A psychometric comparison of the Beck Depression Inventory-II in English and Spanish

The Beck Depression Inventory-II (BDI-II; A. T. Beck, R. A. Steer, & G. K. Brown, 1996) is a widely used measure of depressive symptomatology originally authored in English and then translated to Spanish. However, there are very limited data available on the Spanish translation. This study compared the psychometric characteristics of the BDI-II in Spanish and English in a sample of 895 college students. The instrument was administered twice with a 1-week interval, either in the same language on both occasions or in a different language on each occasion. Results show strong internal consistency and good test-retest reliability in both languages. Confirmatory factor analysis demonstrated that the published English-language factor structure showed good fit with data from the Spanish instrument. Among bilingual participants who took the BDI-II in both languages, there was no significant language effect. These data provide initial evidence of comparable reliability and validity between the English and Spanish BDI-II in a nonclinical sample.