The Factor Structure of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory: An Alternative View

Abstract

Past studies of the factor structure of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI; Spielberger, Gorsuch, Lushene, Vagg, & Jacobs, 1983) have arrived at various solutions. However, a relatively strong consensus supports a four-factor (State Anxiety Present, State Anxiety Absent, Trait Anxiety Present, and Trait Anxiety Absent) structure of the scale resulting from the combination of item polarity dimensions and the original two factors (State and Trait Anxiety). In this article, we assessed the adequacy of an alternative factor model of STAI data, the two-construct, two-method model, in three large samples using confirmatory factor analysis. The results revealed a statistical advantage of the two-construct, two-method model over the one-factor model, the two-construct factor model, and the four-factor model. We discuss possible interpretational advantages of the two-construct, two-method model of the STAI.

Acknowledgments

This research was supported by grants from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) and from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). We thank Nadine LeBlanc for her contribution to the data collection at the Université de Moncton and for her assistance in the preparation of this article.

Notes

¹Such orthogonality assumptions are made for three reasons: They simplify variance decomposition, they facilitate model identification in confirmatory analyses, and they ensure that factor interpretation in terms of construct and method dimensions is indeed possible (see Marsh, 1989).

²We are grateful to D. A. Bors who graciously provided us with the until now unpublished Sample 1 data.

³We thank S. Vautier for making the Sample 2 data available for reanalysis through the web (http://www.univ-tlse2.fr/cerpp/annuaire/vautier/).

^a n = 500.

^b n = 888.

^c n = 625.