zoharah omar

Currently clinicians and researchers in Iran have to use translated western instruments to screen for anxiety and depressive disorders. Although, some western questionnaires translated and adapted for Iranian people have demonstrated suitable validity in Iranian context, considering the difference in the cultural values, it still remains unclear as to whether a realistic picture of this phenomenon in Iranian society has been drawn. Hence, for detecting and monitoring common emotional disorders in Iran, researchers need to reflect the way that young people experience and express this disorder in the Iranian culture.
This study seeked to address these shortcomings by developing and validating an instrument to measure anxiety and depression among adolescents in Iran with the Tripartiate Model and cognitive content specificity theory serving as the conceptual basis for the instrument development.
The participants constituted of 579 students from secondary schools, who resided in the north of Iran during years 2011 and 2012. The instrument was developed and validated using exploratory factor analysis (EFA) (Phase II) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) (Phase III) to ensure its reliability and validity.
The results provide evidence that the developed instrument achieved sound psychometric properties. The hypothesized two-factor model identified via EFA and CFA in the study consisted of 32 items, with 16 items belonging to anxiety and 16 items to depression. The overall reliability value of Cronbach’s Alpha was 0.87. The CFA results showed acceptable goodness-of-fit indices for the revised model.
The anxiety and depression (A&D) inventory is a simple, brief, and easy to administer tool. Indeed, the entire 32-item A&D inventory takes no longer to complete than other symptom measures. Therefore, the A&D Inventory can provide differentiated symptoms between anxiety and depression in a very quick and efficient manner for Iranian adolescents.

In this study، the relationships between Human Resource Practices (HRPs)، firm performance (service quality)، and the mediation effects of employees’ abilities were examined. To assess the relationships between variables، before evaluating the fitted structural model، the measurement model was defined to verify that the measurement variables used to reflect the unobserved constructs do so in a reliable manner. The Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was utilized to test the fitness of the model and to provide evidence of discriminate validity through chi-square difference tests. Data were collected from a sample of 179 branches of two banks in Tehran، Iran. Analysis with the bootstrapping method showed that employees’ abilities mediated the relationship between performance appraisal and service quality. Furthermore، the result of this article showed training practices had an indirect significant relationship with service quality through employees’ abilities. Overall، the findings of the current study provided insights into the role of HRPs and employees’ abilities in firm performance. Furthermore، it becomes important for organizations to build strategic practices in terms of training، career development، participation، and performance appraisal.