Abnormality as a positive characteristic: The development and validation of a scale measuring need for uniqueness.

Abstract

Need for uniqueness is introduced as a positive striving for abnormality relative to other people. Recent research regarding situational determinants of uniqueness motivation is described, and a dispositional individual-differences measure of need for uniqueness is presented. development of the Uniqueness Scale aims at insuring construct validity as a guide for the item selection. internal reliabilities, item-remainder coefficients, test-retest reliabilities, cross-validation information, factor analysis, and discriminant validation data are presented, and all meet the normal psychometric criteria expected of an individual-differences measure. Additionally, eight separate validational studies are presented. Abnormal psychology, as evidenced by the contents of books and journal articles in the area, has typically focused on the negative perspective of deviance. As Sarason (1972) notes in the introductory paragraph of his abnormal psychology text, The term 'abnormal psychology' has traditionally referred to the study of human failures and inadequacies (p. 3). While the manifestation of abnormal or deviant behavior is most commonly conceptualized as maladaptive, this need not be the case. One of the problems, however, with the terms abnormality and deviance is that they carry negative connotations (cf. Freedman & Doob, 1968). Therefore, the present article espouses the term uniqueness to circumvent the connotative qualities of abnormality and deviance. By uniqueness, we mean to convey a positive striving for differentness relative to other people. theoretical underpinning of the uniqueness motivation construct and the de