Psychometric validation of the Chinese version of the desire thinking questionnaire in adolescent mobile phone users

Desire thinking is a conscious and voluntary cognitive process that is closely linked to levels of craving and addictive behaviors. The Desire Thinking Questionnaire (DTQ) can be used to measure desire thinking in all age groups as well as in addicts. This measurement has also been translated into several languages. This study aimed to test the psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the DTQ (DTQ-C) among adolescent mobile phone users. One thousand and ninety-seven adolescents who own a mobile phone and are younger than 18 years old completed the DTQ-C and a battery of questionnaires assessing the big five personality traits, negative affect, brooding, self-control, craving, and problematic mobile phone use (PMPU). The psychometric analyses of the DTQ-C were conducted, including exploratory factor analysis (EFA), confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), reliability, and validity analysis. The EFA revealed a 10-item two-factor structure (i.e., verbal perseveration and imaginal prefiguration) that was confirmed by the CFA. The results of CFA showed fit indexes of χ2/df = 4.83, CFI = 0.967, TLI = 0.954, RMSEA = 0.059, SRMR = 0.032. The total scale had internal consistency reliabilities of 0.93, which demonstrated that DTQ-C presented good reliability. The two dimensions were correlated with PMPU (rverbal perseveration = 0.54; rimaginal prefiguration = 0.45), neuroticism (rverbal perseveration = 0.18; rimaginal prefiguration = 0.14), conscientiousness (rverbal perseveration = −0.19; rimaginal prefiguration = −0.18), depression (rverbal perseveration = 0.22; rimaginal prefiguration = 0.16), anxiety (rverbal perseveration = 0.26; rimaginal prefiguration = 0.22), stress (rverbal perseveration = 0.15; rimaginal prefiguration = 0.10) and self-control (rverbal perseveration = −0.29; rimaginal prefiguration = −0.26), which demonstrated that DTQ-C presented good concurrent validity. The two factors of DTQ-C correlated weakly with brooding (ranging from 0.08 to 0.10). The principal component factor analysis of the two dimensions of desire thinking and craving showed that craving and desire thinking belonged to different dimensions. Both of which showed good divergent validity of desire thinking. Additionally, an examination of incremental validity revealed that two factors were both positively associated with PMPU beyond demographic characteristics, big five personality traits, negative affect, and self-control (Bverbal perseveration = 0.49 and Bimaginal prefiguration = 0.13). It has been found that the 10-item DTQ-C is a reliable and valid measure of desire thinking in Chinese adolescent mobile phone users.