Development and Validation of the Counterfactual Thinking for Negative Events Scale

• Published in: Journal of personality assessment Vol. 90; no. 3; pp. 261 - 269
• Main Authors: Rye, Mark S., Cahoon, Melissa B., Ali, Rahan S., Daftary, Tarika
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Philadelphia, PA Taylor & Francis Group 01.05.2008; Taylor & Francis; Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group
• Subjects: Adaptation, Psychological; Adolescent; Adult; Affect; Biological and medical sciences; Cognition; Cognitive style; Cognitive styles; Counterfactual thinking; Discriminant analysis; Factor Analysis, Statistical; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Life Change Events; Male; Negative events; Personality; Personality Inventory; Personality. Affectivity; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Psychometrics; Reproducibility of Results; Studies; Subscales; Test-Retest reliability; United States; University students; Validation; United States; Human; Evaluation scale; Psychometrics; Cognition; Personality; Counterfactual thinking; Test validation; Life events; Optimism pessimism; Information processing; Self esteem; Rumination; Cognitive style; Test construction
• DOI: 10.1080/00223890701884996
• ISSN: 0022-3891

We examined the psychometric properties of the newly created Counterfactual Thinking for Negative Events Scale (CTNES) in two studies involving university undergraduates. In Study 1 (N = 634), factor analysis revealed four subscales that correspond with various types of counterfactual thinking: Nonreferent Downward, Other-Referent Upward, Self-Referent Upward, and Nonreferent Upward. The subscales were largely orthogonal and had adequate internal consistency and test-retest reliability. The CTNES subscales were positively correlated with a traditional method of assessing counterfactual thinking and were related as expected to contextual aspects of the negative event, negative affect, and cognitive style. In Study 2 (N = 208), we further examined the validity of the scale and demonstrated that the subscales were sensitive to an experimental manipulation concerning the type of negative event participants recalled. Moreover, the CTNES subscales correlated in the expected direction with measures of coping and cognitive style.