Development and Validation of the Psychological Abuse in Relationships Scale

Psychological abuse within intimate relationships is a highly prevalent subtype of intimate partner violence (IPV) that is frequently associated with other types of IPV such as sexual or physical violence. Psychological abuse can cause enduring harm, including the loss of agency and self-belief, and entrapment in a relationship. Previous measures of psychological abuse have been characterized by inconsistencies in conceptualization and measurement contributing to problems in identifying its prevalence, impact, and patterns. To address many of the existing challenges and gaps, we developed a new measure of psychological abuse, building upon scale development work to date, and in consultation with lived experience and academic experts. A sample of 765 adult women in Australia completed our survey of 31 psychologically abusive behaviors to establish reliability and validity evidence for a new measure of psychological abuse victimization and impact. Exploratory factor analysis generated a scale comprising 20 items and four factors-Severe Psychological Abuse, Coercive Emotional Abuse, Restrictive Isolating Abuse, and Financial Abuse-with Cronbach's alphas ranging from 0.73 to 0.85 and overall explained variance of 57.2%. Exhibiting evidence of validity and reliability, the Psychological Abuse in Relationships Scale is a contemporary, concise, and comprehensive measure of psychological IPV that will improve the ability of researchers to identify this common and harmful type of abuse.