Assessing Interparental Conflict: Reports of Parents and Adolescents in European American and Mexican American Families

This article reports on the development of the Multidimensional Assessment of Interparental Conflict Scale (MAIC), with parallel forms for parents and adolescents. Dimensions include frequency, intensity, child-related conflict, conflict behavior, child involvement, and resolution. Altogether, 304 adolescents and their parents completed the scale. Adolescents were aged 12-15 years, and families were either European American or Mexican American. The MAIC is the first instrument to obtain both parent and adolescent reports of multiple dimensions of interparental conflict, to include adolescent reports of parental conflict behavior, and to be validated in two ethnic groups.