ABSTRACT
Background: The Geriatric Anxiety Inventory (GAI) and a short form of this instrument (GAI-SF) were developed to assess the severity of anxiety symptoms in older adults in order to compensate for the lack of validated screening tools adapted to the elderly population. This study examined the psychometric properties of the French Canadian version of the GAI, in its complete (GAI-FC) and short form (GAI-FC-SF).
Method: A total of 331 community-dwelling seniors between 65 and 92 years old participated in this study.
Results: Both the GAI-FC and the GAI-FC-SF have sound psychometric properties with, respectively, a high internal consistency (α = .94 and .83), an adequate convergent validity (r = .50 to .86 with instruments known to evaluate constructs similar to the GAI or related to anxiety), a good test–retest reliability (r = .89 and .85), in addition to a single-factor structure.
Conclusions: The results support the use of both the GAI-FC and the GAI-FC-SF. The GAI-FC-SF seems to be an interesting alternative to the GAI-FC as a screening tool when time available for assessment is limited.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank the participants as well as all people who participated in the data collection: Catherine Gaudreau (subgroup A); Claudie Bax-D'Auteuil, Camie Duhamel, Audrey Dupuis, Cindy Roussy and Caroline Dussault (subgroup B); Élisabeth Beaunoyer (subgroup C). The authors also thank Noémie Heider for her assistance with translation of the manuscript.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interests was reported by the authors.