A Brazilian Investigation of the 36- and 16-Item Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scales

Abstract

Objective: About 10 years ago, Gratz and Roemer (2004) introduced the Difficulties in EmotionRegulation Scale (DERS), a 36-item self-report instrument measuring 6 areas of emotion regulation problems. Recently, Bjureberg et al. (2015) have introduced a new, briefer version of the DERS comprising only 16 of the 36 items included in the original version. Because no studies have yet crossvalidated the recently introduced 16-item DERS and the 36-item DERS has never been tested in Brazil, we sought to inspect the psychometric properties of scores from both DERS versions with a nonclinical Brazilian sample. Method: Participants were 725 adult volunteers aged 18-70 years (mean = 30.54, standard deviation = 10.59), 82.3% of whom were women. All were administered the DERS along with a number of other self-report and performance-based instruments. Data analyses inspected internal consistency, factor structure, and convergent as well as divergent validity of scores from both DERS versions. Results: Results show that scores from both DERS versions possess good psychometric properties. Interestingly, both versions correlated, in the expected direction, with psychopathology and showed no significant correlations with cognitive measures. Like in other studies, however, the Awareness factor of the 36-item DERS did not produce optimal validity and reliability indexes. Conclusion: Taken together, our findings indicate that the 16-item DERS may be preferred over the 36-item version and provide additional support to the differentiation between emotion regulation and cognitive tasks of emotional perception and abstract and verbal reasoning. C

Psychometric properties of the Brazilian version of the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS)

“…The DERS scale was adapted and had its psychometric properties investigated in several countries, e.g., Italy, 14 Portugal, 15 Turkey, 16 Greece, 17 Chile, 18 Argentina, 19 and Brazil. 11 Generally, these adaptations have confirmed the six-factor structure proposed by the original authors.…”

“…A Brazilian version was developed by Miguel et al,11 who found evidence supporting the six-factor structure originally proposed by the creators of the instrument.…”

“…A CFA was conducted to assess how well the six-factor structure originally proposed by Gratz & Roemer 10 fitted the data obtained with the Brazilian version of the DERS. A shorter version of the DERS with 16 items has been tested in another study with a Brazilian sample, 11 with results suggesting good reliability. It has been argued that a shorter version is superior in terms of ease of use, as it takes less time to complete.…”

“…The study performed in the Brazilian sample suggests that the DERS could be applied in clinical and nonclinical populations, especially when associated with related symptoms, e.g., anxiety and depression. 11 Until now, no study was found to have tested whether scores on the Brazilian DERS correlate with measures of depression, anxiety and stress.…”

Influence of maternal reflective functioning on mothers’ and children's weight: A follow‐up study

“…The DERS has been widely used internationally (e.g., Cho & Hong, ; Miguel, Giromini, Colombarolli, Zuanazzi, & Zennaro, ; Rugancı & Gençöz, ; also see Giromini, Ales, de Campora, Zennaro, & Pignolo, 2017), demonstrating excellent psychometric properties. Its Italian version was developed and validated by Giromini, Velotti, de Campora, Bonalume, and Zavattini (2012), who reported high internal consistency, with α = .92 for the total score, and αs > .80 for five subscales, with Awareness yielding an α of .77.…”