The assessment of factorial invariance in need for cognition using Hispanic and Anglo samples.

The Need for Cognition Scale-Short Form (NCS-SF; J. T. Cacioppo, R. E. Petty, & C. F. Kao, 1984) is a commonly administered measure in the behavioral sciences, but little research has assessed its applicability across cultures. A sample of undergraduates in the southeastern United States and a sample of undergraduates at a southwestern U.S. university completed the NCS-SE Hispanic respondents did not differ from Anglos in their mean NCS-SF scores. Confirmatory factor analysis revealed that factor parameter estimates and item intercepts were partially measurement invariant across samples.