title: The anxiety severity interview for children and adolescents: an individualized repeated measure of anxiety severity.
abstract: The Anxiety Severity Interview for Children and Adolescents (ASICA) was developed for the repeated assessment of the impact of anxiety and control over anxiety symptoms. The ASICA incorporates three main components of anxiety: physical response, avoidant behaviour and anxious thoughts. The objective of this study was to evaluate the psychometric properties of the ASICA in children with anxiety disorder (n = 139, age 8-18 years) and a non-anxious control group (n = 40, age 8-18 years). A confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the intended factor structure. Internal reliability was moderate to good; inter-rater reliability was excellent. Four-week test-retest reliability was good. The ASICA discriminated between anxious and non-anxious children and appeared sensitive to treatment change. A cut-off score of 13 was determined. Convergent validity with anxiety symptoms was moderate; discriminant validity with depressive symptoms was less strong. The results suggest that the ASICA is a reliable instrument that could be used in clinical practice to repeatedly monitor anxiety severity.
authors.affiliation: Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Academic Medical Centre/De Bascule, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Sanne M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Hogendoorn
authors.forename: Else
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: de Haan
authors.forename: Lidewij H
authors.initials: LH
authors.lastname: Wolters
authors.forename: Leentje
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Vervoort
authors.forename: Pier J M
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Prins
authors.forename: Annika
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: de Bourgraaf
authors.forename: Nicolien A C
authors.initials: NA
authors.lastname: Scheerman
authors.forename: Maaike H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Nauta
authors.forename: Catharina A
authors.initials: CA
authors.lastname: Hartman
authors.forename: Frits
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Boer
authors.forename: Wayne K
authors.initials: WK
authors.lastname: Goodman
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D002648:Child; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007406:Interview, Psychological / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards*; D008297:Male; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires
keywords: Adolescents; Anxiety; CY-BOCS; Children; Repeated Assessment