Dimensional analysis of childrens' stressful life events

Two studies are presented applying a cognitive dimensional analysis to the study of childrens' life stress events. Study 1 investigated the dimensions derived from nine psychologists' ratings of the similarity of events. Items on a 32-item event scale were paired yielding 496 item pairs. Psychologists rated event similarity using a 5-point scale. Mean similarity judgments were calculated, linearly transformed, and factor analyzed by the method of principal components with varimax rotation. Seven factors with eigenvalue greater than unity accounted for 63.6% of the variance. These factos were judged interpretable: loss, entrance, family troubles, sibling problems, primary environment, physical harm, and positive events. Study 2 utilized these dimensions to identify what stressors related to adjustment problems in a sample of young inner-city schoolchildren. Two dimensions, family troubles and entrance, were found to discriminate maladapting from control children and to correlate with parents' ratings of adjustment problems for the maladapting group. The study was interpreted to support the utility of a dimensional analysis of life stress events.