Measuring Adolescent Depression: Factorial Validity and Invariance of the Beck Depression Inventory Across Gender

Abstract
Extending the earlier work of Byrne and Baron (in press), the factorial invariance of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) was tested across nonclinical adolescent males (n = 351) and females (n = 334) using confirmatory factor-analytic procedures. Despite the differential loading pattern of Item 20 for females, a three-factor structure that comprised one second-order general factor of depression and three first-order factors representing negative attitude, performance difficulty, and somatic elements was found to be invariant across gender. Furthermore, except for two additional items (8 and 10), the remaining BDI measurements were group invariant. Results are expected to be of substantial interest to both researchers and clinicians whose concerns focus on depression as it bears on this population.