Measuring depression for Swedish nonclinical adolescents: Factorial validity and equivalence of the Beck Depression Inventory across gender

Building upon earlier confirmatory factor analytic research that validated a 2nd-order 4-factor structure of the Beck Depression Inventory for Canadian and Swedish nonclinical adolescents, the purposes of the present study were twofold: (a) to test the factorial structure of the Swedish version of the instrument separately for males ( n = 559) and females ( n = 537), and (b) to test for its measurement and structural equivalence across gender. Except for three minor discrepancies involving correlated errors, the hypothesized model best described the data for both males and females. Nonetheless, the imposition of equality constraints across sex revealed differences bearing on the measurement of six items, and latent construct relations involving the Somatic Elements factor. Four gender differences in factorial structure replicated findings for Canadian adolescents. Results have important implications for researchers, clinicians, and others whose interests focus on nonclinical adolescent depression.