Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dzt6s Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T05:18:37.715Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Measurement of Risk-Taking in Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 June 2009

Gail Steketee  and
Randy O. Frost
Gail Steketee
Affiliation:
Boston University, USA
Randy O. Frost
Affiliation:
Smith College, USA
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

A measure of everyday risk-taking, the Everyday Risk Inventory (ERI), was developed to assess avoidance of potentially harmful ordinary activities, and some of its psychometric properties were studied. The hypothesis that outpatients with obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) would score lower than non-patients on this and other measures of risk-taking was tested. The ERI showed good internal consistency and excellent test-retest reliability. It successfully differentiated OCD patients from non-clinical subjects. Consistent with research on sensation seeking, both age and gender were related to ERI scores, with older subjects and females showing greater risk avoidance. The ERI correlated moderately strongly with other measures of risk-taking and showed, as expected, a less strong negative association with measures of responsibility and value orthodoxy. Preliminary findings indicate that the ERI is a useful instrument for assessing non-pleasurable ordinary risk-taking. Findings are discussed in relation to possible dimensions of risk-taking in existing research on decision-making and the need for research on other patient populations.

Type
Research Article
Information
Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapy , Volume 22 , Issue 4 , October 1994 , pp. 287 - 298
Copyright
Copyright © British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Babbitt, T., Rowland, G. and Franken, R. (1990). Sensation seeking: preoccupation with diet and exercise regimens. Personality and Individual Differences 11, 759–761.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brun, W. (1992). Cognitive components in risk perception: natural versus manmade risks. Journal of Behavioral Decision-Making 5, 117–132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, G. and Mathews, A. (1983). Cognitive processes in anxiety. Advances in Behaviour, Research & Therapy 5, 51–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carr, A. T. (1974). Compulsive neurosis: a review of the literature. Psychological Bulletin 81, 311–318.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cloninger, C. R. (1987). A systematic model for clinical description and classification of personality variants. Archives of General Psychiatry 44, 573–588.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foa, E. and Kozak, M. (1986). Emotional processing of fear. Psychological Bulletin 99, 20–35.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Freeston, M. H. and Ladouceur, R. (1993). Appraisal of cognitive intrusions and response style: replication and extension. Behaviour Research and Therapy 31, 185–192.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Frost, R. O., Steketee, G., Cohn, L. and Griess, K. (1994). Personality traits in subclinical and non-obsessive-compulsive volunteers and their parents. Behaviour Research and Therapy 32, 47–56.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goszczynska, M., Tyszka, T. and Slovic, P. (1991). Risk perception in Poland: a comparison with three other countries. Journal of Behavioral Decision-Making 4, 179–193.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackson, D. (1976). Manual for the Jackson Personality Inventory. Goshen, NY: Research Psychologists Press.Google Scholar
Levenson, M. R. (1990). Risk-taking and personality. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 58, 1073–1080.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Mallinger, A. E. (1984). The obsessive's myth of control. Journal of the American Academy of Psychoanalysis 12, 147–165.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
McFall, M. E. and Wollersheim, J. P. (1979). Obsessive-compulsive neurosis: a cognitive behavioral formulation and approach to treatment. Cognitive Therapy and Research 3, 333–348.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pfohl, B., Black, D., Noyes, R., Kelley, M. and Blum, N. (1990). A test of the tridimensional personality theory: association with diagnosis and platelet imipramine binding in obsessive compulsive disorder. Biological Psychiatry 28, 41–46.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rachman, S. (1993). Obsessions, responsibility and guilt. Behaviour Research and Therapy 31, 149–154.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Rasmussen, S. A. and Eisen, J. L. (1989). Clinical features and phenomenology of obsessive compulsive disorder. Psychiatric Annals 19, 67–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Salkovskis, P. M. (1989). Cognitive-behavioural factors and the persistence of intrusive thoughts in obsessive problems. Behaviour Research and Therapy 27, 677–682.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Salzman, L. (1980). Treatment of the Obsessive Personality. New York: Jason Aronson.Google Scholar
Steiner, J. (1972). A questionnaire study of risk-taking in psychiatric patients. British Journal of Medical Psychology 45, 365–374.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Steiner, J., Jarvis, M. and Parrish, J. (1970). Risk-taking and arousal regulation. British Journal of Medical Psychology 43, 333–348.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Teigen, K. H., Burn, W. and Slovic, P. (1988). Societal risks as seen by a Norwegian public. Journal of Behavioral Decision-Making 1, 111–130.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weinstein, N. D. (1980). Unrealistic optimism about future life events. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 39, 806–820.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wyatt, G. (1990). Risk-taking and risk-avoiding behavior: the impact of some dispositional and situational variables. Journal of Psychology 124, 437–447.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zuckerman, M. (1984). Experience and desire: a new format for sensation seeking scales. Journal of Behavioral Assessment 6, 101–114.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Submit a response

Comments

No Comments have been published for this article.