Predicting anxious response to a social challenge: The utility of the SIAS and the SPS in a college population

Trait anxiety is believed to be hierarchical construct composed of several lower-order factors (e.g., anxiety sensitivity and fear of negative evaluation). Assessment devices such as the Social Interaction Anxiety Scale (SIAS), the Social Phobia Scale (SPS) and the Anxiety Sensitivity Index (ASI) are presumably good measures of these lower-order, specific factors. The effectiveness of the ASI, SIAS and SPS in predicting anxious response to a social challenge was examined. As expected, the specific measures of trait social anxiety (together labeled "SocT") were slightly better predictors of anxious response to the social challenge than either the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory - Trait (STAI-T) or the ASI. The SocT was more highly correlated with all pre and post manipulation measures than either the STAI-T or the ASI. This provides some evidence of the specific predictive validity of the SocT in measuring social anxiety.