title: The Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21): further examination of dimensions, scale reliability, and correlates.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  We conducted two studies to examine the dimensions, internal consistency reliability estimates, and potential correlates of the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales-21 (DASS-21; Lovibond & Lovibond, 1995).
  
  
  METHODS
  Participants in Study 1 included 887 undergraduate students (363 men and 524 women, aged 18 to 35 years; mean [M] age = 19.46, standard deviation [SD] = 2.17) recruited from two public universities to assess the specificity of the individual DASS-21 items and to evaluate estimates of internal consistency reliability. Participants in a follow-up study (Study 2) included 410 students (168 men and 242 women, aged 18 to 47 years; M age = 19.65, SD = 2.88) recruited from the same universities to further assess factorial validity and to evaluate potential correlates of the original DASS-21 total and scale scores.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Item bifactor and confirmatory factor analyses revealed that a general factor accounted for the greatest proportion of common variance in the DASS-21 item scores (Study 1). In Study 2, the fit statistics showed good fit for the bifactor model. In addition, the DASS-21 total scale score correlated more highly with scores on a measure of mixed depression and anxiety than with scores on the proposed specific scales of depression or anxiety. Coefficient omega estimates for the DASS-21 scale scores were good.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Further investigations of the bifactor structure and psychometric properties of the DASS-21, specifically its incremental and discriminant validity, using known clinical groups are needed.
authors.affiliation: The University of Texas at San Antonio, Department of Psychology, One UTSA Circle, San Antonio, Texas 78249-0652, USA. augustine.osman@utsa.edu
authors.forename: Augustine
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Osman
authors.forename: Jane L
authors.initials: JL
authors.lastname: Wong
authors.forename: Courtney L
authors.initials: CL
authors.lastname: Bagge
authors.forename: Stacey
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Freedenthal
authors.forename: Peter M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Gutierrez
authors.forename: Gregorio
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Lozano
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001007:Anxiety / Q000175:diagnosis*; D003863:Depression / Q000175:diagnosis*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013315:Stress, Psychological / Q000175:diagnosis*; D055815:Young Adult