Worry: daily self-report in clinical and non-clinical populations

The present study establishes an ecologically-valid point of reference for generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) treatment outcome studies. Although worry is the main diagnostic criterion for GAD, it is also a common and everyday cognition. Few studies have investigated the normal manifestation of worry in a non-clinical population. For this research, time spent worrying and the tendency to worry were measured in a non-clinical sample (n = 36), where GAD was screened-out, and results were compared to those obtained from a GAD sample (n = 60). Participants recorded the time spent worrying in self-monitoring notebooks for two consecutive weeks and completed the French version of the Penn State Worry Questionnaire (PSWQ). It was found that the non-GAD group reported less time spent worrying on a daily basis as well as a lower tendency to worry than the GAD group. Results are discussed in terms of treatment implications.