Am J Psychiatry 1990; 147:645-648
Copyright © 1990 by American Psychiatric Association
Convergent validity of measures of PTSD in Vietnam combat veterans
ME McFall, DE Smith, DK Roszell, DJ Tarver and KL Malas
Seattle VA Medical Center, Psychology Service, WA 98108.
The authors evaluated the convergent validity of several widely used
psychometric tests of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms against
DSM-III-R criteria for PTSD in 130 Vietnam combat veterans. Significant
positive correlations were found between these instruments and the number
of DSM-III-R symptoms endorsed, supporting the validity of psychometric
instruments as continuous measures of PTSD symptom severity. The various
psychometric measures also correlated moderately with one another,
suggesting that they assess related but somewhat separate PTSD phenomena.
Finally, predicted relationships between stressors and symptoms were
supported by significant correlations between degree of traumatic combat
exposure and DSM-III-R and psychometric indexes of PTSD.
