Investigating reliability, validity and factor structure of parenting stress- short form in mother`s of 7-12 year-old children

Aim and Background: The aim of current study was to investigate the factor structure, reliability, and validity of Parenting Stress Index-Short Form (PSI-SF) among Tehran city's mothers with 7-12 year-old children. Methods and Materials: After translation, back translation and adaptation of instrument, due to normalization this instrument by applied survey design, 468 mothers from those which selected by multiphase cluster sampling method, complete the PSI-SF questionnaire. The data were analyzed by structural equating model using LISREL software. Findings: The results of Cronbach's alpha showed that the reliability quotients for parenting stress and each of subscales of parental distress, parent-child dysfunctional interaction and difficult child were 0.90, 0.80, 0.84, and 0.80 respectively for total sample (these results for mothers of boys were 0.89, 0.80, 0.83, and 0.78 and mothers of girls 0.91, 0.80, 0.84, and 0.80). Test-retest reliability after 18 days showed 0.75 for total score, 0.82 for parental distress, 0.73 for parent-child dysfunctional interaction, and 0.71 for difficult child. Depression anxiety stress scales (DASS) and the child behavior checklist (CBCL) tests were used for evaluating the divergent and convergent. By using factor analysis, we extracted 3 factors (parental distress, parent-child dysfunctional interaction and difficult child). Conclusions: Results of this study showed that PSI-SF has psychometric properties for utilizing in psychological research and clinical diagnosis of mother's parenting stress. Keywords: Reliability, validity, factor structure, parenting stress index.