CoChat
Sign Up
Cited by 103Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive ProcessesMental Health Research TopicsPsychological Treatments and Assessments

Development and assessment of brief versions of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire and the Ruminative Response Scale

Topper, Maurice, Emmelkamp, Paul M. G., Watkins, Ed, Ehring, Thomas·2014·British Journal of Clinical Psychology
DOI 10.1111/bjc.12052
Open this paper in CoChat — free account

Abstract

Objectives: Worry and depressive rumination have been found to be involved in the onset and maintenance of a range of psychological disorders. The development of brief screening measures for excessive worry and depressive rumination is therefore desirable to facilitate the assessment of worry and rumination in prevention and treatment settings where routine administration of full questionnaires is not practical due to time‐related constraints. Design and methods: Using the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ) and the Ruminative Response Scale (RRS) as gold standard starting points, brief versions of these measures were developed in a large sample of adolescents ( N = 1,952) and results were cross‐validated in two independent samples ( N = 1,954; N = 457). Results: The brief versions demonstrated acceptable to high internal consistency (brief PSWQ: α = .84–.91; brief RRS: α = .78–.81) and correlated highly with the full questionnaires (brief PSWQ: r = .91–.94; brief RRS: r = .88–.91). In addition, they showed high sensitivity (brief PSWQ: .90–.92; brief RRS: .90–.93), and high specificity (brief PSWQ: .88–.90; brief RRS: .80–.87) to detect excessive worry and rumination. The validity of the brief measures was further supported by demonstrating that the brief measures showed similar differences in scores between males and females as the full measures as well as substantial relationships to other measures of repetitive negative thinking and symptom measures of anxiety and depression. Finally, the brief measures predicted future symptoms of anxiety and depression. Conclusions: The brief versions of the PSWQ and RRS are time‐efficient and valid instruments for the screening of worry and depressive rumination. Their use in clinical practice is recommended to inform treatment and/or to select individuals at risk for development of psychological disorders who may benefit from preventive interventions. Practitioner points: The newly developed brief PSWQ and brief RRS are valid, internally reliable measures that show high diagnostic efficiency to detect excessive worry and depressive rumination. The brief PSWQ and brief RRS are time‐efficient instruments that can be used to determine whether a focus on reducing worry and depressive rumination during treatment is indicated. The brief PSWQ and brief RRS can be used for large‐scale screening purposes to identify individuals eligible for targeted prevention programmes. A potential limitation is that items of the brief RRS have depressive item content which may inflate the observed association with depression. Future research is needed to assess the quality of the brief PSWQ and the brief RRS in broader community and clinical samples.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/bjc.12052

Cites

92 of 92 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Claims other papers make about this one

Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Related

Authors
Topper, M., Emmelkamp, P. M. G., Watkins, E., & Ehring, T.
Affiliations
  • University of Amsterdam (NL)
  • King Abdulaziz University (SA)
  • School of Psychology Mood Disorders Centre University of Exeter UK
  • University of Münster (DE)
Corresponding author
Topper, Maurice
ORCID
Venue
British Journal of Clinical Psychology
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2014-05-02
Volume
53
Issue
4
Pages
402-421
ISSN
  • 0144-6657 (ISSN-L)
  • 2044-8260
DOI
10.1111/bjc.12052
OpenAlex
W2112643237
Cited by
103
References
90
Citations by year
2026: 12 · 2025: 13 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 11 · 2022: 12 · 2021: 14 · 2020: 9 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 5 · 2015: 3
FWCI
4.63
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
onlinelibrary.wiley.com/termsAndConditions#vor (vor)
Locations
  • British Journal of Clinical Psychology (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • UvA-DARE (University of Amsterdam) (publishedVersion)
  • Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
Funders
Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development (200210001)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Anxiety, Depression, Psychometrics, Treatment, Cognitive Processes
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Mental Health Research Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Psychological Treatments and Assessments
Keywords
Penn State Worry Questionnaire, Ruminative Response Scale, excessive worry, depressive rumination, repetitive negative thinking, screening tool, adolescents, anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, preventive interventions, gender differences, psychometric validation, treatment selection, questionnaire shortening, psychometric properties, sensitivity and specificity, internal consistency, cross-validation
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Adult, Anxiety, Anxiety Disorders, Depression, Female, Humans, Male, Netherlands, Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Psychometrics, Surveys and Questionnaires, Regression Analysis, Sex Factors, Thinking, Reproducibility of Results, Young Adult

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review