What does the Chinese version of the Beck Depression Inventory measure in Chinese students--general psychopathology or depression?

Abstract

The Chinese version of the Beck Depression Inventory (C-BDI) was administered to 2,150 Chinese secondary-school students, along with other measures of psychological well-being. While C-BDI scores were found to correlate significantly with all other measures of psychological well-being for the various samples, the results showed that they correlated most strongly with the Depression factor of the Chinese General Health Questionnaire. The Depression factor of the Chinese GHQ was observed to be most predictive of C-BDI scores. These data are generally consistent with the empirical data on the relationship between the BDI and other measures of psychological well-being; the claim that the BDI is more a measure of "general psychopathology" is not supported by the present findings.