(PS4-25) Measurement Invariance of Relationship Intimacy and Attachment Among Hispanic and Non-Hispanic White College Women

Abstract Text: With the growing interest in romantic relationships over the past few decades, numerous self-report measures have been developed of relationship quality. While these measures have been examined and validated with White, Western populations, many have yet to be investigated among underrepresented populations. This is problematic, as the same instrument may measure different constructs across groups, or the same construct may have different implications for diverse groups, thereby rendering group comparisons meaningless. The goal of this study was to examine the Fear of Intimacy Scale (FIS), Personal Assessment of Intimacy in Relationships Inventory (PAIR), Adult Attachment Scale (AAS), and the Adult Attachment Questionnaire (AAQ) for measurement invariance across Hispanic and non-Hispanic White college women. Results revealed that traditional confirmatory factor analyses generally provided poor model fit across measures. Exploratory structural equation models provided better fit for all measures. Specifically, for this FIS, a 3-factor ESEM model provided the best fit to the data [χ2 (493) = 1039.42, p < 0.001, CFI = 0.86, RMSEA = 0.05 (90% CI = 0.05 – 0.06), SRMR = 0.05]. For the PAIR, a 5-factor ESEM model provided the best fit to the data [χ2 (295) = 498.47, p < 0.001, CFI = 0.95, RMSEA = 0.04 (90% CI = 0.04 – 0.05), SRMR = 0.03]. For the AAS, a modified 16-item ESEM model provided the best fit to the data [χ2 (75) = 198.52, p < 0.001, CFI = 0.94, RMSEA = 0.07 (90% CI = 0.05 – 0.08) SRMR = 0.04]. Finally, for the AAQ, a modified 13-item 2-factor provided the best fit to the data [χ2 (53) = 147.22, p < 0.001, CFI = 0.95, RMSEA = 0.07 (90% CI = 0.06 – 0.08) SRMR = 0.04]. This suggests that future work may be warranted to re-examine the theoretical foundations of these measures. Moreover, these exploratory structural equation models demonstrated scalar invariance for the 3-factor model of the FIS, 5-factor model of the PAIR, and 2-factor modified 13-item model of the AAQ. These results indicate that the self-report measures appear to measure the same constructs across Hispanic and non-Hispanic White college women.