Reliability and validity of the Emotional Processing Self-Report.

Area of Science:

• Psychology
• Clinical Psychology
• Psychotherapy Research

Background:

• Emotional processing deficits are linked to various psychopathologies, making them a key target for mental health interventions.
• Despite the recognized importance of emotional processing in psychotherapy, a dedicated self-report measure was lacking.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate the Emotional Processing Self-Report (EP-SR), a practical tool for assessing client emotional processing during therapy.

Main Methods:

• Study 1: Item development (53 items) and expert evaluation, followed by exploratory factor analysis (EFA) on 124 individuals in treatment.
• Study 2: Multilevel EFA on 114 patients (1956 measurements) assessing emotional expression, regulation, and understanding emotional meaning.
• Study 3: Multilevel confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) on 77 patients (1,423 measurements) to confirm the EP-SR's factor structure and psychometric properties.

Main Results:

• The EP-SR demonstrated a three-factor structure: emotional expression, regulation, and understanding emotional meaning.
• The scale exhibited strong internal consistency, convergent, incremental, and predictive validity, correlating with process and outcome measures.
• Confirmatory factor analysis validated the EP-SR's structure and psychometric properties.

Conclusions:

• The Emotional Processing Self-Report (EP-SR) is a reliable and valid instrument for assessing emotional processing in clinical settings.
• Its user-friendliness and robust psychometric properties make it a valuable tool for therapists and researchers.
• The EP-SR's ability to measure key emotional processes supports its clinical importance in improving mental health.