Specificity of Fear Survey Schedule Items and the Prediction of Avoidance Behavior

Abstract

Previous research has generally found low correlations between verbally reported fear and avoidance behavior. The present investigation indicated, however, that the level of descriptive detail of self-report measures can be varied so as to increase the strength of the relation between these two fear indices. This suggests that lack of concordance between behavioral and self-report measures of fear generally found in previous research is partly a function of methodological inadequacies associated with self-report measurement.