Reliability, validity and measurement invariance of the difficulties in emotion regulation Scale-8 in Chinese adolescents

This study aimed to determine the reliability, validity and measurement invariance of scores from the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale-8 in Chinese context. A total of 1114 Chinese adolescents were participants in three phases: N = 424 for the initial DERS-8 measure completion; N = 586 the DERS-8, General Anxiety Disorder Scale, Depression Scale and Emotion Regulation Scale completion, with an interval of one month. Then an additional 104 adolescents also completed DERS-8, General Anxiety Disorder Scale, Depression Scale and Emotion Regulation Scale. Both exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses confirmed the one-factor model of the scale, and the fitness indicators were χ2/df = 4.05, RMSEA = 0.07, CFI = 0.98, and TLI = 0.97. Each item of the DERS-8 had good discrimination. The internal consistency reliability coefficient, split-half reliability coefficient and test-retest reliability coefficient of the scale scores were 0.90, 0.87 and 0.66, respectively. The findings suggest the Chinese version of the DERS-8 is a reliable measure of difficulty of emotion regulation in Chinese adolescents.