Psychometric Features of the First Part of the Youth Anxiety Measure (Yam-5-I) in The Turkish Children’s Sample

Abstract

Murris et al (2017) developed the Youth Anxiety Measure (YAM-5-I), according to DSM V criteria in order to determine the anxiety levels of children and young people. In this study, basic validity and reliability studies were carried out by Simon et al (2017) within the framework of adapting the 27-item form of this scale for children aged 8-12, in which they carried out validity and reliability studies, to the Turkish sample. Youth Anxiety Measure (YAM-5-I), the Perceived Family Social Support Scale and the Cognitive Distortion Scale for Children were used as data collection tools. In the construct valid study conducted within the framework of validity studies, it was seen that the second-level factor structure with five factors of the scale had good fit values (χ²/sd= 1.86, CFI= .90, IFI= .90, TLI= .90, GFI= .90 and RMSEA= .04). In another validity study, significant relationships were found between the total score and subscale scores of the scale and the Perceived Family Social Support Scale and the Cognitive Distortion Scale for Children, except for the Separation Anxiety subscale. In reliability studies, the Cronbach alpha coefficient is .87 for the total scale and subscales. Between 65, the correlation between the synonyms is .80 for the total scale and the test-retest correlation coefficients are .74 for the total scale; For the subscale, it was found to vary between .64 and .90. These findings show that the MCQ 5-I measure the anxiety levels of the Turkish child sample in a valid and reliable manner.