Assessing the Long-Term Stability of the Spielberger State-Trait Inventory Trait Scale over 3.5 Years

The Spielberger State-Trait Anxiety Inventory (STAI) is the most cited measure of state and trait anxiety, and is routinely employed in a variety of research and clinical contexts. Here, we investigate the temporal stability as well as the convergent and discriminant validity of the German version of the STAI trait scale (STAI-T) across multiple time points in two independent samples (105 and 120 Caucasians). We observed temporal stabilities of .42-.67 for intervals between 20 and 41 months and from .81-.87 for intervals of five to 12 months, with decreasing stability as the time interval increased. Temporal stability estimates of the STAI-T were similar to those of related constructs. Additionally, examining the relationships within a nomological network support the recent conclusion that the STAI-T also shares substantial variance with questionnaires measuring negative emotionality such as depression, and hence does not measure anxiety specifically - despite its name. These results provide further psychometric information on what the STAI-T actually measures and to what extent STAI-T scores are expected to be stable across longer time intervals. This is of relevance for researchers aiming, for example, to use the STAI-T scale for predicting symptom trajectories and evaluating the effectiveness of therapeutic interventions.