Anxiety sensitivity as an incremental predictor of later anxiety symptoms and syndromes

Although anxiety sensitivity (AS) has been shown to predict anxiety symptoms and panic, this literature is limited in regard to evaluating AS as an incremental predictor of anxiety psychopathology relative to other established risk factors including sex and negative affect. The present report prospectively evaluated whether AS was predictive of later changes in anxiety symptoms after controlling for potential confounding factors. Consistent with hypothesis, AS was found to be a significant, incremental predictor of anxiety symptoms over time, even after controlling for sex and negative affectivity. These data provide novel evidence for the unique association between AS of the development of anxiety symptoms.