Design and psychometric analysis of the hopelessness and suicide ideation inventory “IDIS”

Abstract

The objective was to design the Hopeless and Suicide Ideation Inventory, also know as IDIS - Spanish acronym for Inventario de Desesperanza e Ideación Suicida - and to analyze its psychometric properties. A quantitative empirical research was conducted employing a non-experimental design, an instrumental variable and cross-sectional analysis. Three hundred and thirty-nine people participated in the study (67.6% females, 31.6% males), in which 54.6% were students and 34.8% were employees. Participants completed the IDIS, the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II), the Positive and Negative Suicide Ideation Inventory, and the Beck Hopelessness Scale. The results indicated an inter-rater reliability and a positive convergent validity in both scales. Suicidal ideation revealed an internal consistency of α = .76, and α = .81 for hopelessness; a total variance of 41.77% and 47.52% was obtained correspondingly. Based on the Item Response Theory (IRT), the adjustments for INFIT and OUTFIT fell under the expected range. It was concluded that the IDIS is a reliable and valid measure, however, further evaluations on sensitivity and specificity are encouraged

Keywords

• Suicide
• suicidal ideation
• hopelessness
• psychometric
• classical test theory and item response theory.