The Timeline Followback Interview to Assess Children’s Exposure to Partner Violence: Reliability and Validity

Abstract

This study evaluated psychometric properties of the Timeline Followback interview—Children’s Exposure to Partner Violence (TLFB-CEPV), an event history calendar interview designed to assess children’s exposure to daily patterns of intimate partner violence. Participants were men (N = 107) entering batterer’s treatment, their female partners, and a custodial child (6–16 years). The TLFB-CEPV asked about days of partner physical aggression and children’s exposure to these episodes, and was administered to partners at pretreatment, posttreatment, 6 and 12 months. At each assessment, the percentage of days of any child exposure (PAE) and of children’s direct exposure (PDE) to violence were calculated. Parents completed measures of partner aggression and social desirability; parents, teachers, and children completed measures of children’s adjustment. TLFB-CEPV scores had excellent temporal stability and strong evidence of concurrent, discriminant, and criterion validity. Interrater agreement for TLFB-CEPV scores was moderate at initial assessment, but high at subsequent follow-up interviews.