Cross-Cultural Metric Equivalence of Somatization, Depression, and Anxiety Scales Across Turkish and U.S.A. University Students

Objective: The purpose of the present study was to gain a better understanding of cross-cultural differences in somatization, depression, and anxiety. Method: The author compared the factor structure of depression, anxiety, and somatization across Turkey and the U.S.A., and investigated the metric invariance of the instruments used to measure these constructs. Data from 778 Turkish and U.S.A. participants were used for the analyses. Results: It was found that depression, somatization, and anxiety are three distinct but related constructs for both Turkish and U.S.A. participants. It was also found that the instruments, namely the Beck Depression Inventory-II, Trait subscale of the State Trait Anxiety Inventory, and the Symptom Check List 90-R Somatization subscale, do not have metric invariance across the two cultures. These instruments do not measure the same construct across Turkey and the U.S.A. Conclusion: The results were consistent with the way depression, anxiety, and somatization are conceptualized in the DSM-IV as separate constructs, but contradicted Krueger et al.'s findings.