Development of a Measure of Sport Injury Anxiety: The Sport Injury Appraisal Scale

The relationship between trait anxiety (TA) and injury incidence has been previously examined, but the results of these studies have, for the most part, been ambiguous. Results suggest that higher levels of TA are related to higher injury incidence in athletes; however, the exact relationship between anxiety and injury incidence remains unclear. One reason why only meager support exists for an anxiety-injury relationship may be the measures of anxiety researchers have utilized. Mandler and Sarason (1952) recommended that researchers construct situation-specific measures of anxiety that would allow more systematic examination of the relationship of various sources of anxiety to other variables (e.g., injury incidence). Although some attempts have been made to develop instruments that measure injury anxiety, to date no theoretically-based measure of sport injury anxiety (SIA) exists. Thus, the purpose of this study was to develop a theoretically-based and psychometrically reliable instrument to measure SIA. The Sport Injury Appraisal Scale (SIAS) was designed to measure several appraisals associated with athletes’ experience of SIA. Participants included 300 collegiate athletes from various sports, all of whom completed a demographic questionnaire and a 51-item version of the SIAS. Results of an exploratory factor analysis revealed a reliable scale (α = .95) with 29 items and seven potential subscales, including anxiety associated with: (a) loss of athleticism (α = .89), (b) being perceived as weak (α = .90), (c) experiencing pain (α = .89), (d) loss of social support (α = .87), (e) letting down important others (α = .86), (f) reinjury (α = .87), and (g) having an impaired self-image (α = .81). Once confirmation of the proposed factor structure is completed a reexamination of the anxiety-injury relationship should be possible.