Analog behavior observations are an important component of an evidence-based approach to assessing parent–child interactions. One threat to the external validity of these observations is reactivity and its purported influence on parent and child behaviors. The effects of reactivity on caregiver-child observations are relatively unknown, and to date, there are no known published attempts to document reactivity using a parent report measure. We examined the psychometrics of the Observation Reactivity Questionnaire (ORQ), a 29-item parent report measure of reactivity, operationalized here as a composite including parent report for whether a clinic-based observation represents home behavior (perceived unrepresentativeness), whether a clinic-based observation represents typical parent and child behavior (perceived unrepresentative parent and child behavior), perceived difficulty of the observation task, and perceived discomfort with the observation task. A community sample of 55 parent–child dyads (parents aged 23–56, children aged 2–10) completed a manualized, analog behavior observation prior to completing the ORQ. We investigated psychometric properties of the ORQ quantitative items and compiled qualitative data wherein parents described their reasoning for their responses. Internal consistency of the ORQ was adequate, although discriminative validity evidence was mixed. On average, parents were significantly more likely to report higher levels of reactivity in themselves compared to their children. We concluded that the ORQ shows promise as a new measure of reactivity during observations of parent–child interactions. By quantifying and accounting for reactivity during analog behavior observations, researchers and clinicians can decrease external validity threat concerns in the contexts of research and parent training interventions.
