Conditional administration of items in the Gambling Harms Measure: Psychometric justification and implications for efficiency.

OBJECTIVE: This study evaluated the psychometric justification for conditionally administering the most severe items within subscales of the Gambling Harms Measure (GHM), a tool assessing gambling-related harms across six domains: financial, psychological, relationship, physical health, work/study, and legal. METHOD: test comparing total scores with and without conditional items. A confirmatory factor analysis evaluated potential changes in factorial structure due to conditional administration. RESULTS: = 0.10-.0.12), but equivalence testing supported practical equivalence within 0.1 raw score bounds. Confirmatory factor analysis supported a single-factor model. CONCLUSIONS: Conditional administration of the most severe items on the GHM preserves psychometric properties while reducing response burden. This method may enhance feasibility in large-scale surveys or screening interviews without compromising reliability or validity. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2026 APA, all rights reserved).