A brief young adult alcohol problems screening test: Short form development using combinatorics

Abstract

Objective: To develop a shortened form of the Young Adult Alcohol Problems Screening Test¹ (YAAPST; original length = 27 items) using a novel combinatorial approach. Participants: 489 college freshmen, half of whom were above average risk for alcohol use disorder based upon family history, attending a large, Midwestern University followed prospectively for 16–17 years across 7 measurement occasions (waves). Methods: Using an exhaustive combinatorial approach, we evaluated all possible combinations of questions and questionnaire length. Each candidate short-form was evaluated using part-whole correlations, alpha coefficients, and polyserial correlations with DSM-III criteria. Results: The 12-item scale, the Brief-YAAPST, was chosen as the best candidate short-form as this scale had the fewest items while maintaining strong reliability and validity. Conclusions: Complete enumeration optimization effectively produced a 12-item short form with minimal loss of reliability and validity making the Brief-YAAPST a desirable assessment alternative when there are concerns about participant or client burden.

Keywords:

• Short-forms
• combinatorics
• YAAPST
• alcohol problems scale
• assessment

Disclosure statement

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report. The authors confirm that the research presented in this article met the ethical guidelines, including adherence to the legal requirements, of the United State of America and received approval from the International Review Board of University of Missouri–Columbia

Notes

1 SAS and all other SAS Institute Inc. product or service names are registered trademarks or trademarks of SAS Institute Inc. in the USA and other countries. ® indicates USA registration.

2 One year re-test occurred 9-12 months following initial collection.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the NIH under grants R25AA023687, T32AA013526, and R01AA024133.