Effects of interparental conflict on children’s psychological adjustment
Franco Bringhenti
Within the framework of the «cognitive-contextual» interpretative model, several studies have
confirmed the negative effects of interparental conflict on children’s psychological adjustment,
regardless of marital separation. The Italian version of the Children’s Perception of Interparental
Conflict Scale (CPIC) was administered to 118 children, aged 9 to 14, belonging to a clinical and a
non-selected sample, together with other measures of anxiety and depression. However, only 4 of
the 9 CPIC subscales were considered in order to obtain a unique measure of conflict severity and to
reduce the risk of partial overlap among measures. Mothers in the clinical sample provided information
on their children’s emotional/behavioural symptoms and on marital conflict and satisfaction. To
test the hypothesis that the level of interparental conflict, but not family composition, affects
children’s psychological adjustment, the scores from the composite measure «Severity of conflicts»
were dichotomized and an ANOVA procedure was performed according to a 2 x 2 factorial design. For
self-report measures of emotional distress we found an interaction effect between conflict level and
family type: the anxious-depressed symptoms increase in the case of children living in intact highconflict
families. Children’s emotional-behavioural disorders were uniquely influenced by the level
of interparental conflict. Family mediation programmes, acting on risk and protective factors, could
prevent psychological disorders in children living in disharmonious contexts.
Keywords
Interparental conflict, Divorce, Marital separation, Children’s psychological
adjustment, Prevention.
