An Examination of the Cross-Cultural Equivalence of the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 Across Chinese and U.S. Samples

• Published in: Psychological assessment 2024-02, Vol.36 (2), p.102-113
• Main Authors: Lau, Sharlane C. L., Sellbom, Martin, Bagby, R. Michael
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; China; Cross Cultural Differences; Cross-Cultural Comparison; Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders; Discriminant analysis; Factor Analysis; Factor Structure; Female; Human; Humans; Male; Personality; Personality Disorders; Personality Disorders - diagnosis; Personality Inventory; Personality Measures; Personality tests; Personality Traits; Quantitative psychology; Reproducibility of Results; Southeast Asian Cultural Groups; United States
• ISSN: 1040-3590; 1939-134X
• DOI: 10.1037/pas0001293

The Personality Inventory for DSM-5 (PID-5) was designed to measure the personality traits of the alternative model of personality disorders (AMPD). It is comprised of 25 lower order facet scales. Factor analytic investigation of these scales has consistently recovered five factors corresponding to the trait domains of the AMPD. Most of these factor analytic studies, however, have been conducted in the United States and Western European countries and languages. Fewer studies have examined the factor structure of the PID-5 in East Asian countries; and no studies have examined whether the five-factor structure found in Western countries/cultures/languages is congruent with those from East Asia. In this study, we examine the PID-5 factor structure in adult community samples from the People's Republic of China (PRC; N = 233 [116 females], Mage = 35.88, range = 22-60) and the United States (N = 237 [118 females], Mage = 35.44, range = 22-60) using exploratory structural equation modelling and assess whether the factor structures across these samples are congruent using Tucker's congruence coefficient. A five-factor solution was an adequate-to-good fit in both samples. The factor structure obtained from the U.S. sample was congruent with the PID-5 normative sample factor structure. The compositional configuration of the factors in the five-factor structure in the PRC sample, however, showed poor congruence with the U.S. sample. A six-factor model proved to be a better fitting model in the PRC sample. We conclude that the PID-5 does not have factor structure equivalence across U.S. and Chinese cultures/languages. Public Significance Statement In this study, we demonstrated that the Personality Inventory for DSM-5 (PID-5) designed to measure personality psychopathology does not measure the same set of pathological personality traits in U.S. and Chinese cultures. The scores on the PID-5 are not comparable in Chinese and U.S. samples and likely cannot be interpreted equivalently across these countries.