Introducing Copula as a Novel Statistical Method in Psychological Analysis.

Elham Dehghani,Hossein Negarestani,Moharram Atashafrooz,Somayeh Hadad Ranjbar,Amir Mosavi,Levente Kovacs

doi:10.3390/ijerph18157972

Abstract

During the past decades, the relationship between various psychological parameters had been studied in detail. However, the dependency structure of correlated parameters was rarely investigated. Knowing the dependence structure helps in finding the probability matrix of the interaction between the parameters. In this research, a novel approach was introduced in psychological analysis using copula functions. For this purpose, the self-esteem and anxiety of 141 university students in Iran were extracted using the Coopersmith Self-esteem Inventory and the Zang Anxiety Scale. Then the dependence structure of self-esteem and anxiety were established using copula functions. The Frank copula achieved the best fit for the joint variables of self-esteem and anxiety. Finally, the probability matrix of different classes of anxiety, taking into account self-esteem classes, was extracted. The results indicated that poor self-esteem leads to severe or very severe anxiety, with more than 98% probability, while strong self-esteem may lead to normal and mild anxiety, with about 80% probability. It can be concluded that the method was promising, and that copula functions can open a window to the dependence structure analysis of psychological parameters.

Highlights

Anxiety disorder is the third most common type of mental disorder after major depressive disorder and alcohol dependence [1]
A new approach was introduced for psychological analysis using copula functions
The probability matrix showed that poor self-esteem leads to severe and especially very severe anxiety, with a very high probability and a negligible probability allocated to mild and normal anxiety

Summary

Introduction

Anxiety disorder is the third most common type of mental disorder after major depressive disorder and alcohol dependence [1]. Epidemiological studies have shown that the prevalence rate of lifelong anxiety disorder is 13.3% [1]. Over the past few decades, several studies have been conducted on student anxiety [2,3,4,5,6]. These studies have shown that the experience of anxiety during schooling creates problems in the stages of the students’. Researchers and clinicians, in recent years, have made increasing efforts to understand the widespread effects of anxiety disorder. Numerous studies have examined the prevalence, etiology, and treatment of this clinical problem [3,9,10]

Methods

Results

Conclusion