NCJ Number
145081
Journal
Journal of Family Violence Volume: 8 Issue: 3 Dated: (September 1993) Pages: 203-228
Date Published
1993
Length
26 pages
Annotation
This study determined the factor structure of an assessment tool for wife abuse and assessed its reliability and validity by statistically analyzing the questionnaire responses of a sample of abused women.
Abstract
The instrument assessed, the Measure of Wife Abuse (MWA), was derived from a previously constructed spouse abuse measure (Lambert and Fantuzzo, 1988). It is a 60-item device designed to assess the type of abuse directed by a man toward his wife. The MWA examines the frequency of abuse based on a respondent's report of the number of times abusive acts occurred in the couple's relationship within a 6-month period. The instrument also assesses the emotional consequences experienced by the victim as a measure of the severity of abuse. The validity and reliability of the MWA was determined from its administration to 164 women who had been abused by their husbands in a relationship of at least 6 months duration. First, confirmatory multiple group factor analyses determined the factor structure of the empirically derived group of items that describe the type, rate, and severity of wife abuse. Second, the internal reliability of these items was determined by computing the alpha coefficients of the scales. The concurrent validity of the MWA was examined by determining its relationship to the Conflict Tactics Scale. The MWA was found to have adequate levels of both reliability and concurrent validity, using the Conflict Tactics Scales as the criterion measure. 5 tables, appended assessment instrument, and 42 references