Development of a simple inventory of maternal rearing attitudes toward their preschool children

Abstract

To develop a simple inventory of maternal rearing attitudes toward preschool children (SMRA), the 50 questions of the revised Taken diagnostic test of the parent-child relationship were restructured in this study. This study consisted of three steps, i.e., (1) restructuring the 50 questions of the revised Taken test, (2) reliability analysis and (3) validity analysis of SMRA.

In the first step, the subjects were 1153 mothers with preschoolers from four to 42 months old. The 50 items were analyzed by principal components (PC) in the factor analysis procedure. As a result, two significant factors emerged. One consisted of six items that indicated “rejection,” while the other consisted of six items that indicated “protection.”

In the second step, the 12 items were analyzed by PC for 89 mothers with preschoolers. As a result, 10 items emerged from the 12 items. Reliability analysis of the two factors was performed by the test-retest method. Both factors showed good a correlation between the test and retest, indicating sufficient reliability for psychological examination of these factors.

In the third step, coefficients of correlation between the two significant SMRA factors and four subscales of MS-form rearing attitude questionnaires were analyzed using Spearman rank order correlation. The subjects were 51 mothers with two-year-old children. One set of SMRA results correlated well with an MS subscale that indicated “rejection,” while the other set of SMRA results correlated well with two MS subscales that indicated “protection.” Therefore, it was confirmed that the SMRA was capable of estimating two maternal rearing attitudes toward preschool children, i.e., “Rejection” and “Dotage.” In addition, the decrease in questions compared to the original Taken test may decrease the burden for subjects.