DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF THE PHYSICAL APPEARANCE STATE AND TRAIT ANXIETY SCALE (PASTAS)

The current paper reports on the development and validation of trait and state versions of the Physical Appearance State and Trait Anxiety Scale (PASTAS) on a sample of 205 college females. The single trait and three state versions have excellent internal consistencies and test-retest reliabilities. Principal components analysis revealed two clear-cut components that were labeled the Weight (W) and Non-Weight (NW) scales. The PASTAS-W correlated highly with available measures of body dissatisfaction, appearance evaluation, and eating disturbance, whereas the PASTAS-NW was not associated with these variables. Eating-disturbed individuals has significantly higher PASTAS-W scores than subjects with little evidence of eating disturbance, across all three anxiety situations (high, medium, low). There was no effect of eating disturbance for PASTAS-NW scores; however, the situational effect held. The PASTAS-W also added to other measures' ability to explain variance associated with level of eating disturbance. It was concluded that the trait and state versions of the PASTAS may prove to be useful tools for research in the areas of body image and eating disturbance. © 1991.