IMPACT OF PARENTS INTEREST ON CHILD INTEREST IN PAKISTAN

      IMPACT OF PARENTS INTEREST ON CHILD INTEREST

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Starting with the name of ALLAH the most beneficent and merciful who gave us the chance to contribute in the ocean of knowledge. We are also thankful to our teacher who guided us in every step that we took in our study.

This project would not have been possible without the guidance and constant encouragement of our teacher MAM SAMREEN IDREES. We would also like to thank our group member and the people who participated in our project without whom this effort could never have reached fruition.

INTRODUCTION:

The study of parent attitudes, belief systems and thinking has taken place along with changing conceptions of child-rearing that have emphasized the bidirectional nature of interactions, with children influencing parents as well as parents influencing children.

The attitudes most frequently considered have to do with the degree of warmth and acceptance or coldness and rejection that exists in the parent-child relationship, as well as the extent to which parents are permissive or restrictive in the limits they set for their offspring.

• EARLY COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT  OF CHILD

Parental involvement with children from an early age has been found to equate with better outcomes (particularly in terms of cognitive development). What parents do is more important than who they are for children’s early development – i.e. home learning activities undertaken by parents is more important for children’s intellectual and social development than parental occupation, education or income.

• LEARNING BY OBSERVATION

Learning through observation is also an important way of learning. Most children learn by observing their parents habits and attitudes. A case study tells that “Four years old JO watches her father tie his shoelaces and tries to copy his movements. JO is learning by observation.” This is also known as SOCIAL LEARNING though observation.

Verbally teaching a child right from wrong has far less of an impact than what she observes her parents and elders doing daily. A parent who frequently parties at night -- and occasionally misses work the next day -- undoes everything he verbally teaches his child about responsibility. If the child neglects to study for a test in favor of playing a computer game, and if she fails the test because of that decision -- and her partying parent punishes her for the lapse -- this can cause confusion in younger children and outright rebellion in teens. On the flip side, parents who rarely socialize and have a very narrow circle of friends can instill in their children a distrust of others, whether they intend to or not.

• SOCIO-CULTURE PERSPECTIVE:

The activity and the attitude of parents toward their children and the way children are reared has varied widely across history, across cultures in same era and even within the identical culture. Some parents swaddle their babies others don’t.

Some breast-feed other bottle feed and so on. In this regard it is interesting to compare infant-parent relationship within different culture.

In Soviet Union babies receive more physical contact hugging, kissing etc.

In United States and Europe children receive attention and care of their parents in the form of bed-time stories.

In Asian countries most parents are over protected and the children don’t get to be independent. 

• BIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE:

Biological perspective gives the information about the genetic make-up and heredity of a child. The child adopts the inherited behavior of his parents. If the certain inherited traits are dominant then the child will show the same behavior. For example, if the father eats hap hazard, the son will also do this. A case study shows that “Tom inherited the trait of aggressiveness from his father.”

• PARENT-CHILD RELATIONSHIP:

Relationship of a child with his parents starts right after his birth. A child’s first institute is his mother’s lap. Child imitates his parents and responds the same in most of the cases. The closer the relationship with his parent, more likely are the chances for a child to follow his parents.

• HUMANISTIC PERSPECTIVE:

What constitutes normal or "good" behavior in children depends on the child's age, personality and physical and emotional development and his free will. It's unrealistic to expect children to behave in specific ways if they haven't reached certain maturity levels. If you know what to expect from your children at each stage of development, you will better understand if their behavior is appropriate and normal.

SIGNIFICANCE:

The significance of our study is that it will help us in near future in our practical life. This study also provided us the main parenting issues of today’s era. It also gives us the information about how the children of this age are being brought up and what are their problems that we need to focus on. Our study is also significant in a way that it will help us to raise good children in our future as parents because it helped us knowing that what things can affect the children positively and negatively.

LITERATURE REVIEW:

A large body of research on attitudes indicates that parental warmth in combination with reasonable levels of control or restrictiveness combine to produce positive child outcomes. Although not strong, the results are quite consistent.

Although many studies have addressed links between parents’ thoughts and actions, more and more investigation is being extended to the influence of parents’ thoughts on child behavior, with actions as the connecting link. Most of the work has been done with mothers, although increasingly research is being extended to fathers.

Researchers have also noted that what is seen to be a reasonable level of control varies as a function of socio cultural context. Thus attitudes toward control are generally more positive in lower socio-economic status contexts.

In 2007, around half of parents surveyed said that they felt very involved in their child’s school life. Two thirds of parents said that they would like to get more involved in their child’s school life.

IMPACT ON EATING HABITS:

Parents are one of the biggest influences on their child, and the child adopts their eating habits and those he sees practiced by the rest of the family whether they are good or bad. Meals Matter reports that the child looks to his parents to make decisions about a wide range of things, including how he eats. Learning more about how parents habits influence the child may help them make changes that improve their health, as well as the health of their child.

One of the most important ways a child learns is by watching parents. If the child sees his parents eating unhealthy foods, he is more likely to believe these eating habits are normal and acceptable.

If parents practice healthy eating habits, the child is more likely to reach for nutritious foods instead of junk. When the child watches his parents consistently making healthy food choices, he is more likely to adopt those habits himself. If a child watches his parents to reach for a piece of fruit or raw vegetables for a snack, it will not only teach him the importance of eating fruits and vegetables, but will also encourage him to make similar choices. He will include vegetables or fruits with every meal and opt for whole grains rather than white versions as additional ways.

IMPACT ON CLOTHINGS:

During the early age of a child parents dress their child up in the manner that they like. Eventually the child adopts those dressing habits which he has seen while growing up and dresses in the same way.

IMPACT ON EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT:

Research on emotional development of children has shown parents’ self support about emotion regulation pattern and coaching their children about emotions. Girls observe their mother expressing emotions more than fathers and adopt the same while the boys observing their fathers, not expressing emotions,

are compelled to do so. So, in any certain situation girls are more likely to behave as their mothers and boys are more likely to behave as fathers.

IMPACT ON EDUCATION:

Another research tried to explore the relationship between parents’ and child’s interests and found out that way parents teach their children in their early ages leaves a great impact on them. Parents’ interest and involvement in their children’s studies influences children’s interest. Most of the children adopts their parents’ interests in education and continue to study the subjects in which their parents were interested. Researches reveal that now-a-days many parents allow their children to do what they want. According to a case study “Dr. Akhtar has two daughters. His wife is a biology teacher and both the daughters are studying MEDICAL.” The daughters have always seen their parents talking about medical in their home and have also developed medical interest and also want to be doctors. So in the light of this, we can say that when children observe their parents in some particular profession they foresee their future as their parents and develop the same interest that their parents have.

METHODOLOGY:

SAMPLE:

We chose two samples for our survey.

We chose children of school as our sample. Their ages ranges from 13-15.

The other sample was the university students. They were of ages 19-22.

LOCALE:

The locale we chose was POF MODEL HIGH SCHOOL in WAH CANTT. The other locale was the WAH UNIVERSITY and WAH MEDICAL COLLEGE.

NUMBER OF PEOPLE:

The number of people who participated in our survey was about 100. There were 50 high school students and 50 university students.

RESULT ANALYSIS

RESULT AND DATA ANALYSIS

Group of students having age 13-16 show         

53.4% positive results

46.6% negative results

Group of students having age 17-22 show

53.5% positive result

46.5% negative result

This shows that parents do have an impact on their children in some cases. Children answered most of the questions in positive reply admitting that they do have similar choices, habits and interests as of their parents.

As one of the candidate, when asked about the topic said that children by their habits and choices depict their parents’ habits and choices
DISCUSSION

Our study shows that there is a great impact of parents’ attitude and interests on their children as the children learn from different paradigms. As discussed earlier children use behaviorism, humanistic, cognitive, biological approaches to learn.

We also learn that respecting the choices of children and learn to deny them in the most soothing way by convincing kids the fact why you deny them. Never consider children as miniature human beings with inferior minds or immature psychic realms. They are miniatures only in the physical form in the feelings level and in the emotional levels, they are intense enough same as elders.

The warmth of parental affection and interpersonal relationship with parents help kids to become mature enough and responsible enough to handle his own life as well that of his/her fellow beings. Regarding our result of survey it is obvious that most of the children think that parents have right to choose their future. They think that what their parents choose for them is best and do not argue rather accept their decisions “as it is” whether it is in their education or clothing or eating habits.

Authoritarian parenting styles can be very rigid and strict. Parents who practice authoritarian style parenting have a strict set of rules and expectations and require rigid obedience.

Permissive or Indulgent parenting is most popular in middle-class families. In these family settings a child's freedom and their autonomy are valued and parents tend to rely mostly on reasoning and explanation. There tends to be little if any punishment or rules in this style of parenting and children are said to be free from external constraints. Children of permissive parents are generally happy but sometimes show low levels of self-control and self-reliance because they lack structure at home.

Younger children are becoming more independent and are beginning to build friendships. They are able to reason and can make their own decisions given hypothetical situations. Young children demand constant attention, but will learn how to deal with boredom and be able to play independently. They also enjoy helping and feeling useful and able. Parents may assist their child by encouraging social interactions and modeling proper social behaviors. A large part of learning in the early years comes from being involved in activities and household duties.

Parents are expected to make decisions about their child's education. Parenting styles in this area diverge greatly at this stage with some parents becoming heavily involved in arranging organized activities and early learning programs. Other parents choose to let the child develop with few organized activities.

LIMITATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS

LIMITATIONS:

Our sample was limited.

Due to shortage of time we couldn’t study it deeply.

There is a possibility that the students must have marked the options randomly.

This is also a possibility of courtesy biasness.

SUGGESTION:

Regarding our study:

Parents should guide their children in every matter.

Parents should not impose everything on their children.

Awareness should be provided to parents and children about parent-children relationship.

Parents should justify every decision, they make for their children.

Parents should try to express their emotions on right time, so that emotional learning of children would be appropriate.

Regarding our survey:

There were some confounding variables that affected the results of our survey.

Some people might be in hurry.

Some people did not want to share their personal information .So; they should be made comfortable to trust the researcher.

                                        CONCLUSION

Parents need to understand the amount of inspiration kids can get from the presence and love of parents. Parents should respect the feelings and choices of your kids. This will generate a mutual respect between children and parents. Better relationship with kids is necessary to interfere and influence in the grooming process of kids. When children feel affection towards parents, he/she may feel the obligation to follow the guidelines of parents

EFFECT OF MODERN NETWORKING ON MALE FEMALE INTERACTION AND RELATIONSHIPS IN PAKISTAN

EFFECT OF MODERN NETWORKING ON MALE FEMALE INTERACTION AND RELATIONSHIPS

INTRODUCTION

Male and Female Relationship

Relationship is a connection between two people.

An example of relationship is a husband and his wife. Relationship of a brother and sister or two business partners working together.

IMPORTANCE

It is very important to be in a relationship as females are always fragile and dependent on males physically, emotionally and economically as in the Holy Quran it is also mention that

“Males are made caretaker of the families”.

Males are also dependent on female for their families and daily routine work because it is the women who make it possible for her man

Women are taught to be more intimate while men are taught that intimacy is somewhat seen as a weakness. Emotionally women differ from men because they are more open with their feelings.   Women can cry and express their feelings with no inhibitions, while once again crying for a man would be seen as a sign of weakness. Female friendships can somewhat be seen as a stronger relationship for the simple fact that they are more intimate in the emotional and physical level.

GENDER ROLE IN RELATIONSHIPS

Some of the most basic gender specific roles have been around since the beginning of time including the most common gender role that the man is the sole provider for his household and the woman is the “stay-at-home mom.” Some other simple gender roles include: the man paying for dates or the man should be the one to ask the woman out on a date or propose.

Things in today’s society are not much different from when our grandparents were teenagers in the sense that if someone breaks away from the norm, society will generally look down upon them with a disapproving look and eyes full of judgment. Gender roles are important and play a big part in relationships today, each couple has found something that works for them and what works for one couple doesn’t always work for another.

POSITIVE AND NEGATIVE ASPECTS OF RELATIONSHIPS

It is positive to be in a relationship as it helps u to find your compatibility with the other person.

It will help to find your spouse.

Girls are dependent on males so being in a relationship helps them to share their feelings.

 LITERATURE REVIEW

The main component that allows for mate selection seems to lie in the evolutionary need for the species to continue. Primarily, males and females that battled and proved themselves strongest, attracted mates more often. Then, they would choose from the strongest from those.

Until recently, it was thought the human race had lost the ability to attract a mate but researches have shown that it is not so.

Daily experience suggests that non-romantic friendships between males and females are not only possible, but common—men and women live, work, and play side-by-side, and generally seem to be able to avoid spontaneously relationships together.

New research suggests that there may be some truth to this possibility—that people may think they are capable of being “just friends” with members of the opposite sex, but the opportunity for “romance” is often lurking just around the corner, waiting to pounce at the most inopportune moment. 

RESEARCH CONDUCTED ON UNDERGRADUATE OPPOSITE SEX FRIENDS

Researchers brought 88 pairs of undergraduate opposite-sex friends into…a science lab for investigation. In order to ensure honest responses, the researchers not only followed standard protocols regarding anonymity and confidentiality, but also required both friends to agree—verbally, and in front of each other. These friendship pairs were then separated, and each member of each pair was asked a series of questions related to his or her romantic feelings toward the friend with whom they were taking the study.

The results suggest large gender differences in how men and women experience opposite-sex friendships. Men were much more attracted to their female friends than vice versa. Men were also more likely than women to think that their opposite-sex friends were attracted to them. In fact, men’s estimates of how attractive they were to their female friends had virtually nothing to do with how these women actually felt, and almost everything to do with how the men themselves felt.

Males assumed that any romantic attraction they experienced was mutual, and were blind to the actual level of romantic interest felt by their female friends. Women, too, were blind to the mindset of their opposite-sex friends; because females generally were not attracted to their male friends, they assumed that this lack of attraction was mutual. As a result, men consistently overestimated the level of attraction felt by their female friends and women consistently underestimated the level of attraction felt by their male friends.

RESEARCH OF ANALYSIS OF CELL PHONE

An analysis of 1.95 billion cell phone calls and 489 million text messages reveal how men and women follow different relationship patterns during their lifetimes. The researchers argue that women's friendships in particular drive the process of finding a mate and supporting the next generation.

A team of researchers examined cell phone data from a single provider in an undisclosed European country. The researchers worked with data gathered over a seven-month time frame and restricted themselves to studying communications between cell phone users of a known age and sex, making a data set of about 3.2 million subscribers, or about 20 percent of the nation's cell phone users. Working on the assumption that close friends communicate most frequently, the team analyzed the top three friendships of each cell phone user based on the frequency of communication to spot patterns in the average male or female user at various ages.

The data revealed that an individual's best friend, particularly in one's 20s and 30s, happens to be someone of the opposite sex and a similar age. In addition, striking differences exist in how men and women communicate with their presumed romantic partner. For one, the man in a woman's life was her very best friend for roughly 15 years, compared with seven years in the case for men.

EFFECT OF MASS MEDIA ON MALE FEMALE RELATIONS

Gender socialization occurs through four major agents: family, education, peer groups, and mass media. Because mass media has enormous effects on our attitude and behavior, notably in regards to aggression, it is an important contributor to the socialization process. This is particularly true with regards to gender. In television and movies, women tend to have less significant roles than men. They are often portrayed as wives or mothers, rather than as main characters. When women are given a lead role, they are often one of two extremes: either a wholesome, saint-like figure or a malevolent, hyper-sexual figure. 

Women almost exclusively appear in ads that promote cooking, cleaning, or childcare-related products. In general, women are underrepresented in roles, or ads, that reference leadership, intelligence, or a balanced psyche. In music videos, women are objectified and portrayed as only existing to serve men. They wear little clothing and are walked around on leashes by men.

They mostly advertise cosmetics, but they also appear in the commercials directed to men. When a beautiful woman accepts and praises the male cosmetics, it is treated by men as a guarantee of its quality. 

Male stereotypes are also various. The first model is “a real man”, athletic, successful, professional, seducer with a beautiful woman by his side. Men generally advertise cars, cigarettes, business products or investments He also has a branded car and a smart phone.

If men and women appear in the commercials together, they are mainly presented as a couple or marriage. A sexual subtext is also often used in this case, even if the advertised product has nothing in common with the erotic sphere. 

Therefore, adolescent create cognitive schemes, which are certain representations of the reality displaying its most typical and fundamental elements and properties. These schemes are responsible for defining the essence of our worldview and have a significant influence on social cognition – understanding, anticipation, and situation and emotion control.

These schemes lead adolescent to believe that having a relationship with opposite sex is necessary and not being in relationship is something to be ashamed of.

EFFECT OF SOCIAL NETWORK ON MALE FEMALE RELATIONS

Social networks have become a global phenomenon and attracted extensive population from all around the world in different ages, cultures, education levels, etc. In addition to routinely checking e-mails, reading daily forums and newspapers or following instant message tools, people now also check their social network profiles by following others’ status changes, updating their profiles or looking at others’ profiles.

Research has shown that many people connect to social network sites at least once a day either to check their profiles or to participate in different online activities.

People use social network sites for a variety of reasons among which ease of use, allowing rapid updating, analyzing and sharing the continuously increasing information, reflecting on daily life, establishing and maintaining spontaneous social contacts and relationships, supporting informal learning practices with interaction and communication and facilitating delivery of education are the leading ones.

Most of the social network users are young individuals most of whom are university students. Hence, social network sites are considered to play an active role in younger generation’s daily lives

Various researchers have studied users’ purposes in using social networks. Social networks can be used for passing time, learning about other people, maintaining social relations. Social network can be oriented towards work- related contexts, establishing new relationships, or reaching those with shared interests such as in music or politics. Users can share their personal information with the help of their profile page, connect with other users, upload, tag and share multimedia content they have created, link others to a variety of accessible content, initiate or join sub-sets of common interest groups.

So, it can be suggested that, most of the studies stated that, people maintain their relations with social networks in which they formed or joined new networks to make new friends. It is noticeable that people generally tend to keeping in touch with friends, maintaining their relations or making new friends. This type of social networking often lead adolescent to indulge in relationships with opposite gender 

METHODOLOGY

Our study was about the “Effects of MODREN NETWORKING on male female interaction and relationships.” Young adolescents are more likely to interact and build relations with opposite sex.

SAMPLE:

We chose students of Fatima Jinnah University and Wah University as our sample. Their ages ranges from 18-23 years.

INSTRUMENT:

We chose survey as our research instrument. We made a closed ended questionnaire with the options of Yes or No to analyze the result.

LOCALE:

The locale we chose was Fatima Jinnah University and Wah University.

NUMBER OF PEOPLE:

The number of people who participated in our survey was about 20.

PROCEDURE:

We took 20 students as our sample, 10 boys and 10 girls in the area of Fatima Jinnah University and Wah University and gave survey questionnaire to them. After they filled the survey we analyzed their results which we have mentioned in our project.

RESULT ANALYSIS

From the result it is cleared that there is a great impact of social networks and mass media on male and female relationships. Relationships are influenced by social media (face book, TV channels). There are some archetype believes prevailing in a society about relationships such as proposal is most appropriate if from males, girls are more relationship oriented etc.

Qualitative analysis

The study reveals that people now a day are indulge more in relationships than before. They want to be having girlfriend or boyfriend not only for sharing themselves but it is in fashion that you might have some kind of commitment or relation in modern era.

Most of the influence of the mass media on interpersonal relationship is due to the powerful influence of advertisements. Commercial messages influence how people feel about themselves and their image to others. Commercial messages influence what a person's expectations are about themselves, about others and about what their lives should be like.

People are particular about their partners and they want them as shown on media. They mostly want them to make their leisure time relaxing and amusing. In present situation, sincerity is not as much worthy as of time pass. These kinds of relationships are mostly physical rather than spiritual .Most of the people think that male and female can be friends without building affectionate feelings for each other but generally it is not possible.

Quantitative analysis

Positive answer to our survey	48.5%
Negative answer to our survey	51.5%

Do you think being in a relationship is a bad thing?	5	15
Do you think social networks e.g. face book play a role in male female interaction?	18	2
Do you think proposal is only acceptable if it is from males?	3	17
Do you think it is odd that you don’t have boy friend/girl friend when your every friend is in a relationship?	1	19
Do you think boy and a girl can be friends?	17	3
Do you think mass media expresses right roles of male and female relationship?	4	16
People are having more than one relationship at the same time because of media. Do you agree?	16	4
1.     Do you agree that being in a relationship is just a fashion now days?	16	4
2.     Do you think it is women responsibility to be more relationship oriented?	6	14
10. In most of the cases boys misunderstand the relationship. Do you agree?	11	9

DISCUSSION

The result of our study shows that there is a great impact of mass media and social networking on male and female relationships. Mass media influence relationship in many ways. It has created some archetype believes among people.

95% of the people said that it is not bad to be in a relationship that if they have any commitment with someone then it is okay with them. Along with this, one of the questions reveals that 80% of the people accept that they indulge themselves in more than one relationship and they feel it.

People think that it is women responsibility to be relationship oriented as the reason is that women are caring and having soft heart so they understand, the problems around them, better.

Although people believe that the media is not expressing right roles of male female relationship and think that the role media project is somehow not true but still whether unintentionally, they are following those roles in their daily lives as people agree that relationships are fashion and people are indulged in more than one relationship now-a-days.

It is seen that in most cases males perceive relationship wrong and take it as a commitment. As  mentioned in the research of cell phone analysis we see that men take less years to finally indulge in relationship with opposite sex while girl take almost double time period as that of boys.

People do believe that social networks play a major role in interaction of male and females and they act as a catalyst to male female relations.

So, we can say that in most of the cases social networks do have an impact on male female interaction and people do follow it as a fashion whether intentionally or unintentionally.

CONCLUSION

There is an impact of social network and media on adolescents. Because they feel that they are following fashion of modern era. Although they do not agree with the roles that are being projected and do agree that some things are just fashion. They still follow some of the roles unintentionally. So, we can say that there is definitely an impact of social networks and media on male female interactions and relationships.

Beck Anxiety Inventory

 Beck Anxiety Inventory

 Definition

The Beck Anxiety Inventory is a well-accepted self-report measure of anxiety in adults and adolescents for use in both clinical and research settings.

 Description

Background

The Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), created by Aaron T. Beck, MD, and colleagues

It’s a 21-item multiple-choice self-report inventory that measures the severity of an anxiety in adults and adolescents.

ITEMS:

Items in the BAI describe the emotional, physiological, and cognitive symptoms of anxiety but not depression, it can discriminate anxiety from depression. Although the age range for the measure is from 17 to 80, it has been used in peer-reviewed studies with younger adolescents aged 12 and older. Each of the items on the BAI is a simple description of a symptom of anxiety in one of its four expressed aspects: (1) subjective (e.g., "unable to relax"), (2) neurophysiologic (e.g., "numbness or tingling"), (3) autonomic (e.g., "feeling hot") or (4) panic-related (e.g., "fear of losing control"). The BAI requires only a basic reading level, can be used with individuals who have intellectual disabilities, and can be completed in 5 - 10 minutes using the pre-printed paper form and a pencil. Because of the relative simplicity of the inventory, it can also be administered orally for sight-impaired individuals. The BAI may be administered and scored by paraprofessionals, but it should be used and interpreted only by professionals with appropriate clinical training and experience. Beck Anxiety Inventory 2

Administration, Scoring, and Interpretation

Respondents are asked to report the extent to which they have been bothered by each of the 21 symptoms in the week preceding (including the day of) their completion of the BAI. Each symptom item has four possible answer choices: Not at All; Mildly (It did not bother me much); Moderately (It was very unpleasant, but I could stand it), and; Severely (I could barely stand it). The clinician assigns the following values to each response: Not at All = 0; mildly = 1; moderately = 2, and; Severely = 3. The values for each item are summed yielding an overall or total score for all 21 symptoms that can range between 0 and 63 points. A total score of 0 - 7 is interpreted as a "Minimal" level of anxiety; 8 - 15 as "Mild"; 16 - 25 as "Moderate", and; 26 - 63 as "Severe". Clinicians examine specific item responses to determine whether the symptoms appear mostly subjective, neurophysiologic, autonomic, or panic-related. The clinical can then further assess using DSM criteria to arrive at a specific diagnostic category and plan interventions targeting the underlying cause of the respondent's anxious symptomatology and/or diagnosis.

Psychometric Properties

The BAI is psychometrically sound. Internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) ranges from .92 to .94 for adults and test-retest (one week interval) reliability is .75. Concurrent validity with the Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale, Revised is .51; .58 for the State and .47 for the Trait subscales of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, Form Y, and; .54 for the mean 7 day anxiety rating of the Weekly Record of Anxiety and Depression. The BAI has also been shown to possess acceptable reliability and convergent and discriminant validity for both 14-18 year and inpatients and outpatients.

Clinical and Research Uses

The BAI can be used to assess and establish a baseline anxiety level, as a diagnostic aid, to detect the effectiveness of treatment as it progresses, and as a post-treatment outcome measure. Other advantages of the BAI include its fast and easy administration, repeatability, discrimination between symptoms of anxiety and depression, ability to highlight the connection between mind and body for those seeking help to reduce their anxiety, and proven validity across languages, cultures, and age ranges. Some researchers have suggested that the BAI may be less sensitive to symptoms secondary to medical or other trauma, more sensitive to panic disorder than it is to the symptoms of other anxiety disorders, and may need separate norms for males, females, and more ethnically/socioeconomically diverse samples.

FOR SELF EVALUATION OF ANXIETY :

 A grand sum between 0 – 21 indicates very low anxiety. That is usually a good thing. However, it is possible that you might be unrealistic in either your assessment which would be denial or that you have learned to “mask” the symptoms commonly associated with anxiety. Too little “anxiety” could indicate that you are detached from yourself, others, or your environment.

A grand sum between 22 – 35 indicates moderate anxiety. Your body is trying to tell you something. Look for patterns as to when and why you experience the symptoms described above. For example, if it occurs prior to public speaking and your job requires a lot of presentations you may want to find ways to calm yourself before speaking or let others do some of the presentations. You may have some conflict issues that need to be resolved. Clearly, it is not “panic” time but you want to find ways to manage the stress you feel.

A grand sum that exceeds 36 is a potential cause for concern. Again, look for patterns or times when you tend to feel the symptoms you have circled. Persistent and high anxiety is not a sign of personal weakness or failure. It is, however, something that needs to be proactively treated or there could be significant impacts to you mentally and physically. You may want to consult a physician or counselor if the feelings persist.