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The Family Socialization Interview—Revised (FSI-R): a Comprehensive Assessment of Parental Disciplinary Behaviors

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Abstract

Elucidating the complex mechanisms by which harsh parenting increases risk of child psychopathology is key to targeted prevention. This requires nuanced methods that capture the varied perceptions and experiences of diverse families. The Family Socialization Interview—Revised (FSI-R), adapted from an interview developed by Dodge et al. (Child Development, 65, 649–665, 1994), is a comprehensive, semi-structured interview for characterizing methods of parental discipline used with young children. The FSI-R coding system systematically rates parenting style, usual discipline techniques, and most intense physical and psychological discipline based on rater judgment across two eras: (1) birth to the previous year, and (2) the previous year to present. The current study examined the psychometric properties of the FSI-R in a diverse, high-risk community sample of 386 mothers and their children, ages 3 to 6 years. Interrater reliability was good to excellent for codes capturing physically and psychologically harsh parenting, and restrictive/punitive parenting styles. Findings supported the FSI-R’s convergent and incremental validity. Importantly, the FSI-R demonstrated incremental utility, explaining unique variance in children’s externalizing and internalizing symptoms beyond that explained by traditional surveys and observed parenting. The FSI-R appeared particularly promising for capturing risk associated with young children’s depressive symptoms, as these were generally not significantly associated with other measures of harsh parenting. Overall, findings support the added value of the FSI-R within a multi-method assessment of disciplinary practices across early child development. Future implications for prevention are discussed.

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Notes

  1. Please note that when models were tested with Historical Restrictive/Punitive entered in steps 2–3 instead of the Past Year variable, it showed incremental validity in predicting ADHD, DBD, and Depressive symptoms B = 0.12 to 0.15, p < 0.05; albeit with smaller effects relative to the Past Year findings presented in Table 5.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by National Institute of Mental Health grants R01MH082830 and U01MH090301. Lauren Wakschlag was also supported by the Walden & Jean Young Shaw Foundation. We thank Beth Venzke for her contribution to our training process. We express our lasting gratitude in memory of David Henry for the innumerable ways that he deepened our efforts to characterize family violence, building on his longstanding collaborations with Families and Communities Research Group. Finally, this study would not have been possible without the outstanding efforts of Jacqueline Kestler, MPH, Erica Anderson, PhD, and their dedicated team, and the generous participation of the study families.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA

    Sarah L. O’Dor

  2. Department of Psychiatry, University of Connecticut School of Medicine, Farmington, CT, USA

    Damion J. Grasso, Kimberly J. McCarthy & Margaret J. Briggs-Gowan

  3. Psychology Department, University of Massachusetts-Boston, Boston, MA, USA

    Danielle Forbes

  4. Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Indiana University, Indianapolis, IN, USA

    John E. Bates

  5. Department of Medical Social Sciences, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Lauren S. Wakschlag

  6. The Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA

    Lauren S. Wakschlag

Authors
  1. Sarah L. O’Dor
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  2. Damion J. Grasso
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  3. Danielle Forbes
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  4. John E. Bates
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  5. Kimberly J. McCarthy
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  6. Lauren S. Wakschlag
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  7. Margaret J. Briggs-Gowan
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Margaret J. Briggs-Gowan.

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Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Funding

This research was supported by the National Institute of Mental Health grants R01MH082830 and U01MH090301. Lauren Wakschlag was also supported by the Walden & Jean Young Shaw Foundation.

Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Informed Consent

Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Supplemental Online Table S-1

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Supplemental Online Table S-2

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Supplemental Online Table S-4

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Supplemental Online Table S-5

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Supplemental Online Table S-6

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Supplemental Online Table S-7

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O’Dor, S.L., Grasso, D.J., Forbes, D. et al. The Family Socialization Interview—Revised (FSI-R): a Comprehensive Assessment of Parental Disciplinary Behaviors. Prev Sci 18, 292–304 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11121-016-0707-7

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