The Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale Short Form (DERS-SF): Validation and Replication in Adolescent and Adult Samples

Abstract

Emotion dysregulation often emerges early in development and is a core feature of many psychological conditions. The Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS) is a well validated and widely used self-report measure for assessing emotion regulation problems among adolescents and adults. The DERS has six subscales with five to eight items each (36 total), suggesting multiple questions may assess similar underlying constructs. In an effort to reduce respondent burden and streamline this widely-used instrument, we created a short-form version of the DERS (DERS-SF) using confirmatory factor analysis on data from three adolescent (n = 257) and two adult samples (n = 797). Scores on the DERS-SF yielded similar correlation patterns relative to the full measure, ranging from.90 to.98 and reflecting 81–96 % shared variance. This instrument maintains the excellent psychometric properties and retains the total and subscale scores of the original measure with half the items.