Development of the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Inventory: Initial Validity and Reliability

This article reports on four studies regarding the development, reliability, and validity of scales to measure two forms of anxiety, ego anxiety and discomfort anxiety. In the first study 140 undergraduates completed fourteen items related to ego anxiety and discomfort anxiety, as well as the Self-esteem Scale, the IPAT Anxiety Scale, and the Hopelessness Scale. Principal component analyses produced two factors, each with five items that showed differentiation between ego anxiety and discomfort anxiety. Guttman scales were developed from the items in the two factors. The resulting Ego Anxiety Scale had a coefficient of reproducibility of .94, a coefficient of scalability of .67 and estimated scale reliability of .84. The Discomfort Anxiety Scale had a coefficient of reproducibility of .91, a coefficient of scalability of .65 and estimated scale reliability of .83. Significant relationships were found between the scores on the two anxiety scales and scores on the Self-esteem Scale and the IPAT. Correlations between scores on the new anxiety scales and scores on the Hopelessness Scale were not significant. In the second study, undergraduates completed the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Scales, the Self-esteem Scale, the IPAT Anxiety Scale, and the Hopelessness Scale. The reliability of the Ego Anxiety Scale (0.77) and the Discomfort Anxiety Scale (0.85) was estimated using Cronbach's alpha measure. t tests for scores of independent samples for students in Studies I and II were completed for scores on the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Scales, Self-esteem Scale, IPAT Anxiety Scale, and Hopelessness Scale. None of these test comparisons were significant. The data from Studies I and II were pooled to provide tentative normative data for the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Scales. The third study explored the reliability and validity of the new scales, testing 79 undergraduates who completed the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Scales, the Fear of Negative Evaluation Scale, and the Problem Solving Inventory. The reliability coefficients of the Ego Anxiety Scale and Discomfort Anxiety Scale were 0.75 and 0.82, respectively. The differences between the combined scores of subjects in Studies I and II and the scores of subjects in the third study on the Ego and the Discomfort Anxiety Scale were not significant. A significant positive correlation, however, was found between scores on the Ego Anxiety Scale and scores on the Fear of Negative Evaluation Scale. Significant negative correlations were found between scores on the Discomfort Anxiety Scale and Problem-solving Confidence and Perception of Personal Control factors of the Problem Solving Inventory. The final study explored the construct validity of the Ego Anxiety Scale and the Discomfort Anxiety Scale by comparing scores of the tentative normative sample of subjects with scores of a sample of 187 chemically dependent clients receiving treatment at a residential treatment center. Reliabilities of the Ego Anxiety Scale and the Discomfort Anxiety Scale for the sample of chemically dependent subjects were 0.78 and 0.87, respectively. t tests were carried out between scores of the control sample and scores of the chemically dependent subjects on the Ego and Discomfort Anxiety Scales. A significant difference in the predicted direction (<.001) was found between scores for the two groups on the Discomfort Anxiety Scale. There was no significant difference between groups in scores on the Ego Anxiety Scale.