The 12 instruments for the evaluation of anxiety disorders

These are the most commonly used assessment instruments for anxiety disorders in psychology.

Currently, a large part of the world's population lives in a globalized society, which undergoes continuous changes at great speed, so that people often have difficulty adapting to them and, therefore, cases of anxiety suffering are increasing.

Given the high prevalence of anxiety disorders in the population worldwide, professionals have increasingly greater demands for detection and treatment of these disorders, so they have come to develop a multitude of assessment instruments for anxiety disorders, as well as specific psychological treatments.

In this article we will discuss the most commonly used instruments for the assessment of anxiety disorders.We have found some both to measure anxiety as a general construct, as well as to measure various more specific anxiety disorders (e.g., phobias, generalized anxiety, etc.).

The most commonly used anxiety disorder assessment instruments.

These are the most frequently used anxiety disorder assessment instruments in the field of clinical psychology.

1. State-Trait Anxiety Questionnaire (STAI)

The State-Trait Anxiety and Trait Anxiety Questionnaire developed by Spielberger and co-workers is one of the most widely used anxiety disorder assessment instruments, if not the one most frequently used by professionals.

Anxiety-state is defined as a process of intense emotional activation before a stimulus that the person perceives as dangerous or before the anticipation of the same one.Therefore, some actions are taken in order to anticipate or protect oneself from it, such as acts of flight and avoidance of the risks that he/she considers that he/she will run if faced with the feared situation. In this case the person feels anxiety at a particular time and usually calms down when the stimulus that considers dangerous has disappeared, but does not have to have a predisposition to feel that way.

In the case of trait anxiety, the symptoms experienced by the person are quite similar to those felt in a case of state anxiety; however, in this case the person has a greater predisposition to feel anxious, and may even experience feelings of restlessness and worry without some stimulus in the environment that triggered them.. In this case, it could be said that when a case of trait anxiety is detected, it is because the person being evaluated usually experiences states of tension on a regular basis.

On the other hand, it should be noted that the STAI questionnaire for anxiety is composed of 2 scales of 20 items each; one to measure state anxiety and the other to measure trait anxiety. In addition, its items are answered on a Likert scale (from 0 to 3) and the scores can range from 20 to 80 points, this score being directly proportional, in an ascending manner, to the degree of anxiety experienced by the person being evaluated.

This is one of the assessment instruments for anxiety disorders that can also be used during the evaluation process of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), social phobia, generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), eating disorders (ED), among others.

Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI) 2.

This instrument was developed mainly for the purpose of measure clinical anxiety or the state of anxiety prolonged over time.. Unlike other instruments for the evaluation of anxiety disorders that are also used to evaluate cases of depression, as is the case of the STAI, the BAI is responsible for measuring anxiety in a more specific way, because its items have less content related to depression.

This inventory to measure anxiety was developed by Aaron Beck and Robert A. Steer, in order to measure anxiety in a Wide range of clinical patients and in the general population aged 13 years and older. On the other hand, This inventory is composed of 21 items to be answered on a Likert-type scale with a score of 0 to 3 points per item. with a score of 0 to 3 points per item, so that the maximum anxiety score would be 63 points.

The cut-off points of this inventory to measure anxiety are as follows:

• Very low anxiety: 0 to 21 points.
• Moderate anxiety: 22 to 35 points.
• Severe anxiety: 36 to 63 points.

Other instruments for the evaluation of anxiety disorders

We will now briefly explain some of the instruments most commonly used to measure other anxiety disorders: generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder, social phobia and selective mutism.

1. Instruments to assess generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).

These are some of the most commonly used generalized anxiety disorder assessment instruments.

1.1 Questionnaire for the Diagnosis of Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GADQ-M)

The Spanish version of this questionnaire, developed by Sandín, is composed of 11 items that are used to diagnose the disorder. which are used to diagnose generalized anxiety disorder in a short time. It is important to note that its items are mainly focused on providing information about the characteristics of the concerns of the evaluee; although it has the DSM-IV criteria as a reference, since no new or revised edition has been made.

1.2 Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ)

This questionnaire contains 16 items that serve to assess pathological and generalized worry.i.e., a preoccupation that is uncontrollable and excessive. Its most modern version is number 11 (PSWQ-11).

2. Instruments to assess panic disorder

In the following, we will briefly explain some of the instruments for the assessment of anxiety disorders that have been developed more specifically for panic disorder and agoraphobia.

2.1 Agoraphobia Inventory (AI)

The Spanish version of this questionnaire was developed by Echeburúa and collaborators and consists of 69 items. is composed of 69 items that have been elaborated to evaluate the symptoms of agoraphobia..

This inventory is divided into 2 parts:

• Part 1: to assess avoidance, bodily sensations and related cognitions.
• Part 2: to assess a number of possible moderating factors of these anxiety responses.

2.2 Panic and Agoraphobia Questionnaire (CPA)

This questionnaire consists of 40 items to evaluate and diagnose panic disorder and agoraphobia, following the DSM-IV criteria.following the DSM-IV criteria.

The advantages of this test are the following:

• It allows detecting the severity of panic attacks.
• It enables the diagnosis of panic disorder and agoraphobia.
• It can be used to detect panic coping, interoceptive avoidance and agoraphobia, among others.

2.3 Abbreviated Questionnaire for Panic Disorder (CATP)

It has been developed by Sandín and collaborators, and revised in 2015. It is composed of 14 items that assess three relevant factors of panic disorder through 3 scales:

• Panic severity.
• Catastrophic interpretations of panic.
• The individual's self-efficacy in the face of panic.

2.4 Child and Adolescent Panic Attack Questionnaire (CAPN)

It is a 28-item version to evaluate and diagnose panic disorder, being a version developed specifically for children and adolescents.

3. Instruments to evaluate phobias

In this section we will see which are the instruments that are usually used in the clinical field of psychology to evaluate phobias.

3.1 Inventory of School Fears (IME)

This is one of the instruments for the evaluation of anxiety disorders, although this one is more specific, since it is more focused on anxiety disorders.It is more focused on the anxiety symptoms experienced in the face of certain school fears. There are 3 different versions, each of them focused on a population group of a particular stage of development.

It is used to evaluate fears related to the school context: fear of physical discomfort, school failure, punishment, social evaluation, among others.

3.2 Fear Questionnaire for Children FSSC-English (FSSC-E)

It is composed of 80 items and has an abbreviated version (25 items) and updated from 2016, conducted by Sandín and collaborators.

It is a questionnaire that is used to evaluate fear of danger, fear of death, fear of animals, fear of strangers, social fears and medical fears..

3.3 Fear Inventory FSS-III-66

The Spanish version has 60 items and is used to evaluate the following phobias: social fears, agoraphobic fears, fears of what is unfamiliar or unfamiliar, fears of blood-injections, harm, and fears of animals.

4. Instruments for assessing separation anxiety disorder (SAD)

The following are some of the most commonly used separation anxiety disorder assessment instruments.

4.1 Separation Anxiety Symptom Inventory (SASI)

This questionnaire consists of 15 items and serves to assess separation anxiety retrospectively in adults, although it focuses on assessing separation anxiety caused at an early age.although it focuses on assessing separation anxiety caused at an early age.

4.2 Childhood Separation Anxiety Questionnaire (CASI)

This 26-item questionnaire is intended for children between 6 and 11 years of age. It primarily assesses separation worry, separation distress and calmness about separation.. It also has a version for the child's parents to answer.

4.3 Early Onset Separation Anxiety Questionnaire (CASIT)

This questionnaire consists of 24 items and is oriented to a very small population group (children aged 3-5 years). It is administered by the child's parents. and it assesses separation anxiety in relation to sleep, day-to-day events or the loss or harm of a loved one.