title: Assessment of implicit health attitudes: a multitrait-multimethod approach and a comparison between patients with hypochondriasis and patients with anxiety disorders.
abstract: Two adaptations of the Implicit Association Task were used to assess implicit anxiety (IAT-Anxiety) and implicit health attitudes (IAT-Hypochondriasis) in patients with hypochondriasis (n = 58) and anxiety patients (n = 71). Explicit anxieties and health attitudes were assessed using questionnaires. The analysis of several multitrait-multimethod models indicated that the low correlation between explicit and implicit measures of health attitudes is due to the substantial methodological differences between the IAT and the self-report questionnaire. Patients with hypochondriasis displayed significantly more dysfunctional explicit and implicit health attitudes than anxiety patients, but no differences were found regarding explicit and implicit anxieties. The study demonstrates the specificity of explicit and implicit dysfunctional health attitudes among patients with hypochondriasis.
authors.affiliation: a Department of Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy University of Frankfurt , Germany.
authors.forename: Florian
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Weck
authors.forename: Volkmar
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Höfling
mesh_terms: D000046:Academic Medical Centers; D000328:Adult; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology*; D001294:Attitude to Health; D005260:Female; D005858:Germany; D006801:Humans; D006998:Hypochondriasis / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015999:Multivariate Analysis; D010045:Outpatients; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires / Q000592:standards*; D055815:Young Adult