Psychometric Evaluation of the Persian Version of Spontaneous Use of Imagery Scale in the Iranian Population

 In recent years, particular emphasis has been placed on the role of mental imagery in psychopathologies.

 The current study aimed to investigate the psychometric properties of the Persian version of the Spontaneous Use of Imagery Scale (SUIS-P) in the general Iranian population.

 The current psychometric study was carried out on 474 Iranian individuals in 2020 through convenience sampling. The SUIS, ambiguous scenarios test relevant to depressed mood (AST-D), and Beck Depression Inventory-second edition (BDI-II) were filled out by the study subjects. Moreover, for the determination of divergent validity between the SUIS and BDI-II, the Pearson correlation was also used. Data analysis was performed by SPSS Software (version 24).

 The internal consistency of the total score of the SUIS was acceptable (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.75). The significant positive relationship between the SUIS and AST-D (r = 0.34; P < 0.01) showed good convergent validity. No significant correlation was observed between the SUIS and BDI-II. Factor analysis using the principal component analysis with a varimax rotation introduced four factors. The four factors explained 0.55 of the total variance. Regarding construct validity, the inter-item correlation and item-total correlations of the SUIS-P were in an acceptable range.

 Based on the results, the SUIS has excellent psychometric properties in the Iranian population and can be used in research and therapeutic interventions.