Citation

Baum C, Kuyken W, Bohus M, Heidenreich T, Michalak J, Steil R. Assessment 2010; 17(2): 220-229.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2010, SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.1177/1073191109356525

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

The Kentucky Inventory of Mindfulness Skills (KIMS) is a well-validated multidimensional questionnaire measuring dimensions of mindfulness on four scales: Observing, Describing, Act With Awareness, and Accept Without Judgment. Even though the KIMS has been used in several clinical studies no information is available about the psychometric properties in different clinical samples. The present study includes two clinical samples: a German sample of people diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, or major depression and an English sample of people diagnosed with recurrent depression. Results of confirmatory factor analysis offer good support for the hypothesized model of four correlated factors, whereas the model of one general underlying mindfulness factor as a second order construct was not confirmed. Furthermore, our analyses revealed that the KIMS scales show high internal consistency and that all KIMS scales are sensitive to change in a subsample of participants taking part in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy.