Social desirability bias and direction modified Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2

This study examined the relation between social desirability bias and responses to the direction modified Competitive State Anxiety Inventory-2 for male soccer players (37 professionals, 40 semiprofessionals, and 40 varsity players; M age = 24.5 yr., SD=3.7) who completed the inventory and Reynolds' 13-item short form of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale one hour prior to a competitive match. Intraclass correlations were calculated to assess the relation between the two sets of scores. Out of the 18 correlations calculated, i.e., 6 subscales x 3 skill levels, 17 were significant (p<.05), ranging from .38 to .70. The highest correlations were found among professional players and the lowest amongst the varsity players, but most of the differences were not statistically significant. These results indicate that scores on both the Intensity and Direction subscales of this anxiety inventory are significantly related to the tendency to self-report socially desirable answers. Therefore, care should be taken when interpreting data from studies using the inventory, and social desirability measures should be taken whenever using this questionnaire.