Psychometric comparison of two short versions of the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-4) in a representative sample of the German population.

ABSTRACT: Perceived stress is a construct of crucial importance to health and well-being, necessitating the provision of economic, psychometrically sound instruments to assess it in routine clinical practice and large-scale survey studies. Two competing short versions of the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), each consisting of four items, have been proposed. In the present study, we compare the two in a sample representative of the German general population (n = 2,527). Our analyses show that both versions are sufficiently reliable and valid, given the right measurement model. Specifically, the original PSS-4 by Cohen et al. suffers from response style effects, which we remedied using random intercept factor analysis. With the addition of the method factor, it is a highly reliable and valid scale

SUBMITTER: Schmalbach B 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC11742941 | biostudies-literature | 2024

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature