P1: GRA
Cognitive Therapy and Research [cotr] pp675-cotr-455267 November 14, 2002 9:38 Style file version Jun 14th, 2002
Cognitive Therapy and Research, Vol. 26, No. 6, December 2002 (
C
2002), pp. 719–727
Examining the High-End Specificity of the Beck
Depression Inventory Using an Anxiety Sample
Denise M. Sloan,
1,4
Brian P. Marx,
1
Margaret M. Bradley,
2
Cyd C. Strauss,
2
Peter J. Lang,
2
and Bruce C. Cuthbert
3
Although the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) is one of the most widely used mea-
sures of depression, there is some concern whether high scores on the BDI represent
the nosologic category of depression or psychological distress more generally. In this
study the high-end specificity of the BDI was examined using a clinical sample of
anxiety-disordered individuals, a group characterized by high negative affect. Results
revealed using a high BDI cut score produced moderate specificity and sensitivity rates.
Additional analyses indicated an overall fair performance of the BDI in classifying
depression in the anxiety sample and an optimal cut score for differentiating anxiety
clients with and without comorbid depression was identified. However, using the op-
timal cut score resulted in nearly one third of the sample being incorrectly classified
on the basis on their BDI scores. The findings underscore the importance of not rely-
ing solely on BDI scores to classify depression samples, which is a current common
practice in psychological research.
KEY WORDS: BDI; high-end specificity; depression; anxiety.
The Beck Depression Inventory (BDI; Beck, Steer, & Brown, 1996; Beck, Ward,
Mendelson, Mock, & Erbaugh, 1961) is a widely used self-report measure of de-
pressive symptomatology that includes dimensions of cognition, somatization, and
motivation. Although the BDI was originally developed to examine evaluation of
treatment produced change (e.g., Beck et al., 1961), a common use of the measure,
particularly in the fields of personality and social psychology, is to classify individuals
into depressed and nondepressed groups based on their scores. (e.g., Tennen, Hall,
& Affleck, 1995). Using the BDI to classify individuals by diagnostic group may be
1
Department of Psychology, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
2
Department of Clinical and Health Psychology, Center for the Study of Emotion and Attention, Univer-
sity of Florida, Gainesville, Florida.
3
National Institute of Mental Health, Rockville, Maryland.
4
Correspondence should be directed to Denise M. Sloan, Department of Psychology, Weiss Hall, Temple
University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19122; e-mail: dsloan@temple.edu.
719
0147-5916/02/1200-0719/0
C
2002 Plenum Publishing Corporation