The Psychometric Properties of Attentional Control Scale and Its Relationship with Symptoms of Anxiety and Depression: A Study on Iranian Population

Abstract

Objectives: The attentional control scale is a self- report questionnaire that assesses individual differences in attentional control. Despite its extensive use, the psychometric properties of the Persian version of the ACS are not well understood. Thus, the present study aimed at investigating the psychometric properties of the attentional control scale and its relationship with symptoms of anxiety and depression in Iranian population. Method: Using quota sampling, we asked a community sample of 524 to respond to Attentional Control Scale, mindfulness, emotion regulation, social anxiety, depression, generalized anxiety, worry, and rumination. SPSS (Version 23) was used for data analysis. Results: Exploratory factor analysis yielded 2 factors of focusing and shifting, which accounted for 30.93% of the total variance. The results of convergent validity revealed that reappraisal, as an emotion regulation strategy and mindfulness facets, had a positive relationship with focusing, shifting, and the total score of the attentional control scale. Furthermore, worry, rumination, depression, generalized anxiety, and social anxiety symptoms all had negative relationships with focusing, rumination, and the total score of the attentional control scale. In addition, the results of incremental validity revealed that focusing, not shifting, uniquely predicted depression and generalized anxiety symptoms. Furthermore, both focusing and shifting uniquely predicted social anxiety symptoms. Test- retest reliability of focusing and shifting was 0.80 and 0. 76, respectively. Conclusions: Attentional control scale has been demonstrated to have acceptable validity and reliability in Iranian population. However, further studies are needed to evaluate other aspects of the ACS like CFA.

Keywords

• Anxiety
• Attention
• Emotion
• Depression
• Psychometrics