A Systematic Review of Values-Based Psychometric Tools Within Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)

The ACT model consists of acceptance, cognitive defusion, contact with the present moment, self-as-context, values, and committed action, which together create psychological flexibility. Limited research has examined the unique contribution of values-focused work in acceptance-based therapies. To investigate this in a reliable and valid way, it is critical to ensure that the instruments used to measure values are empirically sound. This review aims to identify value-based psychometric tools currently in use, and examine their ability to reliably and validly measure the ACT-defined concept of values. The current study searched PsycINFO, Medline, and PubMed databases for psychometric validation papers of values-measurement instruments. Seventeen values-measures were evaluated by extracting data relating to their content, structural, construct, convergent, and discriminant validity, as well as internal consistency and test-retest reliability. The COSMIN manual for systematic reviews of Patient-Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) was utilized as a guideline for assessing bias and examining the quality of psychometric tools identified. Outcomes suggest that the Valuing Questionnaire (Smout, Davies, Burns, & Christie, 2014), Engaged Living Scale (Trompetter et al., 2013), Valued Living Questionnaire (Wilson, Sandoz, Kitchens, & Roberts, 2010), Multidimensional Psychological Flexibility Inventory (Rolffs, Rogge, & Wilson, 2018), Acceptance and Action Questionnaire for Obsessions and Compulsions (Jacoby, Abramowitz, Buchholz, Reuman, & Blakey, 2018), and Bulls-Eye Values Survey (Lundgren, Luoma, Dahl, Strosahl, & Melin, 2012) have the best psychometric properties. A number of alternative values-based instruments demonstrate preliminary evidence for their utility, though further examination of these is necessary. This review also highlights a number of issues pertaining to the cohesiveness and psychometric comprehensiveness of current values-measurement research, with recommendations for improvement.