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Cognitive and somatic item response pattern of pain patients, psychiatric patients, and hospital employees
Author(s) -
Buckelew Susan P.,
Degood Douglas E.,
Schwartz David P.,
Kerler Robyn M.
Publication year - 1986
Publication title -
journal of clinical psychology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.124
H-Index - 119
eISSN - 1097-4679
pISSN - 0021-9762
DOI - 10.1002/1097-4679(198611)42:6<852::aid-jclp2270420603>3.0.co;2-r
Subject(s) - somatization , anxiety , psychology , depression (economics) , clinical psychology , psychiatry , distress , cognition , normative , somatic anxiety , philosophy , epistemology , economics , macroeconomics
Standard psychological tests generally provide a single global score that reflects multidimensional constructs, such as depression and anxiety. This single score, however, integrates a range of item contents, including cognitive/affective, somatic, and behavioral characteristics of these multidimensional constructs. The present study was designed to compare the pattern of item endorsement among chronic pain patients ( N = 50), psychiatric inpatients ( N = 50), and hospital employees ( N = 50) on the SCL‐90‐R (Derogatis, Rickels, & Rock, 1976). Pain patients reported the highest SCL‐90 scale level of Somatization, while the psychiatric inpatients reported the highest level of Anxiety and Depression. Additionally, the within‐scale pattern of item responses on the Anxiety and Depression scales differed among groups. Although psychiatric inpatients endorsed equivalent levels of somatic and cognitive items, the pain patients' reports of psychological distress were limited primarily to somatic signs of anxiety and depression. Thus, the interpretation of pain patients' psychological profiles and subsequent treatment recommendations may be inappropriate if based on normative data obtained from psychiatric and/or normal populations.