The Wimbledon Self-Report Scale: emotional and mood appraisal

Abstract

Self-rating scales currently in use for the detection of mood disturbance may not be suitable for use with neurological patients, or patients with substantial physical illness, because they employ items concerning activity and somatic or cognitive disorder and so are liable to produce a high level of false positive misclassifications. The development of a more suitable scale based purely on feelings, the Wimbledon Self-Report Scale (WSRS), is described. The WSRS provides a catalogue of the patient's adverse emotions for use in counselling and detects levels of mood disturbance that warrant further exploration. The classifications yielded by the scale are reliable and false positive and false negative rates are low. WSRS scores appear unaffected by sex or by age within the 18-80 year range.