A Taxometric Analysis Of Panic Disorder

Panic-related suffering is associated with high individual costs and strain on medical resource utilization. Cognitive-behavioral interventions for panic disorder are effective, but obtaining a diagnosis often precludes access to such treatments. Evidence-based models suggest that panic disorder is a multi-dimensional construct, yet panic disorder is diagnosed categorically (i.e., “you have it, or you don’t”) in modern diagnostic manuals. Taxometric analyses, which test the dimensional or categorical latent structure of constructs, have consistently revealed dimensional latent structures when applied to other anxiety disorders and panic-related processes, but these analyses have never been applied to panic disorder. In this study, seven theoretically-relevant indicators of panic disorder were subjected to three nonredundant taxometric procedures to test the latent structure of panic disorder, and simulated comparison plots and objective fit indices were evaluated. The collective results provided consistent empirical support for a dimensional model of panic disorder. The implications of these findings for the measurement, assessment, diagnosis, and treatment of panic disorder are discussed.