Convergent And Discriminant Validity of Biculturalism And Depression Among Northern Plains American Indians

In order to further develop the Northern Plains Biculturalism Inventory-Revised into a more valid and reliable research instrument for providing data regarding cultural orientation and identification among Northern Plains American Indians, convergent and discriminant validity was investigated. Two hundred and one Northern Plains American Indians between the ages of 18 and 76 participated in the study. Convergent validity was established in that both the European American (EA) (r = -.801) and American Indian (AI) (r = -.621) subscales of the Northern Plains Biculturalism Inventory-Revised (NPBI-R) were strongly and significantly correlated with the similar subscales of the American Indian Biculturalism Inventory-Northern Plains (AIBI-NP). Discriminant validity was adequately established because while the depression measures, the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression (CES-D) and the Beck Depression Inventory-Second Edition (BDI-II), exhibited a strong relationship with each other (r = .684) the biculturalism measure subscales were not shown to be highly correlated with depression measures. Only small significant correlations were established between the CES-D and both the NPBI-R EA subscale (r = -.207) and AI subs subscale (r = -.157). A small significant relationship was found between the NPBI-R EA subscale and the BDI-II (r = -.205). The EA subscale of the AIBI-NP exhibited a small but significant relationship with the BDI-II as well (r = .181). Secondarily, the relationship between biculturalism and depression was investigated and those identifying as bicultural on the NPBI-R and AIBI-NP subscales demonstrated lower overall scores on the BDI-II and CES-D total scores. The relationship trended toward significance