Fifteen Years Controlling Unwanted Thoughts: A Systematic Review of the Thought Control Ability Questionnaire (TCAQ)

Abstract

Thought control ability is a vulnerability factor implicated in the etiology and maintenance of emotional disorders. This manuscript aims to systematically review the use and psychometric performance of the Thought Control Ability Questionnaire (TCAQ), designed to assess people's ability to control unwanted thoughts. Three electronic databases were searched for papers administering the TCAQ published in indexed peer-reviewed journals. Data (participants characteristics, country, study design, etc.) were extracted from the results for qualitative synthesis. The TCAQ's content validity, dimensionality, internal consistency, test-retest reliability, convergent/divergent validity, floor/ceiling effects, and interpretability were summarized. Two reviewers independently screened articles and assessed quality taking COSMIN criteria into account. Finally, the review included 17 papers. The TCAQ has been administered to healthy individuals, students, and adult patients, in six languages from nine countries. We found that the TCAQ, and its shorter versions, demonstrate robust reliability and adequate content validity. Of interest is the TCAQ's capacity to predict performance in diverse experimental tasks focused on thought control. The TCAQ unidimensionality has been supported in exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses. Regarding construct validity, the TCAQ is significantly related to a wide range of psychopathological measures of anxiety, worry, depression, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, etc. However, as only a few of the included studies had a longitudinal design, we are unable to draw firm conclusions about the measure's temporal stability. Moreover, psychometric aspects such as factorial invariance across different samples have not been analyzed. Despite these limitations, based on available psychometric evidence we can recommend using the TCAQ for measuring perceived control of unwanted thoughts.

The role of perceived thought control ability in the psychological functioning of Black American mothers.

“…PTCA has been shown to be related to a reduction in frequency and intensity of negative, intrusive thoughts (Grisham & Williams, 2009; Williams et al, 2010), and since a central component of anxiety is having repetitive negative thoughts or worries that are difficult to control, it is not surprising that PTCA has the strongest relation with anxiety symptoms relative to any other variable. Taken together with previous research demonstrating inverse relationships between PTCA and trait anxiety (Feliu-Soler et al, 2019; Williams et al, 2010), the current study suggests that perceptions of the controllability of one’s thoughts appear to uniquely reduce risk for anxiety arousal and unwanted worry, however future longitudinal research further elucidating the relationship between PTCA and trait anxiety is certainly warranted. Other studies have also found links between PTCA and measures of specific anxiety disorders such as generalized anxiety disorder, as well as psychological disorders such as PTSD and schizophrenia, suggesting that PTCA may be useful as a transdiagnostic predictor of psychological disorders (Feliu-Soler et al, 2019, Gallagher et al, 2014).…”

“…Yet, research on PTCA has been very limited in terms of the populations studied. According to a recent review, the studies published in the past 15 years using the Thought Control Ability Questionnaire with samples from the U.S. consisted only of college students (Feliu-Soler et al, 2019).…”

Assessing beliefs about emotion generation and change: The conceptualisation, development, and validation of the Cognitive Mediation Beliefs Questionnaire (CMBQ)

“…Thought Control Ability. For the current study, the 20-item version of the TCAQ (Williams et al, 2010) was utilised (see Feliu-Soler et al, 2019, for a review). The TCAQ assesses the perceived ability to control unwanted thoughts (e.g., "I often cannot avoid having upsetting thoughts").…”

It’s the thought that counts: Trait self-control is positively associated with well-being and coping via thought control ability

“…To measure perceived thought control ability, the Thought Control Ability Questionnaire (TCAQ; Luciano et al 2005) will be used in the current research. A recent systematic review (Feliu-Soler et al 2019) revealed that this measure has been satisfactorily used in a variety of populationsincluding individuals from the general populations and patients with PTSD or clinical depressionand that the instrument has adequate dimensionality, reliability, and construct validity.…”