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Psychology
in
[he
Schools
Volume 29, April 1992
VALIDITY OF THE PARENTING INVENTORY: YOUNG CHILDREN
ROBERT
A.
FOX
AND
KATHLEEN
S.
BENTLEY
Marquette
University
The Parenting Inventory: Young Children (PI) is a rating scale that measures the
developmental expectations and behaviors
of
parents
of
children who are between
the ages
of
1
and
4
years,
1
I
months. Using a representative urban sample
of
1,056
mothers, the PI was found to discriminate successfully between parents with children
of
different ages and to have substantial item-construct correlations (content validity).
The
PI
was not strongly related
to
the Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory, a
measure
of
parenting attitudes (discriminant validity). Reasons for this latter finding
are discussed. Potential uses of the
PI
for practitioners working with parents in the
schools are described.
Most available instruments that assess parenting are attitudinal in nature (e.g.,
Bavolek, 1984; Block, 1965; Cohler, Weiss,
&
Grunebaum, 1970; Loyd
&
Abidin, 1985;
Pumroy, 1966; Strom, 1984). Unfortunately, attitudes may have little to do with the
actual parent behaviors that children directly experience (Holden
&
Edwards, 1989).
As
an alternative to existing parenting instruments, the Parenting Inventory: Young
Children (PI; Fox, 1990)’ was developed
as
an empirically derived, descriptive classifica-
tion system
of
specific parent behaviors and developmental expectations. A total of
232
preliminary items for the PI were developed within a developmental-behavioral con-
ceptual framework, based on extensive literature searches, reviews of published develop-
mental tests, and clinical experience. Initial content validity was quantitatively established
through critical reviews by parents and professionals (Fox, in press). Based on a represen-
tative sample of a large urban area, 1,140 mothers of 1- to 4-year-old children rated
each of the PI items using a 4-point frequency scale. Following factor analyses and
systematic item-reduction strategies, three factors emerged: Expectations
-
50
items that
measure parents’ developmental expectations (“My child should use the toilet without
help”); Discipline
-
30
items that assess parental responses to problem child behaviors
(“I
yell at my child for whining”); and Nurturing
-
20
items that measure specific parent
behaviors that promote a child’s psychological growth
(“I
read to my child at bedtime”).
These three factors were found to be internally consistent and to have good test-retest
reliability over a period of at least 1 week, respectively: Expectations
=
.97, .98;
Discipline
=
.91, .87; and Nurturing
=
.82,
.81. The PI items are written at a third-grade
reading level.
The present study addressed two content-validity issues, including an evaluation
of
the PI’S sensitivity to the age and sex
of
the parent’s child and the size
of
its item-
construct correlations. Second, the discriminant validity (Campbell
&
Fiske, 1959)
of
the PI was assessed by comparing it with the Adult-Adolescent Parenting Inventory
(AAPI; Bavolek, 1984), a measure of parenting attitudes. The hypothesis was that if
the PI was measuring factors other than parenting attitudes, its subscales would not
This research was supported by a grant from the National Center
for
Nursing Research
of
the National
Requests
for
reprints should be sent
to
Robert A. Fox, Marquette University, School
of
Education,
‘For
a copy of the
Parenting Inventory: Young Children
and a
Preliminary Manual,
write to the first author.
Institutes of Health (No.
1
R01 NRO11609-OIAI) and the Helen
V.
Brach Foundation.
Schroeder Complex, Milwaukee,
WI
53233.
101