Concurrent Validity and Reliability of Two Short Forms of the Mood and Anxiety Symptom Questionnaire in a Student Sample from Northwest Mexico

It is estimated that aproximately 4% of the world’s population is either living with depression, anxiety, or both. The prevalence of these disorders has been consistently increasing. This widespread and increasing prevalence highlights the importance of having well-validated scales to assess symptoms in different languages. The Mood and Anxiety Symptom Questionnaire (MASQ; Clark and Watson Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 100(3), 316–336, 1991) is a commonly used self-report questionnaire that assesses both depression and anxiety symptoms. To investigate the psychometric properties of a Spanish translation of two short forms of the MASQ (the MASQ-SF and Mini-MASQ), each item was translated and back translated by bilingual researchers and checked by two additional senior investigators. The sample included 238 graduate and undergraduate students from Northwestern Mexico. Participants also completed questionnaires assessing self-reported perceived stress, well-being, resilience, and personality traits. We examined internal consistency reliability, factor structure, and convergent, discriminant and concurrent validity of both MASQ short forms. The Mini-MASQ and MASQ-SF showed good internal consistency; moreover, consistent with previous studies, a three-factor structure emerged. We additionally found that MASQ measures were negatively associated with well-being and resilience, and positively related to stress and neuroticism. The study findings suggest that these Spanish versions of the the Mini-MASQ and MASQ-SF are valid and reliable instruments to assess dimensional aspects of depression and anxiety and can be implemented in studies in Northwest Mexico.