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Objectives: The present study aimed to evaluate the measurement invariance of a general measure of the perception of governmental responses to COVID-|19 (COVID-SCORE-10) in the general population of 13 Latin American countries., Methods: A total of 5780 individuals from 13 Latin American and Caribbean countries selected by non-probabilistic snowball sampling participated. A confirmatory factor analysis was performed and the alignment method was used to evaluate invariance. Additionally, a graded response model was used for the assessment of item characteristics., Results: The results indicate that there is approximate measurement invariance of the COVID-SCORE-10 among the participating countries. Furthermore, IRT results suggest that the COVID-SCORE-10 measures with good psychometric ability a broad spectrum of the construct assessed, especially around average levels. Comparison of COVID-SCORE-10 scores indicated that participants from Cuba, Uruguay and El Salvador had the most positive perceptions of government actions to address the pandemic. Thus, the underlying construct of perception of government actions was equivalent in all countries., Conclusion: The results show the importance of initially establishing the fundamental measurement properties and MI before inferring the cross-cultural universality of the construct to be measured., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Background: There is an urgent need to assess changes in well-being on a multinational scale during the COVID-19 pandemic, thus culturally valid scales must be available., Methods: With this in mind, this study examined the invariance of the WHO well-being index (WHO-5) among a sample of 5183 people from 12 Latin Americans countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay)., Results: The results of the present study indicate that the WHO-5 is strictly invariant across samples from different Latin American countries. Furthermore, the results of the IRT analysis indicate that all items of the WHO-5 were highly discriminative and that the difficulty required to respond to each of the five items is ascending. Additionally, the results indicated the presence of moderate and small size differences in subjective well-being among most countries., Conclusion: The WHO-5 is useful for assessing subjective well-being in 12 Latin American countries during the COVID-19 pandemic, since the differences between scores can be attributed to differences in well-being and not in other characteristics of the scale., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

Thousands of people have died of COVID-19 in El Salvador. However, little is known about the mental health of those who are mourning the loss of a loved one to COVID-19. Therefore, the objective of this study was to examine the dysfunctional grief associated with COVID-19 death among Salvadoran adults. A sample of 435 Salvadorans (M = 29 years; SD = 8.75) who lost a family member or loved one to COVID-19 completed a digital survey using the Google Forms platform, during April 2 and 28, 2022. The results revealed that 35.1% reported clinically elevated symptoms of dysfunctional grief and among those mourners, and 25.1% also exhibited clinical levels of coronavirus anxiety. A binary logistic regression revealed that predictor variables such as COVID-19 anxiety (p = .003), depression (p = .021), and COVID-19 obsession (p = .032) were significant (χ 2  = 84.31; Nagelkerke R 2  = .242) and predict a 24.2% chance of dysfunctional bereavement., (© 2023. The Author(s).)

The Purpose in Life Test (PIL) is a measure of purpose in life widely used in many cultures and countries; however, cross-cultural assessments are scarce. The present study aimed to evaluate the cross-cultural measurement invariance of the PIL in the general population of seven Latin American countries (Colombia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Mexico, Paraguay, Argentina, and Uruguay). A total of 4306 people participated, selected by non-probabilistic convenience sampling, where Uruguay has the highest mean age ( M = 41.8; SD = 16.6 years); while Ecuador has the lowest mean age ( M = 24.6; SD = 7.8 years). Furthermore, in each country, there is a higher proportion of women (>60%) than men (<40%). Using Multi-Group Confirmatory Factor Analysis, the factorial structure does not show evidence of invariance among the included countries. However, based on the Multi-Group Factor Analysis Alignment, there is evidence that a three-dimensional structure of the PIL (Meaning of existence, Freedom to make meaning in daily life and Will to find meaning in the face of future challenges) is the same in the participating countries. Results based on item response theory indicate that most PIL items can significantly differentiate responses according to the level of life purpose. In addition, people with low life purpose will tend to choose the lower response alternatives on the PIL; while people with higher life purpose will choose higher response alternatives. The findings indicate that the PIL has the potential to increase knowledge about how people conceive and experience their purpose in life in different countries., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Caycho-Rodríguez, Vilca, Cervigni, Gallegos, Martino, Calandra, Rey Anacona, López-Calle, Moreta-Herrera, Chacón-Andrade, Lobos-Rivera, del Carpio, Quintero, Robles, Panza Lombardo, Gamarra Recalde, Buschiazzo Figares, White and Burgos-Videla.)

Aims: Over the past 2 years, the vaccine conspiracy beliefs construct has been used in a number of different studies. These publications have assessed the determinants and outcomes of vaccine conspiracy beliefs using, in some cases, pooled data from different countries, and compared the results across these contexts. However, studies often do not consider measurement invariance as a necessary requirement for comparative analyses. Therefore, the aim of this study was to develop and evaluate the cross-cultural MI of the COVID-19 Vaccine Conspiracy Beliefs Scale (COVID-VCBS) in 12 Latin American countries., Methods: Confirmatory factor analysis, item response theory analysis and alignment method were applied to test measurement invariance in a large number of groups., Results: The COVID-VCBS showed robust psychometric properties and measurement invariance for both factor loadings and crosstabs. Also, a higher level of acceptance of conspiracy beliefs about vaccines is necessary to respond to higher response categories. Similarly, greater acceptance of conspiracy beliefs about COVID-19 vaccines was related to a lower intention to be vaccinated., Conclusion: The results allow for improved understanding of conspiracy beliefs about COVID-19 vaccines in the countries assessed; furthermore, they provide researchers and practitioners with an invariant measure that they can use in cross-cultural studies in Latin America. However, further studies are needed to test invariance in other countries, with the goal of developing a truly international measure of conspiracy beliefs about COVID-19 vaccines., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Caycho-Rodríguez, Valencia, Ventura-León, Vilca, Carbajal-León, Reyes-Bossio, White, Rojas-Jara, Polanco-Carrasco, Gallegos, Cervigni, Martino, Palacios, Moreta-Herrera, Samaniego-Pinho, Lobos-Rivera, Figares, Puerta-Cortés, Corrales-Reyes, Calderón, Tapia, Arias Gallegos and Petzold.)

Conspiracy theories about COVID-19 began to emerge immediately after the first news about the disease and threaten to prolong the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic by limiting people's willingness of receiving a life-saving vaccine. In this context, this study aimed to explore the variation of conspiracy beliefs regarding COVID-19 and the vaccine against it in 5779 people living in 13 Latin American countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela) according to sociodemographic variables such as gender, age, educational level and source of information about COVID-19. The study was conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic between September 15 and October 25, 2021. The Spanish-language COVID-19 Vaccine Conspiracy Beliefs Scale (ECCV-COVID) and a sociodemographic survey were used. The results indicate that, in most countries, women, people with a lower educational level and those who receive information about the vaccine and COVID-19 from family/friends are more supportive of conspiracy ideas regarding the COVID-19 vaccine. In the case of age, the results vary by country. The analysis of the responses to each of the questions of the ECCV-COVID reveals that, in general, the countries evaluated are mostly in some degree of disagreement or indecision regarding conspiratorial beliefs about COVID-19 vaccines. The findings could help open further study which could support prevention and treatment efforts during the COVID-19 pandemic., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2022 Caycho-Rodríguez, Ventura-León, Valencia, Vilca, Carbajal-León, Reyes-Bossio, White, Rojas-Jara, Polanco-Carrasco, Gallegos, Cervigni, Martino, Palacios, Moreta-Herrera, Samaniego-Pinho, Lobos Rivera, Buschiazzo Figares, Puerta-Cortés, Corrales-Reyes, Calderón, Pinto Tapia, Arias Gallegos and Petzold.)

The invariance of the Preventive COVID-19 Infection Behaviors Scale (PCIBS) was evaluated in 12 Latin American countries (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Paraguay, Peru, and Uruguay). A total of 5183 people from the aforementioned countries participated, selected using the snowball sampling method. Measurement invariance was assessed by multigroup confirmatory factor analysis (MG-CFA) and Multi-Group Factor Analysis Alignment (CFA-MIAL). In addition, item characteristics were assessed based on Item Response Theory. The results indicate that the original five-item version of the PCIBS is not adequate; whereas a four-item version of the PCIBS (PCIBS-4) showed a good fit in all countries. Thus, using the MG-CFA method, the PCIBS-4 achieved metric invariance, while the CFA-MIAL method indicated that the PCIBS-4 shows metric and scalar invariance. Likewise, the four items present increasing difficulties and high values in the discrimination parameters. The comparison of means of the PCIBS-4 reported irrelevant differences between countries; however, Mexico and Peru presented the highest frequency of preventive behaviors related to COVID-19. It is concluded that the PCIBS-4 is a unidimensional self-report measure which is reliable and invariant across the twelve participating Latin American countries. It is expected that the findings will be of interest to social and health scientists, as well as those professionals directly involved in public health decision making., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Caycho-Rodríguez, Vilca, Valencia, Carbajal-León, Vivanco-Vidal, Saroli-Araníbar, Reyes-Bossio, White, Rojas-Jara, Polanco-Carrasco, Gallegos, Cervigni, Martino, Palacios, Moreta-Herrera, Samaniego-Pinho, Lobos-Rivera, Ferrari, Flores-Mendoza, Figares, Puerta-Cortés, Corrales-Reyes, Calderón, Tapia and Gallegos.)

The COVID-19 pandemic has gravely impacted Latin America. A model was tested that evaluated the contribution of socio-demographic factors and fear of COVID-19 on anxiety and depression in samples of residents in seven Latin American countries (Argentina, Ecuador, Mexico, Paraguay, Uruguay, Colombia, and El Salvador). A total of 4,881 individuals, selected by convenience sampling, participated in the study. Moderate and severe levels of depressive symptoms and anxiety were identified, as well as a moderate average level of fear of COVID-19. In addition, it was observed that about a quarter of the participants presented symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder and a major depressive episode. Fear of COVID-19 significantly and positively predicted anxiety and depressive symptoms, whereas the effects of socio-demographic variables are generally low [χ 2 (287) = 5936.96, p < 0.001; RMSEA = 0.064 [0.062, 0.065]; CFI = 0.947; and SRMR = 0.050]. This suggests the need for the implementation of preventive actions in the general population of these countries, with the aim of reducing the prevalence of depressive, anxious and fearful symptoms related to COVID-19., Competing Interests: OR was employed by company Sensorium Corp. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2021 Caycho-Rodríguez, Tomás, Vilca, Carbajal-León, Cervigni, Gallegos, Martino, Barés, Calandra, Anacona, López-Calle, Moreta-Herrera, Chacón-Andrade, Lobos-Rivera, del Carpio, Quintero, Robles, Lombardo, Recalde, Figares, White and Videla.)