A confirmatory evaluation of the profile of mood states: Convergent and discriminant item validity

The Profile of Mood States was administered to samples of 182 college males, 179 college females, and 257 prison inmates. College males and females did not differ significantly from each other in terms of scale elevation but differed from prison inmates on all scales except Fatigue-Inertia. The college samples differed from the published normative college samples, suggesting the importance of using local norms. A confirmatory item factor analysis suggested convergent item validity with the scoring key and similarity of structure across samples. Discriminant item validity, however, suggested that a smaller number of mood scales would offer a more justifiable interpretation of this inventory.This study was supported by the Alberta Hospital Edmonton, the Solicitor General of Canada, and Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada Grant 410-80-0576-XI.