Abstract
Objective:
We aimed to investigate psychometric properties of the instrument “Mother-toddler ınteraction- multiaxial assessment”(MTI-MAXA) which was developed to assess and rate the quality of interaction between mothers andtheir infants of 1-2 years of age, within a laboratory setting..
Method:
The sample included forty (mean age=16.74±4.2 [12-24] months; [male, n=21; female, n=19]) toddlers and their mothers. The videotaping included fi ve sections (free play, tidy up, questionnaire, structured play, and separation-reunion). Both toddlers and their parents were scored over ten items on a fi ve-graded (1=very bad to 5=obviously suffi cient) Likert type scale in MTI-MAXA, by two blinded researchers. Ten items assessed via the instrument were;physical involvement, affective expressiveness, pleasure, responsiveness, reciprocity, joint attention, non-intrusiveness, adaptive fl exibility, support, and acceptance.
Results:
Interrater reliability of the MTI-MAXA scores (mothers, rho=0.33, p<0.05; toddlers, rho=0.55, p<0.001; total, Spearman’s rho=0.52, p=0.001) were within good to excellent range. MTI-MAXA-maternal scores were signifi cantly correlated with Bayley mental and motor scores, while inversely correlated with Brief-infant & toddler Social-emotional assessment scale (BITSEA)-problem scores of toddlers included in the study. In addition, MTI-MAXA-toddler scores were signifi cantly correlated with BITSEA-competence and Bayley-mental scores of the toddlers.
Discussion:
These fi ndings might support that MTI-MAXA is a valid and reliable tool. Future studies that would use MTI-MAXA to assess mother-toddler interaction in different clinical settings and apply the instrument to children with different age groups (e.g., 2-4 year-old) might possibly better accumulate a larger array of fi ndings for MTI-MAXA, in terms of its reliability, validity, and utility.
Keywords: Mother-toddler, interaction, MTI-MAXA
