Capturing the Multidimensionality of Test Anxiety in Cross-Cultural Research: An English Adaptation of the German Test Anxiety Inventory

ABSTRACT Culturally comparative studies about test anxiety often use adaptations of the twodimensional Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI; Spielberger, 1980). To capture multiple facets of test anxiety, however, no multidimensional instrument with transcultural validity exits. In response, the current study reports on the cross-validation of an English version of the four-dimensional TAI-G, which had been introduced as an extended German adaptation of the TAI (Hodapp, 1991, 1996). First year university students of a multi-ethnic South African (N=102) and German sample (N=183) were given parallel versions of the TAI-G in English and German. Multigroup confirmatory factor models were conducted to examine structural and parametric invariance. Indicating high construct validity, a second-order model of test anxiety fits the data well for both samples. Associations with test anxiety correlates suggested high criterion validity. Scale structure and psychometric properties of the English TAI-G replicated findings of German samples suggesting transcultural applicability of the measure. KEYWORDS: test anxiety, cross-cultural measurement, construct validity, multigroup analysis. Everywhere around the world, students face the challenge of coping with upcoming exams and related outcomes. In correspondence, common antecedents of test anxiety like the importance of exams for career development and occupational success are more or less invariant across cultures (Zeidner, 1995; 1998). However, cultural factors may affect various parameters of the anxiety process and its related consequences. Especially current cognitive-motivational models of stress and coping (e.g., Lazarus, 1991a; 1991b), which view emotions as arising from the outcome of a transaction between individuals and their environment, require the explicit incorporation of cultural factors into conceptualizations of anxiety and coping processes (Seipp & Schwarzer, 1996; Zeidner 1998). In order to allow for cross-cultural comparisons with regard to structure and components of anxiety, research needs to employ instruments whose validity has been proven separately for the groups of interest (Hagtvet & Sipos, 2004). Addressing such notion, most cross-cultural studies on test anxiety have been applying language adaptations of the Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI; Spielberger, 1980) whose two-dimensional structure could be replicated with numerous national samples across cultures (Zeidner, 1998). Considering multidimensional instruments for comparative cultural research, however, no measure currently exists whose transcultural validity has been proven for both construct and criterion validity on the basis of separate national samples. In an attempt to close this gap, the current study reports on the psychometric development of an English version of the TAI-G comparing results of a German with a multi-ethnic South African sample. The Multidimensionality of Test Anxiety There has been a long debate about the dimensionality of test anxiety. Representing the starting point in a long line of discussion, Liebert and Morris (1967) suggested test anxiety to be composed of Worry and Emotionality. Worry was conceptually identified as "cognitive expression of concern about one's own performance, while emotionality referred to autonomic reactions which tend to occur under examination stress" (Liebert & Morris, 1967, p. 975). To capture both dimensions, Spielberger and colleagues (Spielberger, 1980; Spielberger, Gonzales, Taylor, Algaze, & Amton, 1978) developed the Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI). Comparing competing structural models, confirmatory factor analysis has provided strong support for the two-factor structure of the TAI in a variety of studies (e.g., Everson, Millsap, & Rodriguez, 1991). Despite such empirical support for conceptual distinction, all cited studies identified both dimensions as highly overlapping. Addressing such lack of distinctiveness, Sarason (1984) proposed a splitting of the cognitive component into Worry and Test-Irrelevant Thinking, as well as of emotionality into Tension and Bodily Symptoms by introducing the fourdimensional Reactions to Tests scale (RTT). …