Home Dermatology New Screening Tool Developed to Assess Tanning Addiction

New Screening Tool Developed to Assess Tanning Addiction

Use of tool finds tan addiction tied to female gender, being single, anxiety, obsessive-compulsiveness

FRIDAY, March 2, 2018 (HealthDay News) — A newly developed scale may identify patients addicted to tanning, according to a study published online Feb. 25 in the British Journal of Dermatology.

Cecilie Schou Andreassen, Ph.D., from University of Bergen in Norway, and colleagues developed a new seven-item tanning addiction scale based on core addiction criteria. The scale was administered online to a cross-sectional convenience sample of 23,537 adults along with an assessment of demographic factors; the five-factor model of personality; and symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder, anxiety, and depression.

The researchers found that tanning addiction was positively associated with being female, not being in a relationship, extroversion, neuroticism, anxiety, and obsessive-compulsiveness. An inverse association was seen between tanning addiction and educational level, intellect/openness, and depression.

“The new scale, Bergen Tanning Addiction Scale, showed good psychometric properties, and is the first scale to fully conceptualize tanning addiction within a contemporary addiction framework,” the authors write.

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