Norm values and psychometric properties of the short version of the Trier Inventory for Chronic Stress (TICS) in a representative German sample

• Published in: PloS one Vol. 14; no. 11; p. e0222277
• Main Authors: Petrowski, Katja, Kliem, Sören, Albani, Cornelia, Hinz, Andreas, Brähler, Elmar
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Public Library of Science 18.11.2019; Public Library of Science (PLoS)
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Algorithms; Analysis; Biology and Life Sciences; Book publishing; Chronic Disease; Confirmatory factor analysis; Eating disorders; Economic development; Economic models; Factor Analysis, Statistical; Female; Germany; Humans; Instruments (Equipment); Male; Mass Screening - methods; Mass Screening - statistics & numerical data; Measures; Measuring instruments; Medicine and Health Sciences; Mental depression; Middle Aged; Model testing; Models, Psychological; People and Places; Physical Sciences; Psychology; Psychometrics - methods; Psychometrics - statistics & numerical data; Psychosomatic medicine; Psychotherapy; Quantitative psychology; Reference Values; Reliability; Research and Analysis Methods; Route selection; Skewness; Social Sciences; Sociology; Stress; Stress (Psychology); Stress, Psychological - diagnosis; Validity; Working conditions; Young Adult; Germany; United States
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0222277
• ISSN: 1932-6203

The Trier Inventory for Chronic Stress (TICS), consisting of 57 items, is an instrument for measuring chronic stress in nine areas. There is also a short form (SSCS) of the TICS consisting of 12 items. However, this 12-item short form does not include all nine areas of the theoretical model and the long version. Therefore, a short version including all nine scales/areas was investigated. The TICS was taken by a sample of N = 2,473 respondents from the general population, aged 14 to 99, selected by random-route sampling. Confirmatory factor analyses applying robust maximum likelihood estimations (MLM) tested the model fit. The one-factor-model proposed by the original authors was tested, and the SSCS showed an unacceptable model fit. For the development of an economical short version of the TICS, including items of the nine areas of chronic stress, nine items based on the alphamax algorithm were selected. The one-factor-model of this new short version of the TICS of nine items provided a good fit for the latent construct and showed good reliability (α = .88). A new and reliable short version of the TICS consisting of only 9 items representing the 9 scales/areas for the assessment of chronic stress was identified to possess a good model fit and good reliability.