Manifest Anxiety: Unifactorial or Multifactorial Composition?

Abstract

The study investigates three subscales of manifest anxiety, consisting of symptoms of striated muscle tension, symptoms of autonomic arousal, and feelings of fear and insecurity. There was both a general factor of anxiety and a specific factor associated with striated muscle tension. Further evidence for the specific nature of striated muscle tension was indicated by its positive relationship to feelings of hostility, its failure to relate to a personality variable of inhibition, and the relatively high score obtained by males. It was hypothesized that striated muscle tension is more closely associated with overt activity than autonomic symptoms, which represent a deeper level of inhibition. Discrepant results of studies using the Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale may be due to a failure to take into account the differential contribution of items relating to different kinds of anxiety.

The stability of behavior: I. On predicting most of the people much of the time.

“…There is a large number of relationships that break the .30 barrier, and no correlation is in an opposite direction from expectancy. All three of the anxiety scales in the Epstein-Fenz inventory (Fenz & Epstein, 1965) correlate significantly in the expected direction with daily ratings of threat and tension. Although it is true that the anxiety scales also correlate with daily ratings of other negative feelings, such positive correlations are lo he expected, as there is a general tendency for negative emotions to cluster together (see factor analysis of similar data reported in Kpstein, 1976).…”

A Factor Analytic Study of Manifest Anxiety: a Transsituational, Transtemporal Investigation

“…The main purpose of the present study was, therefore, to investigate whether the scores on the MAS fall into a single main trait factor, as indirectly suggested by Cattell andScheier (1958, 1961) and Taylor (1953) and more directly by Fenz and Epstein (1965); two main factors, as proposed by Buss (1962) and Eysenck (1961); or a complex of several factors, as proposed by OiConnor et al (1956).…”

“…The personologist would, therefore, maintain that a factor analysis of intersituational correlations, such as provided by most of the 50 MAS items, should result in one or possibly two (see arguments in Buss, 1962;Eysenck, 1961;Fenz & Epstein 1965) main factors explaining a considerable percentage of the total variance and, thus, supporting anxiety as a stable personality trait (Ekehammar, 1974). If, however, the number of main factors exceeds one or possibly two (when the structure resembles that of the previously found factors), anxiety should be considered either to lack transsituational consistency or to reflect the aggregation of several minor and situationspecific forms of anxiety.…”

“…The second factor, on the other hand, was composed of feelings of restlessness, worry, and muscular tension and was termed, accordingly, Conditioned (motonc and ideational) Anxiety. Fenz and Epstein (1965) constructed three anxiety scales from the MAS and named them as follows: (a) Striated Muscle Tension, signifying the effects of sustained contraction of striated (voluntary) muscles; (b) Autonomic Arousal, describing the visceral symptoms associated with activation of the autonomic nervous system; and (c) Feelings of Anxiety, depicting subjective states of fear, insecurity, and their associated attitudes and behaviors. A factor analysis carried out by Fenz and Epstein revealed that all three anxiety scales loaded highly on a single general factor accounting for 75% of the common variance.…”

Changes in heart rate as a function of an unconditional stimulus presented under varying conditions of certainty

“…METHOD Fifty-four male engineering summer students were used as Ss. These Ss represented the interquartile range of scores derived from a previously administered modified version of the Taylor Manifest Anxiety Scale (Fenz & Epstein, 1965;Fenz, 1967). All Ss were free of cardiovascular ailments, and all were paid a small sum for taking part in the experiment.…”