Examining and enhancing the reliability of the Arabic version of the Clinical Perfectionism Questionnaire

Abstract

Background Clinical perfectionism has been implicated among risks for developing depression, anxiety, and eating disorders. This study aimed to translate the widely used Clinical Perfectionism Questionnaire (CPQ) into Arabic and examine its psychometric properties. A general population sample of 1598 Saudi adults completed an online survey. Respondents were randomly selected to create two separate samples of n = 400 each, thus meeting the sample size recommendations for Rasch analysis. We applied the partial credit Rasch model to one independent sample to investigate and improve the psychometric characteristics of the scale and replicated our findings with another independent sample of the equal size. Results Minor modifications were required to address local dependency issues and resulted in a good fit of the Arabic CPQ to the unidimensional Rasch model in both samples. The scale demonstrated unidimensionality, invariance across personal factors, and good reliability (PSI = 0.78). As expected, the scale scores were positively associated with depression, anxiety, and disordered eating behaviors. Conclusions Overall, the Arabic CPQ demonstrated robust psychometric properties after minor modifications that did not change the original scale format. The utility and accuracy of the Arabic CPQ can be enhanced by converting ordinal scores into interval scale scores using conversion tables presented in this paper.