[Anxiety- an approach to defining terms and formulating a methodological concept for measuring anxiety states within the framework of clinical trials with anxiolytic substances (author's transl)].

A methodological concept for measuring anxiety states and changes in anxiety states in clinical studies with anxiolytic substances is presented: Effectivity should be evaluated on several levels which include emotions, objects of anxiety, psychophysiology, biochemistry, and observed behavior. This test concept is based on new knowledge from behavior psychology, learning theory, psychology of testing, psychophysiology, biochemistry, neuroendocrinology, and psychiatry. In diagrams, important mechanisms of thr origin of experimental, stress-induced and pathological anxiety states are depicted. The point is stressed that anxiety is situational and fluctuates.