Medical intervention and the interaction model of anxiety.

Abstract
The interaction model of anxiety was used to assess the state anxiety of 30 females who underwent either a diagnostic dilation and curettage or a laparoscopy in hospital. Research participants were administered measures of state anxiety (PARQ [Present Affect Reactions Questionnaire]) and trait anxiety (S-R GTA [S-R Inventory of General Trait Anxiousness]) in both a high stress condition (2 h before the medical intervention after admission to hospital) and a low stress condition (2 days after discharge from hospital). It was predicted that ambiguous trait anxiety would correlate significantly with state anxiety changes (i.e., between high stress and low stress conditions) since the high stress condition was primarily ambiguous in nature. It was also predicted that significant correlations between state anxiety changes and the non-congruent facets of trait anxiety (interpersonal, physical danger, innocuous and social evaluation) would not occur. The correlation between ambiguous trait anxiety and state anxiety change scores was significant, and none of the interpersonal, innocuous and physical danger trait anxiety correlated with state anxiety changes. The unexpected significant correlation between state anxiety changes and social evaluation trait anxiety was attributed to the minimal components of social evaluation present in the high stress condition being relatively potent determinants of state anxiety for high social evaluation trait anxiety persons.