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Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis

Background: Self-reported depressive complaints among college students might indicate different degrees of severity of depressive states. Through the framework of item response theory, we aim to describe the pattern of responses to items of the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II), in terms of endo...

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Autores principales: de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis, Liebel, Graziela, de Andrade, Arthur Guerra, Andrade, Laura Helena, Gorenstein, Clarice, Wang, Yuan-Pang
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2019
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6379252/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30809161
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00050
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author de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis
Liebel, Graziela
de Andrade, Arthur Guerra
Andrade, Laura Helena
Gorenstein, Clarice
Wang, Yuan-Pang
author_facet de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis
Liebel, Graziela
de Andrade, Arthur Guerra
Andrade, Laura Helena
Gorenstein, Clarice
Wang, Yuan-Pang
author_sort de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis
collection PubMed
description Background: Self-reported depressive complaints among college students might indicate different degrees of severity of depressive states. Through the framework of item response theory, we aim to describe the pattern of responses to items of the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II), in terms of endorsement probability and discrimination along the continuum of depression. Potential differential item functioning of the scale items of the BDI-II is investigated, by gender and age, to compare across sub-groups of students. Methods: The 21-item BDI-II was cross-sectionally administered to a representative sample of 12,677 Brazilian college students. Reliability was evaluated based on Cronbach's alpha coefficient. Severity (b(i)) and discrimination (a) parameters of each BDI-II items were calculated through the graded response model. The influence of gender and age were tested for differential item functioning (DIF) within the item response theory-based approach. Results: The BDI-II presented good reliability (α = 0.91). Women and younger students significantly presented a higher likelihood of depression (cut-off > 13) than men and older counterparts. In general, participants endorsed more easily cognitive-somatic items than affective items of the scale. “Guilty feelings,” “suicidal thoughts,” and “loss of interest in sex” were the items that most likely indicated depression severity (b ≥ 3.60). However, all BDI-II items showed moderate-to-high discrimination (a ≥ 1.32) for depressive state. While two items were flagged for DIF, “crying” and “loss of interest in sex,” respectively for gender and age, the global weight of these items on the total score was negligible. Conclusions: Although respondents' gender and age might present influence on response pattern of depressive symptoms, the measures of self-reported symptoms have not inflated severity scores. These findings provide further support to the validity of using BDI-II for assessing depression in academic contexts and highlight the value of considering gender- and age-related common symptoms of depression.
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spelling pubmed-63792522019-02-26 Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis Liebel, Graziela de Andrade, Arthur Guerra Andrade, Laura Helena Gorenstein, Clarice Wang, Yuan-Pang Front Psychiatry Psychiatry Background: Self-reported depressive complaints among college students might indicate different degrees of severity of depressive states. Through the framework of item response theory, we aim to describe the pattern of responses to items of the Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II), in terms of endorsement probability and discrimination along the continuum of depression. Potential differential item functioning of the scale items of the BDI-II is investigated, by gender and age, to compare across sub-groups of students. Methods: The 21-item BDI-II was cross-sectionally administered to a representative sample of 12,677 Brazilian college students. Reliability was evaluated based on Cronbach's alpha coefficient. Severity (b(i)) and discrimination (a) parameters of each BDI-II items were calculated through the graded response model. The influence of gender and age were tested for differential item functioning (DIF) within the item response theory-based approach. Results: The BDI-II presented good reliability (α = 0.91). Women and younger students significantly presented a higher likelihood of depression (cut-off > 13) than men and older counterparts. In general, participants endorsed more easily cognitive-somatic items than affective items of the scale. “Guilty feelings,” “suicidal thoughts,” and “loss of interest in sex” were the items that most likely indicated depression severity (b ≥ 3.60). However, all BDI-II items showed moderate-to-high discrimination (a ≥ 1.32) for depressive state. While two items were flagged for DIF, “crying” and “loss of interest in sex,” respectively for gender and age, the global weight of these items on the total score was negligible. Conclusions: Although respondents' gender and age might present influence on response pattern of depressive symptoms, the measures of self-reported symptoms have not inflated severity scores. These findings provide further support to the validity of using BDI-II for assessing depression in academic contexts and highlight the value of considering gender- and age-related common symptoms of depression. Frontiers Media S.A. 2019-02-12 /pmc/articles/PMC6379252/ /pubmed/30809161 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00050 Text en Copyright © 2019 de Sá Junior, Liebel, Andrade, Andrade, Gorenstein and Wang. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychiatry
de Sá Junior, Antonio Reis
Liebel, Graziela
de Andrade, Arthur Guerra
Andrade, Laura Helena
Gorenstein, Clarice
Wang, Yuan-Pang
Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title_full Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title_fullStr Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title_full_unstemmed Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title_short Can Gender and Age Impact on Response Pattern of Depressive Symptoms Among College Students? A Differential Item Functioning Analysis
title_sort can gender and age impact on response pattern of depressive symptoms among college students? a differential item functioning analysis
topic Psychiatry
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6379252/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/30809161
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00050
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