A New Measure of General Trait Neuroticism about Body Signals and Worry Specific to Body Signals: The Body Signals Attention and Worry Scale (BSAWS)

Abstract

A new scale was developed to measure trait neuroticism and state worry about bodily signals (the BSAWS). 72 British participants were recruited to complete a heartbeat counting task and then a battery of questionnaires comprising of the BSAWS, the state-trait anxiety inventory (STAI), the emotion regulation questionnaire (ERQ) and the paranoid checklist (PC) and state social paranoia scales (SSPS). Confirmatory factor analysis supported a four-factor model of the BSAWS, with factors of ‘trait neuroticism’, ‘trait unconcern’, ‘state mindfulness’ and ‘state worry’. These results broadly support a two–dimensional model of bodily signals’ attention and worry. Correlational analyses showed concurrent validity of the BSAWS construct with other previously established measures of anxiety, paranoia and emotional regulation. Applications for the scale include measurement of attention and worry during different tasks and/or behaviours, with the potential for clinical use to study the aetiology of various body-related mental health disorders.