Confirmatory factor analysis of posttraumatic stress symptoms in Cambodian refugees

This study used confirmatory factor analysis to examine the factor structure of the Cambodian version of the Harvard Trauma Questionnaire in 488 Cambodian refugees residing in the United States. Five alternative conceptual models were compared. A model with four correlated factors reflecting symptoms of re-experiencing, avoidance, emotional numbing, and hyperarousal provided the best fit to these data. The avoidance and emotional numbing clusters demonstrated distinct associations with depression symptoms, providing some evidence of the construct validity of the four-factor solution.