The role of trait anxiety in induction of state anxiety

Abstract

The reported study had the following goals: to determine psychometric characteristics of a new instrument purpoting to measure trait anxiety - AT29, to explore the effectiveness of a mood induction procedure in eliciting state anxiety, and to determine the role of trait anxiety, as measured by AT29, in responding to mood induction. AT29 was administered as a part of a larger test battery to 232 psychology students during a mass testing session. After three weeks, 90 students were randomly selected to participate in the second, experimental phase of the study. These selected participants were randomly assigned to two groups: experimental (mood-induction group) in which participants watched a video clip with a fear-inducing content and control group in which participants watched a neutral video clip of the same duration as the fear-inducing clip. State anxiety was measured in both groups using the STAI-S questionnaire right before and after mood induction. It was demonstrated that there is a significant association between trait anxiety as measured by AT29 and state anxiety obtained at both measurement occasionsbefore and after mood induction. Following fear induction, the experimental group demonstrated higher state anxiety scores. However, the interaction between group membership and trait anxiety was not significant. Potential explanations regarding the lack of effect of trait anxiety on state anxiety in this mood induction experiment were discussed as well as some recommendations for future research. Additionally, the results suggested that AT29 has very good psychometric characteristics: high internal consistency and test-retest reliability (.96 and .86 respectively), as well as good divergent and convergent validity.Istrazivanju je imalo tri cilja: proveru psihometrijskih karakteristika novokonstruisanog instrumenta za merenje crte anksioznosti - AT29, ispitivanje uspesnosti eksperimentalne indukcije anksioznog stanja i ispitivanje doprinosa crte anksioznosti merene pomocu AT29 reagovanju na afektivnu indukciju. AT29 je primenjen u sklopu sire baterije testova na ukupnom uzorku od 232 studenta psihologije. Tri nedelje nakon tog ispitivanja, iz inicijalnog uzorka slucajno je odabrano 90 ispitanika za eksperimentalni deo istrazivanja. Ispitanici su slucajnim odabirom podeljeni u dve grupe. Eksperimentalnoj grupi je prikazan filmski insert putem koga je indukovano osecanje straha, a kontrolna grupa je posmatrala neutralni videomaterijal u istom trajanju. Stanje anksioznosti kod obe grupe je mereno pomocu STAI-S neposredno pre i posle afektivne indukcije. Rezultati eksperimentalnog dela istrazivanja pokazuju da postoji znacajna povezanost crte anksioznosti merene pomocu AT29 i stanja anksioznosti u oba merenja - pre i nakon indukcije. Nakon indukcije straha, eksperimentalna grupa je imala znacajno povisenje stanja anksioznosti, no interakcija crte anksioznosti i grupne pripadnosti se nije pokazala znacajnom. Diskutovani su moguci razlozi za odsustvo efekta crte anksioznosti na indukciju stanja anksioznosti i iznete smernice i preporuke za dalja istrazivanja. Osim ovih nalaza, ustanovljeno je da novokonstruisani AT29 ima veoma dobre psihometrijske karakteristike - visoku internu konzistentnost (?=.96), test-retest pouzdanost (.86), kao i divergentnu i konvergentnu validnost.