Assessing cross-cultural comparability in mental health among older adults

This article provides a brief review of the implications of cultural differences in mental health assessment. Issues of comparability in mental health across different ethnic, racial, and cultural groups will be examined within the framework of factorial invariance. In particular, comparability is conceptualized as a continuum involving increasingly restrictive assumptions such as conceptual, metric, and structural equivalence. Emphases will be placed on the application of structural equation modeling (SEM) in addressing analytical issues related to cross-cultural comparability.