Factorial Structure and Nomological Network of the Inventory of Callous-Unemotional Traits Accounting for Item Keying Variance

Factorial Structure of the Parent-Reported Version of the Inventory of Callous-Unemotional Traits Among Belgian Children: A Theory-Based Model

“…Furthermore, estimation problems due to an overly high correlation between factors were reported by Bansal et al (2020a) . However, two other studies that took into account the item wording succeeded in having an accurate fit for their model with four correlated factors ( Kliem et al, 2020 ; Koutsogiorgi et al, 2021 ), but only with the self-reported version of the ICU. Again, the correlations between the factors Lack of empathy and Lack of guilt were very strong in these studies ( r = 0.88–0.93).…”

“…For example, studies on adolescent offenders ( Kimonis et al, 2008 ) and on a nationally representative sample of children ( Bansal et al, 2020a ) failed to confirm the 4-factor model but did not take into account the methodological variance. Among the studies that have included a methodological dimension accounting for item-wording and having investigated a 4-factor model, one supported a model with four correlated factors ( Kliem et al, 2020 ), one supported a three-factor bifactor model ( Paiva-Salisbury et al, 2017 ), and one demonstrated support for these two models ( Koutsogiorgi et al, 2021 ). In general, accounting for item-wording improved the fit of all the models in these studies.…”

“…However, results investigating the validity of the ICU could change when accounting for the item-wording. Indeed, Koutsogiorgi et al (2021) found that the magnitude of associations of the general factor increased and the predictive validity of the subscales decreased when adding a methodological dimension to the 3-factor bifactor model. These authors had also investigated a 4-factor model based on the LPE specifier with additional methodological dimensions (positively and negatively keyed items).…”

“…Regarding the Unemotional scale, a different pattern of associations was expected with weak associations with externalizing behaviors, internalizing and empathy. Concerning the theoretical models, and based on the results of Koutsogiorgi et al (2021) , it was hypothesized that the Lack of empathy and the Lack of guilt factors (or the Lack of conscience factor) were associated with higher externalizing behaviors than the other subfactors. The Lack of emotional expression factor was assumed to be negatively associated with internalizing behaviors.…”

Core features of callous–unemotional traits: Network analysis of the inventory of callous–unemotional traits in offender and community samples

“…Positively worded items have been found to be more likely to measure more severe manifestations while negative ones are more likely to assess less severe manifestations (Ray et al, 2016). Thus, the clustering of particular items can be partially driven by measurement variance related to item wording (Koutsogiorgi et al, 2020). Further study is needed to examine the influence of item wording on these items.…”