title: Fear questionnaires for simple phobias: psychometric evaluations of a Norwegian sample.
abstract: The present study presents psychometric data for four different phobic fear questionnaires in a Norwegian sample of 284 subjects. The questionnaires concerned fear of flying, snakes, spiders and a questionnaire of general phobic complaints. The results showed a high estimate of internal consistency, and a very high test-retest reliability for all questionnaires. A low to moderate degree of intercorrelation between the questionnaires appeared. A clear sex difference emerged in responding to all four questionnaires. In addition, a clinical sample of phobics with fear of flying as the main symptom was compared to the larger sample on a fear of flying scale. The results showed a clear difference in responding between the samples. The present study concludes that the four different fear questionnaires yielded a high degree of reliability, and their use in clinical practice is encouraged.
authors.affiliation: Department of Somatic Psychology, University of Bergen, Norway.
authors.forename: B H
authors.initials: BH
authors.lastname: Johnsen
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hugdahl
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D005239:Fear; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009664:Norway; D010556:Personality Tests; D010698:Phobic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D011594:Psychometrics; D013026:Space Flight