Inventario de Evaluación de la Personalidad para adolescentes: consistencia interna y dimensionalidad en adolescentes de Buenos Aires

Abstract

Introduction : The Personality Assessment Inventory for Adolescents (PAI-A) examines the psychopathological symptomatology and variables related to the design of psychotherapeutic interventions. It is composed of 264 items for use in the clinical assessment of adolescents between 12-18 years old. Validity, clinical, treatment-related, and interpersonal relationship scales are included. Purpose : This paper presents psychometric analyses of the Personality Assessment Inventory for Adolescents. Method : The participants were 1,002 adolescents (50.3% women, 49.7% men, M age =14.99, SD=1.88) living in Buenos Aires (Argentina) and on the outskirts. Cronbach’s alphas were calculated to estimate internal consistency, with excellent values for clinical, treatment-related and interpersonal relationship scales, and acceptable values for validity scales and subscales. Results : Dimensionality was examined by principal component analysis with a varimax rotation. A four-factor structure was isolated by including the 22 scales, whereas two factors were obtained when analyzing the 11 clinical scales. Conclusions : We provide evidence of the psychometric quality of the pai-a for use with adolescents from Buenos Aires, filling a gap in local psychological assessment. Further research should extend these psychometric quality analyses, and replicate the procedures in clinical samples.