The Kenny music performance anxiety inventory (K-MPAI): Scale construction, cross-cultural validation, theoretical underpinnings, and diagnostic and therapeutic utility

Abstract

I commenced my academic exploration of music performance anxiety in a study with opera chorus artists from Opera Australia in 2004. I subsequently postulated a new theory of the aetiology of music performance anxiety and began the development of the Kenny Music Performance Anxiety Inventory (K-MPAI) to assess the hypothesized theoretical constructs underpinning its diverse clinical presentations. I proposed a new definition of music performance anxiety in 2009 and revised the item content of the K-MPAI from 26 to 40 in 2011. Over the ensuing years, many researchers have used the K-MPAI in studies on a wide variety of musicians, including vocalists and instrumentalists, popular and classical musicians, tertiary music students, and professional, solo, orchestral, ensemble, band, and community musicians. To date, the K-MPAI has been reported in more than 400 studies and has been translated into 22 languages. It has been the subject of more than 39 dissertations. In this paper, I examine the research that has used the K-MPAI to assess the theory and to ascertain how well the assessment tool, and its cross-cultural validation have provided evidence for its factorial structure, robustness, and utility. The evidence indicates that the factorial structure remains consistent across cultures and different populations of musicians. It has good discriminative ability and utility for diagnostic purposes. I conclude with some reflections on how the K-MPAI can guide therapeutic interventions and with some thoughts on future directions.

Focus of attention in musical learning and music performance: a systematic review and discussion of focus instructions and outcome measures

“…One of the main reasons for that is the absence of FOA studies in music with a learning paradigm in an application-oriented educational setting. Concerning on-stage musical performances in performance under pressure contexts, the research situation manifests as tighter due to a long tradition of multidisciplinary investigations in relation to anxiety and stress in high-pressure performing settings from psychology, sports, and music, e.g., the growing field of music performance anxiety research (for current reviews, see Fernholz et al, 2019 ; Osbourne and Kirsner, 2022 ; Kenny, 2023 ). However, studies showed that dealing with music-specific high-pressure challenges is highly individual and diverse, and depends on multiple factors (see, e.g., Buma et al, 2015 ; Oudejans et al, 2017 ).…”

Dispositional and performance-specific music performance anxiety in young amateur musicians

“…A higher score represents higher levels of MPA as well as psychological distress ( Kenny, 2011 ). The questionnaire has been validated and used in numerous research studies and is available in several languages ( Kenny, 2023 ).…”

Design and Evaluation of a Collective Preventive Program for Musical Performance Anxiety (ConfiDance)

“…Once the content of the proposed design is validated, a pilot study is conducted to evaluate its effectiveness in reducing MPA. For this purpose, pre-and post-measurements of MPA are carried out using the K-MPAI test [55]. Additionally, post-treatment MPA measurement is complemented with a qualitative evaluation of the program through a participant satisfaction questionnaire designed ad hoc (mixed design).…”

“…To assess the level of MPA experienced by the participants, the Kenny music performance anxiety inventory (K-MPAI) [55] was used in its complete version, as it is the psychometric record shared by most studies in recent research. It is the only instrument developed for this purpose based on a psychological theory, Barlow's triple vulnerability theory [32,68].…”

“…Total scores range from 0 to 240, with higher scores reflecting higher levels of MPA. The K-MPAI is widely used in MPA research and has demonstrated outstanding internal reliability (Cronbach's alpha = 0.94) (Chang-Arana et al, 2017), as well as convergent validity with widely accepted measures of trait and social anxiety [17,55]. According to Kenny [69], the cutoff point on the K-MPAI could depend on individual clinical issues of interest.…”