The assessment of anxiety can be difficult in older populations. In particular, the assessment of anxiety in long-term care settings can be problematic, because patients may be experiencing some level of cognitive impairment as well as co-existing medical conditions. The Geriatric Anxiety Inventory (GAI) is a brief, 20-item anxiety screening tool validated previously in community and outpatient samples of older adults. In this series of studies the predictive validity of the instrument in residential care settings is examined. Results indicated that classification of presence or absence of anxiety symptoms by the GAI was not significantly associated with an individual's cognitive status, in either community dwelling or residential care samples. In addition, data supported the predictive validity of the GAI in residential care settings with respect to diagnosis of anxiety disorders. Thus the GAI may be a useful measure to assess anxiety symptoms in residential care.