“…Second, to the best of our knowledge, no studies have cross-validated any two or more scores of self-stigma instruments at the same time. Third, most of the studies evaluating the scores of psychometric self-stigma instruments used only classical statistical methods, such as exploratory factor analysis, internal consistency, and test-retest reliability using correlation coefficients (Boyd et al, 2014;Stevelink et al, 2012). However, some advanced statistical methods (e.g., item response theory, which is described in detail later) have been available for more than half a century and, therefore, a cumulative evaluation of the construct validity of those instruments is needed to inform healthcare professionals and researchers (Su, Experience" has been considered embedded within the concept of experienced stigma, rather than self-stigma per se.…”