Well‐being in Patients with Affective Disorders Compared to Nonclinical Participants: A Multi‐Model Evaluation of the Mental Health Continuum‐Short Form

Abstract

Objectives The Mental Health Continuum‐Short Form (MHC‐SF), measuring emotional, social, and psychological well‐being, has scarcely been validated in clinical populations. We evaluated MHC‐SF in 203 patients with affective disorders and 163 nonclinical participants. Method Traditional confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), bifactor CFA, three‐factor exploratory structural equation modeling (ESEM), and bifactor ESEM models were compared. Convergent/discriminant validity was tested against classic well‐being validators and current mood state. Results All three subscales were significantly lower in patients. Test‐retest reliability in patients was moderate. Bifactor ESEM fitted data best and displayed full scalar gender and partial scalar invariance across groups. Factor strength indices suggested that MHC‐SF is primarily unidimensional, especially in patients. However, subscales differed considerably on size, internal consistency, distinctness, discriminant validity, and temporal stability. Conclusions MHC‐SF was valid and reliable for monitoring well‐being in both clinical and nonclinical samples, but further research is needed before safely concluding on its dimensionality.

Be Your Best You: An Evaluation of a Positive Psychology Intervention Programme in Greece

“…Mental Health Continuum Short Form (MHC-SF) The MHC-SF (Keyes et al, 2008;Ferentinos et al, 2019) assesses through 14 items the emotional, psychological and social well-being on a 6-item Likert scale, which runs from 0 ("never") to 5 ("almost always"). The scale asks the participants to consider their experience over the past four weeks and choose on a 6-point Likert scale (0 "never" to 5 "almost always) their answer.…”

A Salutogenic Mental Health Model: Flourishing as a Metaphor for Good Mental Health

“…The MHC-SF shows good internal reliability, consistency, and convergent and discriminant validity in respondents between the age of 18 and 87 years [20] and across the lifespan [28]. The MHC-SF is claimed to be valid and reliable for monitoring well-being in student groups [29], as well as in both clinical (affective disorders) and nonclinical groups [30]. Moreover, the MHC-SF has also been used as the outcome in intervention studies [31,32].…”

“…There is a growing interest for studying the relationship between mental health and mental illness in various environments, including work settings and psychosocial work conditions [47]. MHC-SF has been found to be valid and reliable for monitoring well-being in both clinical (patients with affective disorders) and nonclinical samples [30]. The prevalence of flourishing among individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders has been studied in Hong Kong [48].…”

Monitoring Positive Mental Health in Swedish Adolescents: Psychometric Evaluation of the Mental Health Continuum – Short Form

“…More recently, some of these limitations were addressed by studies that tested additional methods and models [28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37]. The bifactor model, for example, allows for evaluation of the relevance and reliability of subscale scores after controlling for the variance of the general factor [27].…”

“…Psychometric studies that compared the fit of the bifactor model with that of other proposed models have, in most cases, favoured the bifactor solution [28, 31-36, 39, 40], including studies using exploratory structural equation modelling techniques [31,33,35,40]. However, only one study [35] (to our knowledge) has tested the bifactor model on adolescents exclusively.…”