Personality (GAS)

The goal-oriented personality traits of adult Lifelines participants (section: mental health) were assessed in follow-up questionnaire 1C using the Goal Disengagement and Goal Reengagement Scale (GAS) ¹⁾.
Note that personality traits were also assessed in Lifelines using the ASI, the NEO, and the Type D instruments.
Moreover, various personality traits (hostility, reward sensitivity) were assessed in the context of an an additional questionnaire on ADHD.

Goal adjustment tendency, as measured by the GAS, has been found to predict mental and physical health in both healthy populations (e.g. students) and clinical populations (e.g. patients with a chronic medical condition). The GAS may be used to explain why people show differences in well-being, despite experiencing similar disease severity or life stressors.

A syntax to score the results of the GAS is available at Lifelines.
Respondents are asked how strongly the 10 statements in the GAS applies to them on a 5-point Likert scale where 1 = almost never true and 5 = almost always true.
The 10 items in the GAS are distributed over 2 subscales:

• Goal disengagement (4 items), which measures the ease with which respondents are able to reduce effort and relinquish commitment toward unattainable goals. Two items were developed for each component of goal disengagement: relinquishment of commitment and reduction of effort.
• Goal re-engagement (6 items), which measures the extent to which individuals generally reengage in other new goals if they face constraints on goal pursuits. It contains three two-item sets assessing the tendency to identify new goals, to commit to new goals, and to begin active pursuit of new goals, respectively.

Note: the individual components of goal disengagement and goal re-engagement are hardly ever studied. Studies tend to focus on the two subscales.

The psychometric qualities of the Goal Adjustment Scale have been evaluated in a sample of 115 undergraduate students, a sample of 120 adults from the general population and a sample of 45 parents of children undergoing treatment for cancer (Wrosch et al., 2003). In all three samples, findings were consistent with hypotheses which suggests good construct validity. The tendency to disengage from unattainable goals was associated with higher levels of well-being. Furthermore, the tendency to reengage in new goals predicted well-being above and beyond the ease of abandoning unattainable goals. Since the GAS could not be compared to a gold standard, the criterion validity of this instrument could not be examined.