INTEGRATION OF POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE AFFECTIVITY AND COGNITIVE CONTENT-SPECIFICITY - IMPROVED DISCRIMINATION OF ANXIOUS AND DEPRESSIVE SYMPTOMS

In a sample of 159 psychiatric outpatient adults, negative affectivity (NA) was significantly correlated with a broad range of anxiety and d epressive symptoms and was not useful for the differentiation of anxie ty from depression. Low positive affectivity (PA) was significantly re lated only to depressive symptoms. Whereas depressive cognitions demon strated discriminant capability, anxiety cognitions (in isolation) dem onstrated nonspecificity. A combination of NA and anxious cognitions s ignificantly predicted anxiety symptoms, better than did cognitions or affect alone. NA, depressive cognitions, and low PA significantly pre dicted depressive symptoms. Results support the integration of affecti ve and cognitive models for the discrimination of anxious from depress ive symptoms and have implications for measure development. Modificati ons in the cognitive content-specificity theory of anxiety states are discussed.