Manual For

Family
Pathology
Scale
FPSyVDA

Ms. Vimala Veeraraghavan Archana Dogra

M.A. (Psy.), M.S.W., Ph.D. M.A., Ph.D.
Professor, Director,
Department of Applied Psychology Delhi School of Business
University of Delhi, South Campus Shivalik
Benito Juarez Road NEW DELHI
NEW DELHI

MANASL

AGRA

MANASVI
UG-I, Nirmal Heights, Agra Mathura Road, AGRA
Manual
for
FAMILY
PATHOLOGY
SCALE
FPS-vDA
Ms. Vimala Veeraraghavan Archana Dogra
M.A. (Psy.), M.S.W., Ph.D. M.A., Ph.D.

Professor, Director
Department of Applied Psychology Delhi School of Business
University of Delhi, South Campus Shivalik
Benito Juarez Road NEW DELHI
NEW DELHI

ANAS

AGRA

MANASVI
Distributor
NATIONAL PSYCHOLOGICAL CORPORATION
2464926
KacheriGhat, AGRA-282 0040:(0562)
4/230,
 INTRODUCTION
The family is a primary social unit ofevery cutture. In India, the family rather than
the individual has been considered as the unit of social system. The Indian family
reflects the socio-cultural fabric of Indian society, its philosophy and values (Sethi,
1989).
The relationships within a family are complex,of varying
myriad in nature. The emotional tone, which governs the degrees of intensity and
persons, iscontinuously influenced in its course by relationship between any two
in the family. This changing manifold emotional relationships of allothers
emotional
the prevailing "atmosphere" in the family currents and crosS-currents determines
interpersonalrelationships in the family. which sets the basis for interaction and
The family is of central importance to
of an individual's development human beings and it is inconceivable to think
cultural functionsof the familyoccur without a family. The biological,sociological and
in terms of the interactions of the socio
family
outside of the family. These interactionsmembers
with each other and with persons
basic foundationover which the edifices of the are the
the many social changes that have family are built up. Over the centuries
occurred in
affected these interactiors,yet despite these societiesthehave in one way or the other
and identity more or less in the same way changes family has retained its unity
as in the past with very little
This is all the more so in India. As is well change.
known, in
system to an extent, has given way to nuclear family ndian setting the joint family
single parent families, as is obtained in the western world, system and ina few cases, to
yet one cannot deny the
fact that the child and the parents are part of a family. The
strong emotional bond which
exists amonyst the members of a family, the typical roles and
functions of each member.
the values, the cultural influence, the religious affinity, andthe
social mores playa
significant role in the development of the personality of an individual born in that family.
InIndia. even today, the iniluence of the family on an individual's life is very high in
that there eis still relatively lesser scope for individual decision-making vis a vis family
The interactions continue to be relatively more one sided viz., parent
decision-making.
tothe child, the husband to the wife and the grand parent to the parent. This could be
Seen in many families, where one finds practically an inflexible interaction of
Sided nature.
 4 Manual for FPS-VVDA
Inthe western families, while children become independentof the parents bytha
time they finish school, in India, the dependence of an individual on his family
on. While the core relationship in the western families hinges
continues
between the hushband
and wife, in India it rests between the parent and the
child. Sethi (1989) describes
Indian families as having lasting roots in the past
generations, almost making one full cycle. generationextending on to future
DEVELOPMENT OF THE SCLAE
The family pathology scale, indicates the
present amongst thefamily members in theirextent to which maladaptive behaviour is
spouses and between parents and children. interaction with each otheri.e. between
Atotalof 100 items were
form of statements which had to be
rated on a 3-point scale, with 1 prepared in the
family pathology (Never'response), 2 indicating 'low /no
indicating
response) and 3 indicating 'high family pathology' 'average family pathology' ('occasional
consistingof 100 items was distributed to 25 clinical(most often response). This scale
The judges were asked to
indicate as to what extent eachpsychologists &25 psychiatrists.
pathology on a three-point scale i.e. "highly item was indicative of family
at all indicative". Using the indicative", "somewhat indicative" and "not
on which the rating was the
internal consistency method, only those items
same amongst all the 50 experts. were chosen
which were given a rating of 1 indicating poor Secondly, the items,
from the item that was chosen as family pathology, differed by two points
were selected and included in the indicative
of high family pathology. Only
final scale for family pathology, which those items
twocriteria. Thus, there are 42 items in the met the above
'most often', 'occasionally' scale to be responded by the subjects with
&' never' .These were then administered to a group of 300
married couples from the normal population, (N = 600) and
100 couples from the
psychiatric (pathological) population (N= 200) and the reliability and validity were
Worked out.
Administration
This is a self-administered scale. The
Complete all the statements by marking a tickrespondents
are given the instruction to
z on any of the three responses 'most
often' , 'occasionally' or 'never' V whichever is applicable in their
They Nere asked not to omit any item from the case.
scale. It was emphasised that there
was nothing'right or wrong' about these items andthey shouldi
answerto all items frankBy
and truthfully without inhibition. Since many items were higiy personal
the
individuals,
 Manual for FPS-a| 5
ihey were assured of confidentiality of their responses. Both husband and wife were
asked to independently rate each scale.
Scoring
tems indicative of 'high family pathology' were given 3 by ticking most often,
oderate family pathology' given 2points by tickingon occasionally and 'no family
pathology' was assigneda score of 1by ticking never response. Total score possible
to obtain ranged between 42-126, with higher score indicating higher family pathology.
and lower score indicating the reverse.
Interpretation
Allthe 42 items selected were indicative of family pathology. These were to be
tick-marked by the respondents as to what extent the behaviour occurred 'most often',
"occasionaly' &'never'.Where the response occurred 'most often', it was indicative
of high family pathology. while 'occasionally' and 'never'were indicative of average
and no family pathology at all respectively. These scores were classified into three
categories based on the scores obtained by the normal population (N =600) and the
pathological population (N =200). The categories are as follows :
Low / No pathology 42-63

Moderate pathology 64-98

High pathology 99-126

On a continuum running from 42 to 128, the 3 categories will fall at the points
indicated

98 128
42 64
Low
ModerateAHigh
 6 Manual for FPS-WDA
Highfamily pathology is indicatedin the 98-128 area and moderate family pathology
below 64 are indicative of low or without
being between 64-98. The scores
pathology.
nal and pathology population are
The means and standard deviations for the normal

given in Table 1.
TABLE1

Groups Mean Standard deviation N

Normal population 48.6 7.60 600

Psychiatric population 96.8 8.70 200

RELIABILITY

() The split-haf reliability correlation odd-even items applying Spearman Brown

formula for doublingthe test length was found to be x, =.57,N=600 within an
index of reliability of x, = .70
(i) The test-retest reliability for this scale was x, = 0.79.

The test-retest reliability was estimated to be x,= 0.63, with an index of reliability
X, =.79. These are presented in Table 2 below.

TABLE2
Split-half and test-retest reliability values
N Index of reliability
Split-half 600 .70

Test-retest 600 .79

 Manual for FPS-Oa 7
VALIDITY

Tho face validity of the questionnaire appeared to be fairty high, as the items
()
epreoared following intensive interviews of 300couples regarding the extent
of family pathology present in the family.
(i) Thecontent validity was adequately assuredas only those items were selected
for the initial scale for which there was complete agreement amongst the experts.
REFERENCE
Sethi, B. B. (1989).Family as a potent therapeutic force. Indian Journal of Psychiatry,
31,22-30.

©2014, 2000. Al rights reserved. No portion of this inventory material shouid be reproduced in any form without the
written pemission of the publisher. Manual for Family Pathology Scale (FPSwDA). RP