The Contribution of Anxiety Sensitivity to Obsessive–Compulsive and Anxiety Symptoms in a Naturalistic Treatment Setting

Anxiety sensitivity (AS), a fear of arousal-related sensations, is prevalent in a number of disorders. We examined the relationship between internalizing symptoms and the anxiety sensitivity components of physical, social, and cognitive concerns in a sample of 165 patients seeking treatment in a clinic specializing in cognitive behavioral therapy for anxiety-related disorders. Social anxiety symptoms were associated with greater social concerns. Cognitive concerns were characteristic of both depression and generalized anxiety symptoms, suggesting these two classes of symptoms may share AS symptomatology. Physical concerns were specifically related to panic symptoms. Although obsessive–compulsive symptoms were related to cognitive concerns using univariate regression, these symptoms were not strongly related to any of the anxiety sensitivity components when the correlation between disorders was taken into account. Thus, within the internalizing symptoms studied here, the anxiety sensitivity domains were most relevant to panic, social anxiety, generalized anxiety, and depressive symptoms and less related to obsessive–compulsive symptoms.