Crossing cultural barriers: an initial cross-cultural validation of the Arabic compared to the German version of the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Checklist for DSM-5 using multi-group confirmatory factor analysis

The present study supports previous research indicating that the factorial structure of the PCL-5 is consistent across both language versions in the CFA. Nevertheless, our findings show a lack of scalar invariance in the MGCFA, which suggests potential bias in the cross-linguistic and cross-cultural comparability of the PCL-5 sum scores between the Arabic and the German versions. This highlights the need for context-, language-, and culture-sensitive diagnostics to ensure accurate PTSD assessments.