measurement of social-evaluative anxiety1 - APA PsycNET

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DAVID WATSON 2. University of Hawaii. RONALD FRIEND. University of Toronto. The specification of a construct of social anxiety, the subsequent development.
Journal oj Consulting and Clinical Psychology 1969, Vol. 33, No. 4, 448-457

MEASUREMENT OF SOCIAL-EVALUATIVE ANXIETY1 DAVID WATSON 2

RONALD FRIEND

University of Hawaii

University of Toronto

The specification of a construct of social anxiety, the subsequent development of two scales, and validational studies are reported. The two scales are the Fear of Negative Evaluation scale (FNE) and the Social Avoidance and Distress scale (SAD). The scales had very high indexes of homogeneity and possessed sufficient reliability. Three experiments and other correlational data are presented. People high in SAD tended to avoid social interactions, preferred to work alone, reported that they talked less, were more worried and less confident about social relationships, but were more likely to appear for appointments. Those high in FNE tended to become nervous in evaluative situations, and worked hard either to avoid disapproval or gain approval. Certain convergent and discriminant relationships had been part of the construct of social anxiety, and the correlational data supported these differentiations.

Several lines of research and theory point to the potential heuristic value of the development of a scale or scales to measure anxiety experienced in social situations. Those studies on the effects of social censure on the performance of psychotics (Rodnick & Garmezy, 1957), on the effect of disturbed family and social relationships in psychopathology (Gerard & Siegel, 19SO), and on the correlation between social incompetence and hospitalization (Zigler & Phillips, 1962) have all suggested that distressful social relationships may be one powerful determinant of psychopathology. A second line of research has followed the idea that some individuals are more anxious than others in social situations, and might therefore be more persuasible (Sears, 1967), more concerned with others' evaluations of themselves (Diggory, 1966), or simply be upset at having to interact with other people (Byrne, McDonald, & Mikawa, 1963). A third line of evidence which points to the need for social anxiety scales is that which suggests that anxiety scales which confine their questions to specific situations or conditions, (Endler & Hunt, 1966) have greater predictive validity for those specific situations than those scales which sparsely 1

sample diverse situations. There do exist two sets of items which have been nominated as measuring social anxiety (Dixon, deMonchaux, & Sandier, 1957; Sears, 1967) but these items either are too few or have no underlying construct, nor have they been controlled for response style problems such as acquiescence or social desirability, and they have never been validated. Social-evaluative anxiety was initially defined as the experience of distress, discomfort, fear, anxiety, etc., in social situations; as the deliberate avoidance of social situations; and finally as a fear of receiving negative evaluations from others. The first two aspects were combined to compose a Social Avoidance and Distress (SAD) scale, and the last factor was employed to compose a Fear of Negative Evaluation (FNE) scale. Specification of the Constructs The two scales were constructed at the same time. Three general goals were adopted: to suppress response style errors, to foster scale homogeneity, and to foster discriminant or convergent relationships with certain other scales. These goals can be approached by paying careful attention to the nature of the constructs from which the items follow. Anxiety often is inferred from verbalized subjective distress, the execution of avoidance responses, impaired performance, or certain physiological signs. Almost all anxiety scales are a haphazard mixture of items asking S to

This research was conducted while the first author was at the University of Toronto and was supported by Grant No. 67 from the Ontario Mental Health Foundation. 2 Requests for reprints should be sent to David Watson, Psychology Department, University of Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii 96822. 448

SOCIAL-EVALUATIVE ANXIETY report on these four aspects of his behavior or experience. It was decided in the construction of the present scales to exclude items asking about physiological signs or impaired performance. This would make clear what behavior was used as a sign for membership in the class "anxious"—subjective distress and avoidance—and what behavior was considered a correlate of class membership—impaired performance and physiological signs. The advantage of this specification is that one may later more easily distinguish between construct and predictive validity. A second, rarely followed, requisite for careful delineation of a construct is the necessity for adequate definition of the range of the trait, particularly its opposite instance (Jackson, 1966a). To control for acquiescence response set in a true-false format, as was done here, one must have approximately half of the items worded so that answering "false" indicates presence of the trait, which requires an adequate definition of the opposite instance. For example, the opposite instance of social avoidance is not necessarily social approach, that is, affiliation, but simply a lack of avoidance. If the opposite instance of avoidance were allowed to be affiliation it would have obscured any possible discriminant relationship between the SAD scale and measures of affiliation. Particular attention was paid to wording items so that the opposite instance of a trait simply indicated absence of that trait, not the presence of some other trait. Fear of negative evaluation was defined as apprehension about others' evaluations, distress over their negative evaluations, avoidance of evaluative situations, and the expectation that others would evaluate oneself negatively. The presence of high FNE does not necessarily imply that an individual evaluates himself negatively, or that he is concerned about revealing his inferiority (Dixon et al, 19S7). Fear of loss of social approval would be identical to FNE, but the opposite instance of FNE is simply lack of anxiety about others' evaluations, not inevitably a desire for positive evaluation. High FNE differs from test anxiety in that it is not specific to testing conditions, but may operate in any

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social, evaluative situation, such as being on a date, talking to one's superiors, or being interviewed for a job. The SAD scale was divided into two subscales, social avoidance and social distress. The purpose was to create a general scale, so the respondent was not asked why he experienced distress or avoided social encounters. Social avoidance was defined as avoiding being with, talking to, or escaping from others for any reason. Both actual avoidance and the desire for avoidance were included. The opposite instance was simple lack of an avoidance motive, not desire to affiliate. Social distress was defined as the reported experience of a negative emotion, such as being upset, distressed, tense, or anxious, in social interactions, or the reported lack of negative emotion, such as being relaxed, calm, at ease, or comfortable. The opposite instance of distress was lack of unhappiness, not the presence of some positive emotion. The item selection procedure was explicitly chosen to eliminate as much social desirability variance as possible, for questions about anxiety in social situations would tend to elicit great concern with issues of social desirability, and the additional variance would not have been helpful. In two other instances discriminant relationships were explicitly encouraged. Questions about S's reaction to testing situations were excluded, as there are already several test-anxiety scales in existence, and because the social anxiety scales could be more explicitly oriented to social situations. Finally, the authors attempted to foster a discriminant relationship between the SAD and FNE scales themselves, in the hope that separating them would increase their heuristic value. CONSTRUCTION OF THE SCALES Following the stringent criteria for evaluation of items suggested by Jackson (1966a), 145 items were selected by rational analysis from a much larger pool.3 These were then subjected to an empirical test, and the final 58 items which survived as the two scales 8

The authors wish to thank Barney Gilmore, Stewart Page, and Sybil Paterson, who either contributed suggestions for items or aided in their evaluation.

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are presented in Tables 1 and 2. The scoring key is given after each item. The SAD scale is evenly divided between true and false items; the FNE scale has 17 true and 13 false items. The 145 items initially selected were administered to 297 undergraduates at the UniTABLE l SOCIAL AVOIDANCE AND DISTRESS (SAD) SCALE 1. I feel relaxed even in unfamiliar social situations. (F) 2. I try to avoid situations which force me to be very sociable. (T) 3. It is easy for me to relax when I am with strangers. (F) 4. I have no particular desire to avoid people. (F) 5. I often find social occasions upsetting. (T) 6. I usually feel calm and comfortable at social occasions. (F) 7. I am usually at ease when talking to someone of the opposite sex. (F) 8. I try to avoid talking to people unless I know them well. (T) 9. If the chance comes to meet new people, I often take it. (F) 10. I often feel nervous or tense in casual get-togethers in which both sexes are present. (T) 11. I am usually nervous with people unless I know them well. (T) 12. I usually feel relaxed when I am with a group of people. (F) 13. I often want to get away from people. (T) 14. I usually feel uncomfortable when I am in a group of people I don't know. (T) 15. I usually feel relaxed when I meet someone for the first time. (F) 16. Being introduced to people makes me tense and nervous. (T) 17. Even though a room is full of strangers, I may enter it anyway. (F) 18. I would avoid walking up and joining a large group of people. (T) 19. When my superiors want to talk with me, I talk willingly. (T) 20. I often feel on edge when I am with a group of people. (T) 21. I tend to withdraw from people. (T) 22. I don't mind talking to people at parties or social gatherings. (F) 23. I am seldom at ease in a large group of people. (T) 24. I often think up excuses in order to avoid social engagements. (T) 25. I sometimes take the responsibility for introducing people to each other. (F) 26. I try to avoid formal social occasions. (T) 27. I usually go to whatever social engagements I have. (F) 28. I find it easy to relax with other people. (F)

TABLE 2 FEAR OF NEGATIVE EVALUATION (FNE) 1. I rarely worry about seeming foolish to others. (F) 2. I worry about what people will think of me even when I know it doesn't make any difference. (T) 3. I become tense and jittery if I know someone is sizing me up. (T) 4. I am unconcerned even if I know people are forming an unfavorable impression of me. (F) 5. I feel very upset when I commit some social error. (T) 6. The opinions that important people have of me cause me little concern. (F) 7. I am often afraid that I may look ridiculous or make a fool of myself. (T) 8. I react very little when other people disapprove of me. (F) 9. I am frequently afraid of other people noticing my shortcomings. (T) 10. The disapproval of others would have little effect on me. (F) 11. If someone is evaluating me I tend to expect the worst. (T) 12. I rarely worry about what kind of impression I am making on someone. (F) 13. I am afraid that others will not approve of me. (T) 14. I am afraid that people will find fault with me. (T) 15. Other people's opinions of me do not bother me. (F) 16. I am not necessarily upset if I do not please someone. (F) 17. When I am talking to someone, I worry about what they may be thinking about me. (T) 18. I feel that you can't help making social errors sometimes, so why worry about it. (F) 19. I am usually worried about what kind of impression I make. (T) 20. I worry a lot about what my superiors think of me. (T) 21. If I know someone is judging me, it has little effect on me. (F) 22. I worry that others will think I am not worthwhile. (T) 23. I worry very little about what others may think of me. (F) 24. Sometimes I think I am too concerned with what other people think of me. (T) 25. I often worry that I will say or do the wrong things. (T) 26. I am often indifferent to the opinions others have of me. (F) 27. I am usually confident that others will have a favorable impression of me. (F) 28. I often worry that people who are important to me won't think very much of me. (T) 29. I brood about the opinions my friends have about me. (T) 30. I become tense and jittery if I know I am being judged by my superiors. (T)

SOCIAL-EVALUATIVE ANXIETY versity of Toronto. The Crowne-Marlowe (1964) Social Desirability scale and the first 10 items of Jackson's (1966b) Infrequency scale were also administered. The latter was used to control for pseudorandom responding, and 5s who answered any of these items incorrectly were dropped from all analyses. Ninety-two 5s were dropped for this reason or because they did not answer all items. The Crowne-Marlowe scale provided an initial empirical criterion against which to evaluate the SAD and FNE items. Jackson's (1966a, 1967) item selection procedure was employed, to minimize covariation with social desirability as a response style. For every item for 205 5s a computer calculated the biserial correlation of the item with its own scale and the biserial correlation with all other scales in the sample. Items endorsed by less than 5% of the sample were dropped. Jackson's Differential Reliability Index (DRI) was calculated for each remaining item. In the first instance, the DRI was calculated for the item's own scale and the CrowneMarlowe, giving an estimate of the amount of correlation between an item and its own scale with social desirability variance removed. The first criterion for selecting items was that this DRI be as high as possible and in all cases above .50. It would not have been possible to apply further criteria had not the original rational analysis provided a large number of items which passed this first hurdle. The second criterion was that the probability of endorsement of each item must have been above 10% and as close to 50% as possible. Third, a discriminant relationship between the SAD and FNE was encouraged by using a DRI in which item-own scale correlation was estimated with variance attributable to the other scale removed, selecting those items with minimal common variance. Fourth, to control for acquiescence, items were selected by judging the adequacy of those representing the opposite instance of the trait. Finally, items were selected according to content dissimilarity and the representativeness of the situations about which the items inquired.

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Characteristics oj the Scales One of the major goals was to foster scale homogeneity. This can be expressed as the mean biserial correlation of each item with its own scale. The mean biserial correlation of the selected FNE items, corrected for presence of item in the total score, was .72; and of the selected SAD items, it was .77 (# = 205, / > < .01). The product-moment correlation of the two subscales of the SAD, avoidance and distress, was .75. A second index of homogeneity is the KR-20 reliability statistic. The KR-20s of both the selected FNE and SAD items were .94. The KR-20 of the Crowne-Marlowe was .79. In a second sample of 154 5s the KR-2Q of the FNE was .96 and that of the SAD was again .94. The two scales are very homogeneous. A second goal was to minimize the relationship of the scales to social desirability. The product-moment correlations of both the FNE and SAD with the Crowne-Marlowe scale were -.25 (N = 205, p < .01). These correlations might have been less had the Crowne-Marlowe itself been more homogeneous. In any case, the relationship with social desirability has been minimized. Another goal had been to foster a discriminant relationship between FNE and SAD. In the first sample, the product-moment correlation between the two was .51 (N = 205, p < .01). A later sample of 42, with which a Spearman correlation was used, showed a correlation of .32 (N = 42, p< .05). The attempt to foster a discriminant relationship between SAD and FNE did not eliminate all the common variance, probably because some people score highly on SAD just because they are fearful in social-evaluative situations. However, the common variance has been minimized. Neither of the scales was normally distributed. The distribution of the FNE was nearly rectangular. The mean was 15.47, the standard deviation was 8.62, and the median was 16. This rectangular!ty indicated that the entire range of the scale was well used. The distribution of the SAD was skewed. Although the modal score was zero, the mean was 9.11, the median was 7, and the standard deviation was 8.01. Separate analysis of the social avoidance and social distress subscales

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tions, and to prefer to be alone. Even the prospect of having to be in a future social interaction might make those high on SAD anxious. In this study Ss were told that they would later be required to participate in a group discussion or write an essay alone, and the effect of this expectation on their performance, anxiety, and other attitudes was observed. From the 82 5s scoring zero or one on the SAD, 46 were randomly selected as the low anxious (LA) group, and from the 85 scoring 12 or above, 52 were selected as the high anxious (HA) group. Within these two groups 5s were randomly assigned either to an Essay or Group Discussion condition. The 5s participated in the study in heterogeneous groups varying in size from 6 to 15. All 5s had the same female E. The Ss were told that they would actually be in two experiments, one to occur immediately and the second afterward. In the Essay condition, Ss were informed that in the second experiment they would be placed alone in a cubicle where they would write an essay on an interesting, controversial topic. In the Group Discussion condition, Ss were told that they would be placed in a small group in which they would be expected to participate actively in a discussion of an interesting, controversial topic. Envelopes labeled "Essay Writing" or "Group Discussion" which ostensibly contained material for the later work were provided. The Ss then participated in what was for them the first of two experiments, in which they had administered to them the Digit Symbol subtest of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. If the Ss were very anxious, EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES " this would have been reflected in impaired performance on this test. The 5s then filled The SAD and FNE scales were adminisout a questionnaire. After this E said that tered to 358 students in the summer school at the University of Toronto. From this pool 5s the second experiment could not take place were drawn for three experiments, whose pur- at that time, and elicited an indication of how interested 5s might be in returning for the pose was to validate the two scales. second study. That concluded the experiment. SAD and the Prospect of Working All of the significant results came from the Alone or Together questionnaire, as the simple expectation of Persons who are high on SAD would be later social interaction apparently did not expected to be uncomfortable in social situa- arouse the degree of anxiety necessary to interfere with performance at the Digit Sym4 The authors wish to thank Betty Jean Findlay, bol task. Donna Hutchinson, and Mary Ann Linseman for The Ss indicated how interested they were serving as Es. The authors appreciated the useful advice of John Arrowood on the design of one in returning at a later date by checking a 5of the studies. point scale labeled "Not at all" at one end,

indicated that the distribution of social avoidance was most skewed. High levels of SAD were not as common as high levels of FNE. High levels of SAD may be more pathological. Variables determining extreme social withdrawal or distress, which might be termed schizoid, are probably not normally distributed within the general population, which would explain the skew in the SAD data. This lack of normality in the SAD may make easier the task of early identification of those who later show schizoid reactions. There were differences between the sexes in scores on the two scales. The mean scores on the SAD were: males, (N = 60) 11.20; females (N = 145) 8.24. This difference is significant (t = 2.64, p