Indonesia Endowment Fund for Education, University of Groningen.

This study aims to evaluate a number of procedures that have been proposed to enhance cross‐cultural comparability of personality and value data. A priori procedures (anchoring vignettes and direct measures of response styles (i.e. acquiescence, extremity, midpoint responding, and social desirability), a posteriori procedures focusing on data transformations prior to analysis (ipsatization and item parcelling), and two data modelling procedures (treating data as continuous vs as ordered categories) were compared using data collected from university students in 16 countries. We found that (i) anchoring vignettes showed lack of invariance, so they were not bias‐free; (ii) anchoring vignettes showed higher internal consistencies than raw scores where all other correction procedures, notably ipsatization, showed lower internal consistencies; (iii) in measurement invariance testing, no procedure yielded scalar invariance; anchoring vignettes and item parcelling slightly improved comparability, response style correction did not affect it, and ipsatization resulted in lower comparability; (iv) treating Likert‐scale data as categorical resulted in higher levels of comparability; (v) factor scores of scales extracted from different procedures showed similar correlational patterning; and (vi) response style correction was the only procedure that suggested improvement in external validity of country‐level conscientiousness. We conclude that, although no procedure resolves all comparability issues, anchoring vignettes, parcelling, and treating data as ordered categories seem promising to alleviate incomparability. We advise caution in uncritically applying any of these procedures. Copyright © 2017 European Association of Personality Psychology

The study aimed at investigating the association between maternal and paternal parenting styles and psychological well-being among Indonesian adolescents. The Parental Authority Questionnaire (PAQ), General Health Questionnaire-12 (GHQ-12), and the Brief Multidimensional Students' Life Satisfaction Scale, were administered to 500 adolescents. We were unable to replicate the three-factor solution of the PAQ using confirmatory factor analysis. The permissive subscale demonstrated poor psychometric properties; it was therefore not included in any further analysis. Mothers were perceived to be more authoritative than fathers; on the other hand, fathers were perceived to be more authoritarian than mothers. Both maternal and paternal authoritative parenting styles were positively associated with outcomes. Authoritarian parenting was not associated with any outcome. Scores computed to represent perceived differences between maternal and paternal use of various parenting styles were associated with reported GHQ-12 and life satisfaction scores. Our results confirm Western findings on the positive effects of authoritative parenting, but do not replicate the negative associations of authoritarian parenting. Future studies that examine different parenting styles at the construct level are needed to elucidate the association between parenting styles and adolescent psychological functioning in the Indonesian and other similar contexts.

Despite its popularity, the factorial structure of the Psychological Sense of School Membership (PSSM) Questionnaire remains controversial. The current study set out to clarify its structure across different cultural contexts. The study was carried out among 1,928 adolescents aged 11 to 20 years in the Netherlands, Kenya, Indonesia, and Spain. Item-based measurement models with a single factor did not show a good fit. A bifactor method (defining a method factor for negatively worded items) did not show a good fit either. However, when items were combined per target to be rated (school, student, teacher, other people, and self), measurement invariance of a one-factorial model was found. Internal consistencies observed across the cultural groups studied were high. In addition, an evaluation of functional equivalence indicated that the relationship between PSSM and life satisfaction was invariant across countries. Implications for assessment and future directions are discussed.

BackgroundDepression is a leading cause of disease burden across the world. However, in low-middle income countries (LMICs), access to mental health services is severely limited because of the insufficient number of mental health professionals available. The WHO initiated the Mental Health Gap Action Program (mhGAP) aiming to provide a coherent strategy for closing the gap between what is urgently needed and what is available in LMICs. Internet-based treatment is a promising strategy that can be made available to a large number of people now that Internet access is increasing rapidly throughout the world. The present study will investigate whether such an Internet-based treatment for depression is effective in Indonesia.MethodsAn Internet-based behavioral activation treatment, with support by lay counselors who will provide online feedback on the assignments and supportive phone contact to encourage participants to work in the program (Guided Act and Feel Indonesia/GAF-ID), is compared to an online-delivered minimal psychoeducation without any support (psychoeducation/PE). Initial assessment for inclusion is based on a Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) score of at least 10 and meeting criteria for major depressive disorder or persistent depressive disorder as assessed using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-5 (SCID-5). Participants with depression (N = 312) will be recruited and randomly assigned to GAF-ID or PE. Overall assessments will be done at baseline, post intervention (10 weeks from baseline) and follow-ups (3 months and 6 months from baseline). The primary outcome is the reduction of depression symptoms as measured by the PHQ-9 after 10 weeks from baseline.DiscussionTo our knowledge, this is the first study in Indonesia that examines the effectiveness of an Internet-based intervention for depression in a randomized controlled trial. The hope is that it can serve as a starting point for bridging the mental health gap in Indonesia and other LMICs.Trial registrationNederlands Trial Register (www.trialregister.nl): NTR5920, registered on 1 July 2016.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s13063-016-1577-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.