title: Development and psychometric evaluation of the pleasant activities list.
abstract: This paper describes the development of a new 139-item behavioral questionnaire (PAL) assessing the frequency and enjoyability of pleasant activities occurring in the natural environment of patients with substance use disorders. The sample consisted of 265 patients with mainly substance use disorders and 272 healthy controls. Group comparisons indicated that patients reported lower frequency, enjoyability, and cross-product activity scores than controls. This study confirms previous findings that addiction is associated with a decreased level of engagement in pleasant activities. The PAL seems to be a standardized, feasible, and valid instrument to sample non-substance-related rewarding activities in patients' everyday lives.
authors.affiliation: Department of Forensic Psychiatry, Erasmus University Medical Centre, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. h.roozen@boumanggz.nl
authors.forename: Hendrik G
authors.initials: HG
authors.lastname: Roozen
authors.forename: Hans
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Wiersema
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Strietman
authors.forename: Jan A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Feij
authors.forename: Peter M
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Lewinsohn
authors.forename: Robert J
authors.initials: RJ
authors.lastname: Meyers
authors.forename: Margot
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Koks
authors.forename: J J M
authors.initials: JJ
authors.lastname: Vingerhoets