Development and Validation of the Social Thermoregulation and Risk Avoidance Questionnaire (STRAQ-1)

Abstract

Development and Validation of the Social Thermoregulation and Risk Avoidance Questionnaire (STRAQ-1) How do interpersonal relationships form and what are they for? Bowlby's (1969) model of interpersonal relationships proposed that caregivers (early in life) and partners (later in life) serves as a secure base from which to explore. The concept of interpersonal attachments has been associated with nearly every important aspect of human psychology, ranging from individual differences in emotion regulation (Fraley, Waller, & Brennan, 2000; Sbarra & Hazan, 2008) to mental health (Schore, 2001). In the social psychological literature, individual differences of attachment are mostly assessed through self-reports that tap people's phenomenological experiences of felt safety and security in their past relationships and how these past relationships influence present appraisals of relationships. However, in the literature on self-reported differences in attachment, it is overlooked that the behavioral attachment system was originally thought to have evolved as it benefited infant survival, revolving, in most animals around the social distribution of temperature regulation (i.e., social thermoregulation) and risk avoidance (Beckes

Individual differences in adapting to temperature in French students are only related to attachment avoidance and loneliness

“…5 In half of our sample, the correlation between solitary thermoregulation and sex was r = .31, p < .001 and the correlation between social thermoregulation and sex was r = .04, p = .44. Furthermore, Vergara et al (2019) found a link between thermoregulation variables and the relationship status and we might expect similar relation in our sample as well. In half of our sample, the correlation between solitary thermoregulation and the relationship status was r = -.11, p = .09 and the correlation between social thermoregulation and the relationship status was r = .22, p < .001.…”

“…The STRAQ-1 was created and validated to investigate whether people's strategies to thermoregulate relate to their feelings of reliability and safety in relationships. And indeed, Vergara et al (2019) found that people's desires to socially and solitarily thermoregulate respectively relate to avoidance and anxiety in relationships. The STRAQ-1 thus provides not only a valid measurement tool, but also shows that people's ways of coping with the environment relate to their attachment styles.…”

“…Temperature is only second in importance next to oxygen regulation for survival. Yet little attention has been devoted to directly measuring how humans deal with temperature, and even less so how they deal socially with the environment, with the exception of one tool giving a first impulse in this direction: the Social Thermoregulation and Risk Avoidance Questionnaire (STRAQ-1; Vergara et al, 2019). The STRAQ-1 has for example a subscale that reliably assesses individual differences in terms of desires to socially thermoregulate.…”

“…We omitted the Risk Avoidance scale because the scale reliability was questionable in its original version (for a discussion see alsoVergara et al (2019)). …”

Validation of the ISP131001 Sensor for Mobile Peripheral Body Temperature Measurement

“…The Social Thermoregulation and Risk Avoidance Questionnaire (STRAQ-1; Vergara et al, 2019) is composed of 23 items and 4 subscales. The most important scales for this type of research are the Social Thermoregulation subscale (exploratory sample: α = 0.77; ω h : 0.64; ω t : 0.89; confirmatory sample: α = 0.65; ω h : 0.64; ω t : 0.88; sample item: "When I feel cold I seek someone to cuddle with"), which measures individual differences in the desire to rely on other people to regulate temperature; the Solitary Thermoregulation subscale (exploratory sample: α = 0.82; ω h : 0.45; ω t : 0.94; confirmatory sample: α = 0.87; ω h : 0.66; ω t : 0.93; sample item: "When I feel cold I don't turn on the heater"), which measures individual differences in the degree to which people desire to regulate temperature by themselves; and high temperature sensitivity (exploratory sample: α = 0.91; ω h : 0.68; ω t : 0.98; confirmatory sample: α = 0.88; ω h : 0.75; ω t : 0.94; sample item: " I am sensitive to heat").…”