The development and validation of the attitude toward father scale. A tool for assessing the father's role in children's behavior problems.
A quick, three-part father scale is now validated and links to adult well-being.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Mueller et al. (2000) built a brand-new self-report tool called the Attitude Toward Father Scale.
College students answered questions about how they see their dads.
The team checked if the scale was reliable and if scores lined up with life-adjustment measures.
What they found
The scale has three clear parts and good psychometrics.
Higher positive father scores went hand-in-hand with better adult adjustment.
The tool is ready for research and clinic use.
How this fits with other research
Kelly et al. (2022) and Boxum et al. (2018) extend this work. They made even shorter parent scales that work for toddlers and for families of kids with developmental disabilities.
Van der Molen et al. (2010), Prigge et al. (2013), and McQuaid et al. (2024) used the same recipe—write items, run factor analysis, show reliability—but built attitude scales for disability instead of fathers.
No clash here. The newer papers simply widen the map: they cover moms, stress, and disability attitudes while M et al. stays the starting point for father-focused measurement.
Why it matters
If your intake packet ignores the dad, you may miss key family dynamics. Slip the Attitude Toward Father Scale into your parent survey set. One extra page gives you a normed peek at father-child warmth or conflict that can guide goals and parent training focus.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Numerous measures assess how parental influences may relate to children's development of psychological difficulties. The majority of such measures focuses specifically on the mother-child relationship or assume both parents contribute equally and similarly to their children's psychological well-being. Previous research has largely ignored the need to assess the father-child relationship when examining parental influences on behavior problems. The goal of the present study was to develop and validate a self-report questionnaire to assess the father-child relationship. The Attitude Toward Father Scale was developed and validated using three independent samples of college undergraduates. The scale, which includes three subscales, was shown to have good psychometric properties. It was found effective in examining associations between father-child relationship scores and scores on adjustment measures. Findings showed total scale and subscale scores associated with measures of stress, alcoholism, hostility, depression, anxiety, and paranoia. Implications of findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.
Behavior modification, 2000 · doi:10.1177/0145445500245007