in eleven countries
Author
Doric, Ana 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Stevanovic, Dejan 2   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Stupar, Dusko 2 ; Vostanis, Panos 3 ; Atilola, Olayinka 4   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Moreira, Paulo 5   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Dodig-Curkovic, Katarina 6 ; Franic, Tomislav 7   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Davidovic, Vrljicak 8   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Avicenna, Mohamad 9 ; Multazam Noor 10   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Nussbaum, Laura 11   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Thabet, Abdelaziz 12   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Ubalde, Dino 13 ; Petrov, Petar 14 ; Deljkovic, Azra 15 ; Monteiro, Luis Antonio 16 ; Ribas, Adriana 17 ; Oliveira, Joana 18   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Knez, Rajna 19   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

1  Department of Psychology (Center for Applied Psychology), Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia 
2  Child Psychiatry, Clinic for Neurology and Psychiatry for Children and Youth, Belgrade, Serbia 
3  School of Psychology, Leicester University, Leicester, UK 
4  Department of Behavioural Medicine, Lagos State University College of Medicine Ikeja, Lagos, Nigeria 
5  CIPD, Porto Lusíada University, Porto, Portugal 
6  Medical Faculty Osijek, Faculty for Dental Medicine and Health, University Health Center Osijek, Osijek, Croatia 
7  Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, School of Medicine, University of Split, Split, Croatia 
8  Department of Psychiatry, Clinical Hospital Centre Split, Split, Croatia 
9  Faculty of Psychology, State Islamic University Syarif Hidayatullah, Jakarta, Indonesia 
10  Psychiatry department, Dr Soeharto Heerdjan Mental Hospital Jakarta, Jakarta, Indonesia 
11  Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Medicine and Pharmacy “Victor Babes”, Timisoara, Romania 
12  School of Public Health, Al Quds University, Gaza Branch, Palestine 
13  Department of Psychology, St. Dominic College of Asia, City of Bacoor, Philippines 
14  Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University Hospital St. Marina, Varna, Bulgaria 
15  Mental Health Center, Pljevlja, Montenegro 
16  Universidade Estacio de Sá in Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 
17  Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 
18  CIPD, Lusíada University, Porto, Portugal 
19  Department of Women´s and Children´s health, Skaraborgs Hospital, Skövde, Sweden; Department of Psychiatry and Psychological Medicine, Medical School, University of Rijeka, Rijeka, Croatia; University of Gothenburg, Sahlgrenska Academy, Institute of Neuroscience and Physiology, Göteborg, Sweden 
Publication year
2019
Publication date
2019
Publisher
Taylor & Francis Ltd.
e-ISSN
20008066
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/20008198.2019.1605282
ProQuest document ID
2351040221
Copyright
© 2019 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons  Attribution – Non-Commercial License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.