Members of the ARCH Lab recently collaborated with colleagues from the COMPASS study on a paper titled “Measurement Invariance of the GAD-7 and CESD-R-10 Among Adolescents in Canada” that was published in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology.

The primary objective of the study was to assess measurement invariance (by grade and sex) of the 7-item Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) and 10-item Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Revised (CESD-R-10) scales in a sample of adolescents in Canada. Results showed both the GAD-7 and CESD-R-10 demonstrated strict measurement invariance by sex and grade in the robust sample of 59,052 adolescents. Mean scale scores were higher among adolescents in grade 12 compared to grade 9 and among female adolescents compared to males.

Findings support the validity of the GAD-7 and CESD-R-10 for screening risk of generalized anxiety and depression among Canadian adolescents, and further indicate that differences observed in scale scores across subgroups reflect actual differences in risk for generalized anxiety and major depression, respectively.