Cross-national validity of the five-components model of self-assessed fears: Canadian psychiatric outpatients data vs. Dutch target ratings on the fear survey schedule-III

Abstract

In spite of the importance of examining empirically the within-country stability and cross-national generalizability of dimensional models of self-assessed fears, surprisingly few studies utilizing a confirmatory approach have been conducted. Using a method based on “perfectly-congruent weights”, dimensions as measured by the Wolpe and Lang Fear Survey Schedule-III (“Social Fears”, “Agoraphobic Fears”, “Fears of Bodily Injury, Death and Illness”, “Fears of Sexual and Aggressive Scenes”, and “Harmless Animals Fears”), identified originally with Dutch noninstitutionalized phobic subjects (Ss) (cf., Arrindell, Emmelkamp, & Van der Ende, 1984), were shown to be retrievable in subsamples comprising Anglophone Canadian phobic and obsessive-compulsive outpatients. Within the pooled sample of Canadian outpatients, evidence in favor of invariance of fear factors across sex was also demonstrated. In addition, the findings provided further support for the notion that the situations that evoke fears and phobias are nonrandom (e.g., Eysenck, 1987). Special attention was given to the diagnostic implications, suggested by Marks (e.g., 1989), of the invariance of the Agoraphobic cluster of fears.