These are three questions that have been mandatory in the UK IAPT (Improving Access to Psychological Therapies, now “NHS Talking Therapies”). I think they are also sometimes called “the phobia questions”. I see them as “trigger items” rather than scales: prompts that something might be a significant issue for the person rather than scales whose numbers should be taken very seriously in psychometric terms for comparing individuals. I don’t say disrespectfully: I see the risk items in the CORE measures as very similar and if they work for the client and practitioner as cues that lead into constructive conversations about potentially shame/guilt laden topics that might otherwise not surface in a typically time pressured initial meeting that’s all well and good.
Details #
Here are the questions (from here as it happens: a quick search on the internet and in the IAPT documentation has failed to give me any clarity about the origins and possible copyright on these “scales”
So they tap into social anxieties leading to phobic avoidance, panic and specific phobias. I haven’t found any information about what scores practitioners are supposed to take as triggers but I would guess that people are not unreasonably expected to use common sense and experience in starting a conversation out of the scores.
Try also #
IAPT
Chapters #
Mentioned briefly in Chapter 4!
Online resources #
None.
Dates #
First created 30.iv.24.
