Picardi Angelo, Filastro Antonella
Centre for Behavioural Sciences and Mental Health, Italian National Institute of Health, Rome, Italy.
Institute for Humanistic and Existential Psychotherapy (IPUE), Rome, Italy.
Clin Pract Epidemiol Ment Health. 2025 May 5;21:e17450179366317. doi: 10.2174/0117450179366317250410071321. eCollection 2025.
Research in the field of existential psychotherapy has mainly relied on measures of spiritual well-being and existential quality of life, and has been hindered by the lack of instruments specifically assessing existential distress and wellbeing. Our aim was to develop a valid and reliable instrument to measure this dimension.
First, we created a list comprising more than 200 items that address the main existential themes as described by the philosophical and clinical literature. Out of these, 84 were retained after pilot testing and exclusion of the items that showed unsatisfactory psychometric properties. A total of 411 non-clinical participants with a wide range of age groups and educational levels participated in the validation study with a cross-sectional design and a 4-week follow-up. They completed the new instrument, named the 'Existential Dimension Inventory' (EDIN), along with several criterion measures, such as the 15-item Dispositional Resilience Scale, the 18-item Personal Well-Being Scale, the Experiences in Close Relationships Questionnaire, the 18-item Brief Symptom Inventory, the Maudsley Obsessive-Compulsive Inventory, the Authenticity Scale, and the Temperament and Character Inventory. They also completed the EDIN for a second time after 4 weeks. After performing principal component analysis with orthogonal rotation, we estimated the internal consistency and test-retest stability of EDIN factorially derived scales. Convergent and discriminant validity were assessed by examining the correlations between EDIN total and subscale scores, and scores on the criterion measures.
Eight factors (interpreted as Mastery, Fear of loss and death, Authenticity, Serenity in relationships, Pressure of time, Openness to others, Worry about meaning in life, and Loneliness) that accounted for 53% of the total variance were extracted. All EDIN scales displayed high internal consistency and stability, and the pattern of correlations between EDIN scores and their relevant criterion measures was consistent with expectations. Also, the results supported discriminant validity with respect to emotional distress, psychiatric symptomatology, and temperament and character dimensions.
These findings suggested that the EDIN may allow valid and reliable measurement of existential well-being. Many EDIN subscales cover themes identified by existential philosophers and therapists as key issues that human beings face in their everyday lives, which corroborates the relevance of the dimension of existential wellbeing as measured by the EDIN. Despite some limitations, this study supports the validity and reliability of the EDIN. It suggests that this instrument holds the promise of being a valuable tool for research, clinical, and training purposes.
存在主义心理治疗领域的研究主要依赖于精神幸福感和存在主义生活质量的测量，并且一直受到缺乏专门评估存在主义痛苦和幸福感的工具的阻碍。我们的目标是开发一种有效且可靠的工具来测量这一维度。
首先，我们创建了一个包含200多个项目的列表，这些项目涉及哲学和临床文献中描述的主要存在主义主题。其中，经过预测试并排除心理测量特性不令人满意的项目后，保留了84个项目。共有411名来自不同年龄组和教育水平的非临床参与者参与了这项具有横断面设计和4周随访的验证研究。他们完成了名为“存在维度量表”（EDIN）的新工具，以及几项标准测量工具，如15项的气质复原力量表、18项的个人幸福感量表、亲密关系体验问卷、18项的简明症状量表、莫兹利强迫观念-强迫行为量表、真实性量表以及气质和性格量表。他们还在4周后再次完成了EDIN。在进行具有正交旋转的主成分分析后，我们评估了EDIN因子衍生量表的内部一致性和重测稳定性。通过检查EDIN总分和子量表分数与标准测量工具分数之间的相关性来评估聚合效度和区分效度。
提取了八个因子（解释为掌控感、对失去和死亡的恐惧、真实性、人际关系中的宁静、时间压力、对他人的开放性、对生活意义的担忧以及孤独感），它们占总方差的53%。所有EDIN量表都显示出高内部一致性和稳定性，并且EDIN分数与其相关标准测量工具之间的相关模式符合预期。此外，结果支持了在情绪困扰、精神症状学以及气质和性格维度方面的区分效度。
这些发现表明EDIN可能允许对存在主义幸福感进行有效且可靠的测量。许多EDIN子量表涵盖了存在主义哲学家和治疗师确定为人类在日常生活中面临的关键问题的主题，这证实了通过EDIN测量的存在主义幸福感维度的相关性。尽管存在一些局限性，但这项研究支持了EDIN的有效性和可靠性。这表明该工具有望成为研究、临床和培训目的的有价值工具。
