The Demographic Psychosocial Inventory: A New Instrument to Measure Risk Factors for Adjustment Problems Among Immigrants

Objective-The purpose of this studywas to develop and test the DemographicPsychosocial Inventory(DPSI), a self-report questionnaire thatassesses demographic and backgroundcharacteristics of immigrants,and psychosocial risk factors of demoralization.Method-Based on a review of instrumentsused to study immigrants, andresearchers' experience in this area, an85-item questionnaire was developedthat includes 10 scales and three generalindices. Subjects are asked to indicatetheir level of satisfaction withvarious aspects of their lives, their reasonsfor immigration, and problemsthey had encountered since they immigrated.Results-DPSI (Demographic PsychologicalInventory) was tested on 1,200adult immigrants who came to Israelfrom the former USSR since 1989. Thereliability of the scales and general indiceswas generally high as measuredby Cronbaeh's Alpha. For one generalindex and two scales it was above .78,for one general index and two scales itwas between .60 and .73, for one generalindex and two scales between.41and .55, and for one scale .23. The generalindices were highly correlatedwith the Psychiatric EpidemiologyResearch Interview DemoralizationScale (PERI-D) and the Brief SymptomInventory (BSI). The results suggestthat the greatest risk factors of demoralizationare a greater number of distresssources, difficulty in dealing with conflict, greater discrepancy betweenactual difficulties encountered andthose expected, and more reasons forimmigration. The single most importantvariable in predicting a demoralizationcase was the number of distresssources. We developed DPSI cuttingpoints for caseness based on comparisonsto BSI and PERI-D. For the BSI,DPSI cutting points are .44 for males,and .48 for females. These cuttingpoints recognize about 61% of thosewho are cases according to BSI, andabout 72% of those who are not casesaccording to BSI. For the PERI-D, DPSIcutting points for caseness are .42 formales and .44 for females. These cuttingpoints recognize about 63% ofthose who are demoralized accordingto PERI-D and about 68% of those whoare not demoralized according toPERI-D. DPSI tends to recognizeslightly more cases as being at risk ofdemoralization than those who aredemoralized according to PERI-D, andslightly less than those identified ascases according to BSI.Conclusions-DPSI is a promising instrumentfor gathering demographicand background characteristics of immigrants,and for studying psychosocialrisk factors for development ofdemoralization. DPSI is available inEnglish, Hebrew, and Russian.