Infant Behavior Questionnaire-Revised Very Short Form: A New Factor Structure's Associations With Parenting

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Elizabeth R Peterson1,2, Karen E Waldie1,2, Jatender Mohal2

  • 1a School of Psychology , The University of Auckland , New Zealand.

Journal of Personality Assessment
|March 30, 2017
PubMed

Insights

The Infant Behavior Questionnaire Revised-Very Short Form (IBQ-R VSF) shows a 5-factor model is a better fit for infant temperament than the original 3 factors. This revised measure relates to parenting perceptions and child language development.

Area of Science:

  • Developmental Psychology
  • Child Psychology
  • Behavioral Science

Background:

  • The Infant Behavior Questionnaire Revised-Very Short Form (IBQ-R VSF) is a new measure of infant temperament.
  • Previous research suggested a 3-factor model (positive affectivity/surgency, negative emotionality, orienting and regulatory capacity), but its psychometric properties require further validation in large, diverse samples.
  • The predictive validity of the IBQ-R VSF has not been established.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To administer the IBQ-R VSF to a large, diverse sample of infants and mothers.
  • To evaluate the psychometric properties of the IBQ-R VSF's proposed 3-factor model.
  • To explore alternative factor structures and establish the predictive validity of the IBQ-R VSF in relation to parenting perceptions and child development.

Main Methods:

  • Administered the IBQ-R VSF to 5,639 mothers of infants aged 23–52 weeks.
  • Conducted confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to test the 3-factor model.
  • Performed exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to identify the most parsimonious and statistically sound factor structure.

Main Results:

  • The initial 3-factor model did not achieve satisfactory model fit in the large, diverse sample.
  • Exploratory factor analysis supported a 5-factor solution: positive affectivity/surgency (PAS), negative emotionality (NEG), Orienting Capacity, Affiliation/Regulation, and Fear.
  • All 5 temperament dimensions were associated with infant closeness, parenting confidence, and parenting satisfaction.
  • Four dimensions (PAS, Orienting Capacity, NEG, Fear) were linked to infant communication development.
  • Parental differences in perceptions were also observed.

Conclusions:

  • The 5-factor IBQ-R VSF demonstrates superior statistical and conceptual fit compared to the 3-factor model.
  • The 5-factor IBQ-R VSF is a promising measure for assessing infant temperament.
  • Infant temperament, as measured by the 5-factor IBQ-R VSF, is significantly related to parenting perceptions and early child language development.

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