Development and Psychometric Evaluation of the Brief Adolescent Gambling Screen (BAGS)

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to develop and evaluate the initial reliability, validity and classification accuracy of a new brief screen for adolescent problem gambling. The three-item Brief Adolescent Gambling Screen (BAGS) was derived from the nine-item Gambling Problem Severity Subscale (GPSS) of the Canadian Adolescent Gambling Inventory (CAGI) using a secondary analysis of existing CAGI data. The sample of 105 adolescents included 49 females and 56 males from Canada who completed the CAGI, a self-administered measure of DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for Pathological Gambling, and a clinician-administered diagnostic interview including the DSM-IV diagnostic criteria for Pathological Gambling (both of which were adapted to yield DSM-5 Gambling Disorder diagnosis). A stepwise multivariate discriminant function analysis selected three GPSS items as the best predictors of a diagnosis of Gambling Disorder. The BAGS demonstrated satisfactory estimates of reliability, validity and classification accuracy and was equivalent to the nine-item GPSS of the CAGI and the BAGS was more accurate than the SOGS-RA. The BAGS estimates of classification accuracy include hit rate = 0.95, sensitivity = 0.88, specificity = 0.98, false positive rate = 0.02, and false negative rate = 0.12. Since these classification estimates are preliminary, derived from a relatively small sample size, and based upon the same sample from which the items were selected, it will be important to cross-validate the BAGS with larger and more diverse samples. The BAGS should be evaluated for use as a screening tool in both clinical and school settings as well as epidemiological surveys.

Anthropomorphic tendencies in autism: A conceptual replication and extension of White and Remington (2019) and preliminary development of a novel anthropomorphism measure

“…Although there are no conventional guidelines for ω and glb, they range from 0 to 1, with higher values generally indicating better reliability. These statistics are therefore interpreted in the same way as α in the present studies (Eldesouky & English, 2018;Rimkeviciene et al, 2016;Stinchfield et al, 2017). Internal consistency of all measures was in line with previous research: overall anthropomorphism (α standardised = 0.91, ω = 0.91, glb = 0.96), adult anthropomorphism (α standardised = 0.87, ω = 0.87, glb = 0.90), childhood anthropomorphism (α standardised = 0.90, ω = 0.90, glb = 0.94) and AQ-10 (α standardised = 0.57, ω = 0.60, glb = 0.73).…”

Gambling Behaviors and Problem Gambling: A Population-Based Comparison of Transgender/Gender Diverse and Cisgender Adolescents

“…To our knowledge, it is the first population-based study to compare youth who identify as TGD to their cisgender counterparts with regard to gambling. Relatedly, it is one of the first studies to use a new brief screener, the BAGS, derived from the Canadian Adolescent Gambling Inventory (Tremblay, Sinchfield, Wiebe & Wynne, 2010;Stinchfield et al, 2017), to estimate the prevalence of youth problem gambling.…”

“…Problem gambling was assessed via the 3-item Brief Adolescent Gambling Screen (BAGS; Stinchfield, Wynne, Wiebe, & Tremblay, 2017). Only students who reported ever engaging in any gambling behavior completed the BAGS.…”

“…Only students who reported ever engaging in any gambling behavior completed the BAGS. The measure has good sensitivity (0.88) and specificity (0.98) in identifying adolescent problem gambling (Stinchfield et al, 2017). Items asked: during the last 12 months, how often have you 1) "felt that you might ha ve a problem with gambling/betting?…”

“…We also used the new 3-item BAGS to estimate rates of problem gambling. This brief screen was derived primarily from the gambling problem severity subscale of the Canadian Adolescent Gambling Inventory (CAGI) and validated against a clinician-administered diagnostic interview including DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for pathological gambling (Stinchfield et al, 2017). Although the BAGS was not designed to directly assess DSM-5 Gambling Disorder among youth, it is intended to improve screening and assessment of adolescent problem gambling.…”