The Kempe Family Stress Inventory: a review

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this article is to review the Kempe Family Stress Inventory (KFSI), a 10-item scale that measures risk for parenting difficulties based upon responses to a thorough psychosocial interview. The article provides a historical overview, as well as reviewing research regarding its reliability and validity.

Method: Research and documentation regarding the KFSI were gathered from journals, book chapters, presentations, workshops, and intervention evaluation reports.

Results: The KFSI has been used to predict parents' future risk of maltreating their children. The scale covers a variety of domains, including psychiatric history, criminal and substance abuse history, childhood history of care, emotional functioning, attitudes towards and perception of child, discipline of child, and level of stress in the parent's life. Although construct validity has been demonstrated with the KFSI, questions remain about its specificity and sensitivity. In addition, there has been minimal reliability work done on the measure.

Conclusions: It is concluded that the KFSI may have clinical utility, but should be used as part of a more comprehensive risk assessment that includes multiple measures. Acceptable accuracy in predicting child abuse and neglect when used by itself has not been demonstrated. There is a need for more demonstration of reliability and validity. Suggestions for future research are noted.