Development and validation of the penn state worry questionnaire

https://doi.org/10.1016/0005-7967(90)90135-6Get rights and content

Abstract

The present report describes the development of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire to measure the trait of worry. The 16-item instrument emerged from factor analysis of a large number of items and was found to possess high internal consistency and good test-retest reliability. The questionnaire correlates predictably with several psychological measures reasonably related to worry, and does not correlate with other measures more remote to the construct. Responses to the questionnaire are not influenced by social desirability. The measure was found to significantly discriminate college samples (a) who met all, some, or none of the DSM-III-R diagnostic criteria for generalized anxiety disorder and (b) who met criteria for GAD vs posttraumatic stress disorder. Among 34 GAD-diagnosed clinical subjects, the worry questionnaire was found not to correlate with other measures of anxiety or depression, indicating that it is tapping an independent construct with severely anxious individuals, and coping desensitization plus cognitive therapy was found to produce significantly greater reductions in the measure than did a nondirective therapy condition.

References (44)

  • T.D. Borkovec et al.

    The effect of worry on cardiovascular response to phobic imagery

    Behaviour Research and Therapy

    (1989)
  • J.M. Burger et al.

    The desirability of control

    Motivation and Emotion

    (1979)
  • D.D. Burns

    The perfectionist's script for self-defeat

    Psychology Today

    (1980)
  • J.T. Cacioppo et al.

    The efficient assessment of need for cognition

    Journal of Personality Assessment

    (1984)
  • D.L. Chambless et al.

    Assessment of fear in agoraphobics: The body sensations questionnaire and the agoraphobic cognitions questionnaire

    Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

    (1984)
  • J. Cohen et al.

    Applied multiple regression / correlation analysis for the behavioral sciences

    (1975)
  • D.P. Crowne et al.

    The approval motive: Studies in evaluative dependence

    (1964)
  • J.L. Deffenbacher

    Worry and emotionality in test anxiety

  • E. Diener et al.

    The independence of positive and negative affect

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1984)
  • P.A. DiNardo et al.

    Reliability of DSM-III anxiety disorder categories using a new structured interview

    Archives of General Psychiatry

    (1983)
  • A. Fenigstein et al.

    Public and private self-consciousness: Assessment and theory

    Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology

    (1975)
  • S. Folkman et al.

    Coping as a mediator of emotion

    Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

    (1988)
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text