title: Symptom-positively and -negatively worded items in two popular self-report inventories of anxiety and depression.
abstract: Substantially higher mean scores on symptom-negatively versus symptom-positively worded items have consistently been reported in the literature for the balanced State-Trait Anxiety Inventory. In this study we aimed to replicate and extend these findings to Dutch trait versions of the inventory and Zung's similarly balanced Self-rating Depression Scale. Analysis indicated significantly higher mean subscale scores for symptom-negative as opposed to symptom-positive items of both measures, across sexes and age groups as well as across different levels of distress in nonclinical (n = 863), subclinical (n = 450), and clinical subject samples (n = 96). Sex and age differences were mainly confirmed to symptom-positive subscales. Scale intercorrelations were lowest between symptom-positively and symptom-negatively worded scales both within and across measures. Factor analyzing the combined measures identified a symptom-negative and a symptom-positive factor, tentatively labeled "absence of positive affect" and "presence of negative affect." Several explanations of the findings among which item-intensity specificity, the response style of social desirability, and the trait model of positive and negative affectivity are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Medical Psychology, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mook
authors.forename: W C
authors.initials: WC
authors.lastname: Kleijn
authors.forename: H M
authors.initials: HM
authors.lastname: van der Ploeg
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001007:Anxiety / Q000175:diagnosis*; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis; D003863:Depression / Q000175:diagnosis*; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011594:Psychometrics; D012737:Sex Factors