Translation and Cross-Cultural Adaptation into French of the Mother-to-Infant Bonding Scale

Patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) are relevant for assessing the bond between a mother and her child, both before and after childbirth. Several questionnaires have been developed with the Mother-to-Infant Bonding Scale (MIBS) prominent among them, as it is a valid and easy-to-administer questionnaire owing to its length. Even though, this PROM has been adapted in Japanese, Indonesian and Swedish, it remains to be translated into French. The objective of this study was to translate and cross-culturally adapt the MIBS into French (MIBS-Fr).

The translation and cultural-adaptation of the questionnaire were performed following a 10-step process as recommended by the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR). During the cognitive debriefing, each item of the questionnaire was rated between 1 to 10 according to the comprehension level by 11 mothers.

The French version was very well understood with a mean level of comprehension of 9.7 ± 1.4 out of 10. The one-word descriptor used to express feelings in the original version was replaced by phrases in the French version for a better language adaptation. Slight modifications were made by the original developer, and back translations were found to be very consistent.

This study reports the development of a French version of the MIBS (MIBS-Fr) following the ISPOR's recommendations for the translation and intercultural adaptation of a questionnaire. The MIBS-Fr provides French-speaking healthcare professionals with a practical and standardized tool to assess mother-to-infant bonding, facilitating early identification of bonding difficulties and supporting appropriate interventions in postpartum care.