David Cooke and colleagues have published a series of item response theory (IRT) studies investigating the equivalence of the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) for European versus North American (NA) male criminal offenders. They have consistently concluded that PCL-R scores are not equivalent, with European offenders receiving scores up to five points lower than those in NA when matched according to the latent trait. In this article, the authors critique the Cooke et al. Analyses and demonstrate how their anchor item selection method is responsible for their final conclusions concerning the apparent lack of equivalence.

The authors provide a competing IRT analysis using an iterative purification strategy for anchor item selection and show how this more justifiable approach leads to very different conclusions regarding the equivalence of the PCL-R. More generally, it is argued that strong interpretations of IRT analyses in the presence of uncorroborated anchor items can be highly misleading when evaluating score metric equivalence. Zeiss Lumera 700 Manual Lymphatic Drainage.

Download PDF PDF download for Validity of Factors of the Psychopathy Checklist—Revised in Female. The Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised. Toronto, Canada: Multi-Health Systems. Google Scholar. The Hare Psychopathy Checklist—Second Edition. Toronto, Canada:. Download PDF PDF download for Score Metric Equivalence of the Psychopathy Checklist–Revised (PCL, Article information. Review of the Hare Psychopathy Checklist- Revised, 2nd edition. Plake (Eds.). The sixteenth mental measurements yearbook.