Development of a Brief Computerized Adaptive Testing Version of the SCL-90: Validation of a Six-Factor Model Using a Chinese Adolescent Clinical Sample

multidimensional item response theory. In post hoc simulations with a stopping rule (SE < 0.4), average test length was reduced from 90 to 37 items (58.9% reduction), maintaining high agreement with full-scale estimates (≥ 0.89) and acceptable marginal reliability (≥ 0.76). External validation with the SDS, SAS, and Y-BOCS provided preliminary support for external validity. Overall, this study supports a clinically meaningful six-factor representation of the SCL-90 and provides an efficient adaptive assessment framework for Chinese adolescents in clinical settings.