The Perceived Stress Scale 2&2: a two-factorial German short version of the Perceived Stress Scale

Sarah K Schäfer; Lisa von Boros; Anja S Göritz; Sophie Baumann; Michèle Wessa; Oliver Tüscher; Klaus Lieb; Anne Möhring

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1195986

The Perceived Stress Scale 2&2: a two-factorial German short version of the Perceived Stress Scale

Front Psychiatry. 2023 Jul 6:14:1195986. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1195986. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Sarah K Schäfer^{1

2}, Lisa von Boros¹, Anja S Göritz³, Sophie Baumann⁴, Michèle Wessa^{1

5}, Oliver Tüscher^{1

6

7}, Klaus Lieb^{1

6}, Anne Möhring⁴

Affiliations

¹ Leibniz Institute for Resilience Research, Mainz, Germany.
² Department for Clinical Psychology, Psychotherapy and Psychodiagnostics, Technische Universität Braunschweig, Braunschweig, Germany.
³ Behavioral Health Technology, Augsburg University, Augsburg, Germany.
⁴ Department Methods in Community Medicine, University Medicine Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany.
⁵ Department of Clinical Psychology and Neuropsychology, Institute for Psychology, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz, Mainz, Germany.
⁶ Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center of Johannes Gutenberg University, Mainz, Germany.
⁷ Institute for Molecular Biology, Mainz, Germany.

Abstract

Background: Stress is among the leading causes for diseases. The assessment of subjectively perceived stress is essential for resilience research. While the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) is a widely used questionnaire, a German short version of the scale is not yet available. In the current study, we developed such a short version using a machine learning approach for item reduction to facilitate the simultaneous optimization of multiple psychometric criteria.

Method: We recruited 1,437 participants from an online panel, who completed the German long version of the PSS along with measures of mental health and resilience. An ant-colony-optimization algorithm was used to select items, taking reliability, and construct validity into account. Findings on validity were visualized by psychological network models.

Results: We replicated a bifactor structure for the long version of the PSS and derived a two-factor German short version of the PSS with four items, the PSS-2&2. Its factors helplessness and self-efficacy showed differential associations with mental health indicators and resilience-related factors, with helplessness being mainly linked to mental distress.

Conclusion: The valid and economic short version of the PSS lends itself to be used in future resilience research. Our findings highlight the importance of the two-factor structure of the PSS short versions and challenge the validity of commonly used one-factor models. In cases where the general stress factor is of interest, researchers should use the longer versions of the PSS that allow for the interpretation of total scores, while the PSS-2&2 allows of an economic assessment of the PSS factors helplessness and self-efficacy.

Keywords: German; Perceived Stress Scale; ant-colony-optimization; assessment; machine learning; resilience; short version; stress.

Grants and funding

This work was supported by the Peer Mentoring Team Program of the German Psychology Society (DGPs, section Health Psychology) and the European Funds for Regional Development with the Ministry of Science and Health of Rhineland-Palatinate (grant number 84009588). The new PSS-2&2 was developed as a part of a larger stress and resilience self-assessment, which will be published on the digital resilience platform ResiLIR (https://www.resilir.eu). Within this framework, the PSS-2&2 will be used to assess stress symptoms.