Psychotic Experiences Questionnaire. Part 1

BACKGROUND: The rationale for the concept of psychotic and psychotic-like experiences, delusions and auditory hallucinations, on the basis of which the Psychotic Experiences Questionnaire was developed. AIM: The purpose of this study is to present the results of testing and validating of a questionnaire that assesses the severity of psychotic experiences. The study aims to determine the content of the experience at different phases of manifestation, including the phase of psychotic-like experiences, as well as metacognitive appraisals of the experience and its relationship to social anxiety. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The sample of 122 respondents includes non-clinical and two clinical groups — with symptoms of the affective spectrum and with symptoms of the psychotic spectrum. To assess the convergent validity of the Questionnaire, the Russian-language Symptom Check List-90-Revised was used. Metacognitive appraisals of psychotic experience and the overall severity of social anxiety (“Social Anxiety and Social Anxiety Disorder Questionnaire”) were measured. RESULTS: The structure of the Questionnaire obtained by cluster analysis was verified by confirmatory factor analysis, and optim