Conversion of the Abbreviated PCL-5 to the Full PCL-5 Using Genetic Programming
Abstract
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a major public health concern. Therefore, the assessment of PTSD symptoms is a critical component of research and treatment. PTSD is comprised of 20 total symptoms across four different clusters of symptoms (intrusion symptoms, avoidance, negative alterations in cognitions and mood, and hyperarousal) which can be difficult and burdensome to assess on a regular basis in research and clinical practice. The PTSD Symptom Checklist for the DSM-5 (PCL-5) is a commonly used self-report measure to assess all 20 symptoms of PTSD, and measures symptom severity on a Likert Scale (0 = Not at all; 4 = Extremely). An abbreviated 8-item version of the PCL-5 was developed to reduce time and burden of the measure. However, total scores on the abbreviated measure (0-32) do not directly translate to scores on the full measure (0-80), which limits the interpretability of the abbreviated measure. The current study aimed to convert scores of the abbreviated measure to meaningful scores on a scale comparable to the full measure. Participants were a community sample of 1151 trauma exposed individuals. Genetic Programming (GP) was used to create an equation that translated scores on the original version from each item to scores comparable to the full measure. The abbreviated measure converted scores were, on average, M = 2.66 points, 95% CI [2.51, 2.82] different from the full measure scores. This equation can provide a method for the conversion of abbreviated PCL-5 scores to full PCL-5 scores, which has important implications for the interpretability of the abbreviated measure and increases its utility.
Conversion of the Abbreviated PCL-5 to the Full PCL-5 Using Genetic Programming
Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a major public health concern. Therefore, the assessment of PTSD symptoms is a critical component of research and treatment. PTSD is comprised of 20 total symptoms across four different clusters of symptoms (intrusion symptoms, avoidance, negative alterations in cognitions and mood, and hyperarousal) which can be difficult and burdensome to assess on a regular basis in research and clinical practice. The PTSD Symptom Checklist for the DSM-5 (PCL-5) is a commonly used self-report measure to assess all 20 symptoms of PTSD, and measures symptom severity on a Likert Scale (0 = Not at all; 4 = Extremely). An abbreviated 8-item version of the PCL-5 was developed to reduce time and burden of the measure. However, total scores on the abbreviated measure (0-32) do not directly translate to scores on the full measure (0-80), which limits the interpretability of the abbreviated measure. The current study aimed to convert scores of the abbreviated measure to meaningful scores on a scale comparable to the full measure. Participants were a community sample of 1151 trauma exposed individuals. Genetic Programming (GP) was used to create an equation that translated scores on the original version from each item to scores comparable to the full measure. The abbreviated measure converted scores were, on average, M = 2.66 points, 95% CI [2.51, 2.82] different from the full measure scores. This equation can provide a method for the conversion of abbreviated PCL-5 scores to full PCL-5 scores, which has important implications for the interpretability of the abbreviated measure and increases its utility.