Timeline Followback Interview to Assess Children's Exposure to Partner Violence: Reliability and Validity

• NCJ Number: 226018
• Journal: Journal of Family Violence Volume: 24 Issue: 2 Dated: February 2009 Pages: 133-143
• Author(s): Wendy K.K. Lam; William Fals-Stewart; Michelle Kelley
• Date Published: February 2009
• Length: 11 pages
• Grant Number(s): R01DA12189
• Sponsoring Agency: National Institute on Drug Abuse; The Alpha Foundation; Old Dominion University
• Publication Format: Article
• Publication Type: Test/Measurement
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

This study evaluated the psychometric properties of the Timeline Followback--Children’s Exposure to Partner Violence (TLFB-CEPV), which is an event history calendar interview designed to assess children’s exposure to daily patterns of intimate partner violence (IPV).

Abstract

The results indicate that the TLFB-CEPV is reliable and valid for assessing children’s exposure to parental violence, and it may effectively differentiate the degree to which a child is exposed to such violence. The flexibility of the TLFB-CEPV may allow further detailed examination of episodes in which a child experiences his/her parents being violent with each other, the severity of the violence or conflict, the chronology of the child’s exposure, the child’s age at the time of the exposure, developmental effects, and short-term and longer-term reactions of the child. Relevant to children’s exposure to parental violence, the TLFB method also has been recently used as a method for assessing (IPV). A comprehensive psychometric analysis revealed the Timeline Followback Spousal Violence interview to have high reliability, interjudge agreement, concurrent and discriminate validity, and strong day-to-day agreement between partners. Extension of the TLFB to include evaluation of children’s exposure to partner violence asks partners with custodial children additional questions about the identified episodes of partner violence in order to determine children’s exposure. For each reported IPV episode, both partners are asked followup questions on the presence of the child during abusive episodes and the number of days of a given type of exposure to various types of abuse. Study participants were couples (n=107) with a custodial child between the ages of 6 and 16 years old. The male partners were entering a batterer’s outpatient treatment program in western New York State. Men and their female partners were interviewed separately with the TLFB for spousal violence and the TLFB-CEPV. 6 tables and 46 references