Conflict with Family

Abstract

The Conflict with Family assessment—adapted from the foundational Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) developed by Murray A. Straus—is an internationally recognized, behaviorally specific psychometric instrument engineered to quantify the behavioral strategies individuals mobilize during intrafamily disputes. Designed specifically for assessing interpersonal altercations across sibling-sibling, child-parent, and parent-child dyads, this 14-item instrument measures conflict resolution behaviors across three primary dimensions: Reasoning (calm discussion and evidence gathering), Verbal Aggression / Hostility (shouting, insulting, sulking, and exiting), and Physical Violence / Aggression (throwing objects, pushing, hitting, and weaponized assault). Utilizing a frequency-based response continuum (ranging from 0 = Never to 6 = More than 20 times over the past year), the instrument bypasses subjective, moralistic self-labeling by operationalizing interpersonal conflict into concrete behavioral acts. Across four decades of epidemiological, developmental, and clinical research, the instrument has demonstrated robust psychometric integrity. Internal consistency reliability ranges from moderate for brief cognitive reasoning scales (α = .50–.76) to strong for verbal aggression (α = .68–.82) and physical violence dimensions (α = .75–.88). Confirmatory factor analytic investigations consistently support a tripartite dimensional architecture with hierarchical severity gradations. This comprehensive article delineates the theoretical foundations under conflict theory and social learning theory, psychometric properties, factor structure, scoring algorithms, and clinical-research applications of the Conflict with Family scale.

Keywords

Conflict Tactics Scale, Family Conflict, Sibling Violence, Domestic Violence, Intrafamily Aggression, Verbal Aggression, Physical Violence, Conflict Resolution, Murray Straus, Psychometrics

Authors

The original Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS) and its family, sibling, and parent-child adaptations were conceived and validated by Murray A. Straus, Ph.D. (1926–2016), Professor of Sociology and Founder/Co-Director of the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire. Co-developers and primary collaborators who shaped the conceptualization, validation, and dissemination of the intrafamily adaptations include:

• Richard J. Gelles, Ph.D. – Professor of Social Policy and Criminology, School of Social Policy & Practice, University of Pennsylvania; pioneer in the National Family Violence Surveys.
• Sherry L. Hamby, Ph.D. – Research Professor of Psychology, Sewanee: The University of the South; founding editor of Psychology of Violence; primary co-author of the Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2) and Parent-Child Conflict Tactics Scales (CTSPC).
• David Finkelhor, Ph.D. – Professor of Sociology and Director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center, University of New Hampshire.
• Desmond K. Runyan, M.D., Dr.P.H. – Professor of Pediatrics and Public Health, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill / Kempe Center, University of Colorado.

Purpose

Interpersonal conflict is an inescapable facet of human social organization, but within family units—characterized by high emotional interdependence, structural power differentials, continuous contact, and shared domestic resources—the escalation of disagreement carries profound developmental and psychological implications. The overarching purpose of the Conflict with Family scale (CTS Family/Sibling Version) is to provide an objective, standardized, behaviorally anchored measurement tool for assessing how individuals handle intra-familial disagreements with brothers, sisters, or parents.

Prior to Straus’s paradigm-shifting work in the 1970s, clinical and sociological assessments of intrafamily conflict predominantly relied on global, value-laden queries (e.g., “Have you ever been abused?” or “Is your sibling violent?”). Such subjective metrics suffered catastrophic underreporting due to social desirability bias, personal normalization of violence in dysfunctional households, semantic ambiguity, and emotional defensiveness. The CTS framework circumvented this barrier by anchoring every query in overt, demonstrable behaviors embedded within an explicit context of normative dispute resolution. By framing the instrument around the universal premise that all family members inevitably disagree, respondents are given a socially permissible, de-stigmatized context within which they can accurately disclose both prosocial negotiations and severe aggressive behaviors.

In clinical family therapy, developmental psychology, and psychiatric epidemiology, the scale serves critical diagnostic and investigative functions:

• Epidemiological Surveillance: Estimating prevalence, incidence, and chronicity rates of sibling aggression, child-to-parent aggression, and parent-to-child physical discipline within representative community and clinical populations.
• Developmental Trajectory Modeling: Mapping the longitudinal pathways through which sibling aggression serves as a training ground for peer bullying in middle childhood, dating violence in adolescence, and intimate partner violence (IPV) in adulthood.
• Clinical Risk Assessment: Identifying high-risk families exhibiting escalating coercive cycles where low-level verbal hostility reliably triggers weaponized or dangerous physical violence.
• Intervention Efficacy Evaluation: Serving as a pre-test, post-test, and follow-up outcome measure for family therapy modalities, parent management training, and nonviolent communication interventions.

Psychological Construct

The psychological construct underlying the Conflict with Family instrument is tactical conflict behavior within close kinship dyads. Conflict tactics refer to the concrete strategies, communicative acts, and coercive operations deployed by an actor to impose their will, manage negative emotional arousal, resolve structural impasses, or defend their boundaries during an interpersonal dispute. Rather than treating family aggression as a unitary trait or a binary diagnostic pathology, the construct posits a multidimensional spectrum organized across three distinct operational dimensions:

1. Reasoning (Cognitive-Rational Negotiation)

The Reasoning dimension comprises rational, prosocial, and communicative attempts to negotiate a settlement or persuade the other family member without resorting to hostility or coercion. This construct operationalizes cognitive reframing, active listening, and calm dialectical engagement. Representative behaviors include attempting to talk out differences calmly (Item 1), sustaining a calm discussion (Item 2), and presenting logical evidence or corroborating information to support one’s perspective (Item 3). Reasoning reflects an actor’s ego-resiliency, cognitive empathy, problem-solving competencies, and capacity for emotional self-regulation during interpersonal distress.

2. Verbal Aggression and Hostile Expressivity

The Verbal Aggression / Hostility dimension captures non-physical acts designed to exert psychological dominance, cause emotional distress, express contempt, or terminate communicative interaction through hostile withdrawal. In this adaptation, verbal aggression spans both active and passive expressive modalities:

• Active verbal hostility: Heated argumentation that stops short of screaming (Item 5) and overt shouting, screaming, or hurling insults and demeaning epithets (Item 6).
• Coercive triangulation: Bringing in an external third party (such as a parent, authority figure, or other sibling) to impose an outcome (Item 4).
• Passive-aggressive withdrawal: Sulking, emotional stonewalling, or refusing to communicate (Item 7) and physical abandonment of the interaction through dramatic stomping out of the room (Item 8).

Psychologically, these behaviors represent breakdowns in emotional containment, manifesting as primitive defense mechanisms (projection, passive aggression, splitting) and dysregulated physiological arousal.

3. Physical Violence and Somatic Aggression

The Physical Violence / Aggression dimension is defined conceptually as the intentional execution of physical force by one family member directed against the property of or body of another family member, with the potential or intention to cause physical pain, discomfort, or injury. This construct exhibits an intrinsic Guttman-like hierarchical severity gradient:

• Displaced / Symbolic Physical Aggression: Smashing objects, slamming doors, or throwing things not directly at the individual (Item 9).
• Threats of Physical Violence: Verbalized or gestural threats to hit or launch missiles at the other person (Item 10).
• Minor / Moderate Direct Physical Assault: Throwing objects directly at the person (Item 11) and pushing, grabbing, or shoving the other individual (Item 12).
• Severe / Dangerous Physical Assault: Striking or attempting to strike the person with an open hand or closed fist (Item 13) and striking or attempting to strike the other person with a hard object or blunt weapon (Item 14).

This continuum isolates instrumental aggression (force applied strategically to gain compliance) from reactive, impulsive violence driven by uncontrolled affective rage.

Theoretical Framework

The Conflict with Family scale is anchored in three synergistic theoretical traditions in sociological and psychological science: Conflict Theory, General Systems Theory, and Social Learning Theory.

Conflict Theory and the Ubiquity of Dispute

Straus rejected the traditional functionalist view of the family as an inherently harmonious, equilibrium-seeking unit. Drawing upon classical conflict theorists such as Georg Simmel and Lewis Coser, Straus posited that conflict is an inevitable, ubiquitous, and structural property of all human groups—and particularly the nuclear family. Because family members share physical space, financial resources, emotional dependencies, and parental attention, conflicting interests, desires, and goals are continuous. Consequently, the presence of conflict is not indicative of pathology. Pathology arises exclusively from the tactics selected by family members to manage those conflicts. The CTS framework was specifically engineered to dissociate the frequency of disagreement from the violent means used to resolve it.

General Systems Theory of Family Violence

In his landmark 1973 formulation, Straus articulated a General Systems Theory of intrafamily violence. Within this model, the family operates as a cybernetic feedback system wherein aggressive tactics function as control mechanisms. Violence is conceptualized as a systemic product resulting from:

1. Systemic Stressors: External socioeconomic pressures, developmental transitions, or sibling rivalry.
2. Positive Feedback Loops: Morphogenetic processes where mild verbal aggression (shouting, insults) triggers retaliatory aggression (pushing, hitting), escalating unchecked in the absence of dampening feedback.
3. Systemic Homeostasis: Violence often becomes an institutionalized, homeostatic mechanism within dysfunctional family systems to temporarily re-establish order, dominance hierarchies, or emotional compliance.

Social Learning Theory and Coercive Family Interaction

From a psychological vantage point, the scale draws deeply upon Albert Bandura’s Social Learning Theory and Gerald Patterson’s Coercion Model. Bandura demonstrated that aggressive behavioral scripts are acquired through observational modeling, vicarious reinforcement, and direct behavioral enactment. Children observe parents resolving disputes through shouting or corporal punishment and subsequently rehearse these scripts in interactions with siblings. Patterson demonstrated that sibling aggression frequently operates as an escalating coercive exchange: one child uses aversive behaviors (screaming, hitting) to force another child to capitulate; when the second child relents, the first child’s aggression is negatively reinforced, solidifying a trajectory toward chronic intrafamily and extrafamily violence.

Validity

The psychometric validity of the Conflict Tactics Scales and its intrafamily derivatives has been extensively corroborated across diverse clinical, community, and cross-cultural cohorts over several decades of research.

Construct and Structural Validity

Construct validity is substantiated by the scale’s ability to reflect the theoretical hierarchy of conflict tactics. Studies systematically demonstrate that Reasoning items exhibit high annual prevalence rates (approaching 90–100% in normative family samples), Verbal Aggression items exhibit moderate-to-high prevalence (70–90%), and Physical Violence items exhibit lower, negatively skewed prevalence distributions (15–45% in normative sibling samples; 5–15% in parent-child samples). Factorial validity confirms that items load cleanly onto their intended theoretical dimensions, validating the distinction between prosocial negotiation, verbal hostility, and physical aggression.

Convergent and Concurrent Validity

Extensive empirical studies have evaluated the convergent validity of the CTS family items:

• Observational Convergence: Laboratory observation studies of family problem-solving tasks reveal significant correlations (r = .40 to .62, p < .001) between self-reported CTS verbal/physical aggression scores and independently coded hostile affect, interruption rates, and aggressive gestures.
• Multi-Informant Dyadic Agreement: Dyadic validation studies comparing sibling reports (where Sibling A reports their own actions and Sibling B reports Sibling A’s actions) demonstrate moderate-to-substantial concordance (inter-informant correlations typically range between r = .38 and .65, p < .001). Given the secretive nature of sibling conflict away from adult supervision, these concordance rates are remarkably high for behavioral reporting.
• External Behavioral Indices: Physical violence subscale scores correlate significantly with external measures of conduct disorder, such as the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; r = .35 to .54) and school disciplinary referrals.

Discriminant Validity

Discriminant validity is demonstrated by weak, non-significant correlations between the Reasoning dimension and the Physical Violence dimension (typically r = −.08 to .14), demonstrating that the tendency to use cognitive problem-solving is distinct from the impulse toward physical assault. Furthermore, the CTS exhibits low to moderate correlations with general social desirability scales (e.g., Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale, r = −.12 to −.28), demonstrating that while socially undesirable, respondents across anonymous and research settings are remarkably willing to report specific, concrete aggressive acts.

Predictive and Longitudinal Validity

Longitudinal prospective cohort studies have firmly established the predictive validity of the family conflict tactics. High frequency scores on sibling physical violence measured via the CTS during middle childhood prospectively predict adolescent peer bullying, juvenile delinquency, and adolescent dating violence perpetration (β = .24 to .38, p < .01), controlling for baseline family socioeconomic status and parental warmth. In parent-child dyads, high parental verbal aggression scores prospectively predict adolescent depressive symptomatology, low self-esteem, and borderline personality features in young adulthood.

Reliability

The Conflict Tactics Scales framework has undergone extensive psychometric testing to establish internal consistency, temporal stability, and inter-rater reliability across varied family relationships.

Internal Consistency (Cronbach’s Alpha)

Internal consistency estimates vary systematically across subscales due to item count, base rate frequencies, and the Guttman-like cumulative nature of aggressive behaviors:

• Reasoning Subscale (Items 1–3): Cronbach’s alpha coefficients typically range from α = .50 to .76. The lower coefficient is psychometrically expected due to the small number of items (3 items) and the restriction of variance common in normative populations where reasoning items have high endorsement ceilings.
• Verbal Aggression / Hostility Subscale (Items 4–8): Cronbach’s alpha demonstrates strong internal consistency, consistently falling between α = .68 and .82 across adolescent and adult retrospective samples.
• Physical Violence / Aggression Subscale (Items 9–14): Cronbach’s alpha ranges between α = .75 and .88. Despite severe positive skewness in non-clinical populations, the somatic violence items exhibit high inter-item covariance, indicating that individuals who engage in severe violent acts (e.g., hitting with an object) almost universally engage in lower-severity violent acts (e.g., pushing or throwing things).

Test-Retest Stability

Temporal stability evaluations demonstrate solid test-retest coefficients over short-to-medium intervals. In a sample of adolescents re-administered the CTS family version over a 2-to-4-week interval, test-retest reliability coefficients were:

• Reasoning: r = .70 to .78
• Verbal Aggression: r = .74 to .84
• Physical Violence: r = .80 to .89

Over extended multi-year intervals, stability coefficients reflect predictable developmental shifts: physical sibling violence peaks in middle childhood (ages 8–11) and declines monotonically through late adolescence, while verbal hostility remains moderately stable across developmental stages.

Factor Analysis

The structural dimensionality of the Conflict Tactics Scales has been rigorously scrutinized using both Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) across diverse epidemiological and cross-national samples.

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

Early principal axis factoring and principal components analyses with varimax and promax rotations consistently extracted three primary factors accounting for 52% to 68% of the total item variance:

• Factor 1 (Physical Violence): Defined by robust factor loadings (.62 to .84) for Items 9 through 14 (throwing objects, pushing, grabbing, hitting, hitting with an object). Cross-loadings on the reasoning factor are consistently below .15.
• Factor 2 (Verbal Aggression & Hostile Withdrawal): Defined by prominent loadings (.54 to .78) for Items 5 through 8 (heated arguments, yelling/insulting, sulking, stomping out). Item 4 (“Brought in someone else”) frequently exhibits moderate loadings (.38 to .48) on this factor, reflecting its role as a coercive escalation tactic.
• Factor 3 (Reasoning & Negotiation): Defined by strong loadings (.65 to .83) for Items 1, 2, and 3 (calm discussion and evidence gathering). This factor demonstrates orthogonality or weak negative correlations with Factor 1.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

Modern psychometric evaluations using structural equation modeling have tested competing dimensional models: a one-factor unidimensional conflict model, a two-factor model (Reasoning vs. Aggression), and the hypothesized three-factor tripartite model. CFA findings unequivocally favor the three-factor model across sibling, parent-child, and marital datasets.

Representative goodness-of-fit indices from large adolescent sibling samples demonstrate superior structural fit for the three-factor model:

• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): .948 to .972 (surpassing the standard ≥ .95 threshold for adequate fit).
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): .936 to .965.
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): .042 to .055 (90% CI [.034, .063]), indicating exceptional parameter approximation.
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): .038 to .049.

Alternative analyses deploying Item Response Theory (IRT; 2-parameter logistic models) and Rasch modeling demonstrate that physical violence items possess high severity thresholds (β > 2.0), functioning primarily at the extreme upper tail of the latent family dysfunction continuum, whereas verbal aggression items offer maximum measurement precision throughout the central distribution.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Instrument Name: Conflict with Family (Conflict Tactics Scales – Family / Sibling Adaptation)
• Target Respondent: Children, adolescents, or adult respondents reporting on interactions with a brother, sister, or parent.
• Administration Format: Self-administered paper-and-pencil questionnaire, structured interview, or computer-assisted self-interview (CASI).
• Completion Time: Approximately 5 to 10 minutes.
• Item Count: 14 core closed-ended items (plus an optional open-ended qualitative item for unlisted tactics).
• Recall Period: Past 12 months (“that year”) or lifetime prevalence.
• Response Continuum (7-point Authentic Frequency Scale):
  • 0 = Never
  • 1 = Once
  • 2 = Twice
  • 3 = 3-5 times
  • 4 = 6-10 times
  • 5 = 11-20 times
  • 6 = More than 20 times
• Subscale Architecture:
  • Reasoning Subscale: Items 1, 2, 3 (Items A, B, C)
  • Verbal Aggression / Hostility Subscale: Items 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 (Items D, E, F, G, H)
  • Physical Violence / Aggression Subscale: Items 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 (Items I, J, K, L, M, N)
• Scoring Methodologies:
  1. Prevalence Scoring (Dichotomous): Each subscale is scored as 1 (prevalent) if any constituent item is endorsed ≥ 1, and 0 (non-prevalent) if all items are scored 0. Yields annual dyadic prevalence rates.
  2. Chronicity / Frequency Scoring (Midpoint Recoding): Because categories 3 through 6 encompass ranges, response categories are converted to their category midpoints to estimate the actual annual frequency of occurrences:
     • 0 = 0 times
     • 1 = 1 time
     • 2 = 2 times
     • 3 = 4 times (midpoint of 3–5)
     • 4 = 8 times (midpoint of 6–10)
     • 5 = 15 times (midpoint of 11–20)
     • 6 = 25 times (conservative estimate for > 20 times)

     Midpoint values are summed within each subscale to yield a continuous chronicity index reflecting total estimated annual incidents.

  3. Severity Categorization: Physical violence is further subdivided into Minor Violence (Items 9, 11, 12) and Severe Violence (Items 10, 13, 14).

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The original Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS1) were published in 1979 by Dr. Murray A. Straus in the Journal of Marriage and the Family, following pilot formulations in 1974. The family, sibling, and parent-child adaptations evolved through extensive field applications across the 1980s and 1990s, culminating in standardized presentations in academic compendiums including Fischer and Corcoran’s Measures for Clinical Practice and Research (1994, 2007) and technical manuals issued by the Family Research Laboratory at the University of New Hampshire.

Copyright and Permitted Usage: The CTS instrument and its academic derivatives are copyrighted by Murray A. Straus and the University of New Hampshire. For academic research, dissertation investigations, and non-commercial clinical evaluations, the CTS forms are accessible for use under fair academic use provisions, provided full bibliographic attribution is maintained and items are not modified without explicit permission. Clinical reproduction, incorporation into commercial electronic medical records (EMR), or sponsored trial testing requires formal authorization or licensing via the Family Research Laboratory or Western Psychological Services (WPS), depending on the specific edition.

References

• Fischer, J., & Corcoran, K. J. (2007). Measures for clinical practice and research: A sourcebook (4th ed., Vol. 1, pp. 227–231). Oxford University Press.
• Straus, M. A. (1974). Leveling, civility, and violence in the family. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 36(1), 13–29. https://doi.org/10.2307/351141
• Straus, M. A. (1979). Measuring intrafamily conflict and violence: The Conflict Tactics (CT) Scales. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 41(1), 75–88. https://doi.org/10.2307/351733
• Straus, M. A. (1990). The Conflict Tactics Scale and its critics: An evaluation and new data on validity and reliability. In M. A. Straus & R. J. Gelles (Eds.), Physical violence in American families: Risk factors and adaptations to violence in 8,145 families (pp. 49–73). Transaction Publishers.
• Straus, M. A., & Douglas, E. M. (2004). A short form of the Revised Conflict Tactics Scales, and typologies for severity and mutuality. Violence and Victims, 19(5), 507–520. https://doi.org/10.1891/vivi.19.5.507.63686
• Straus, M. A., & Gelles, R. J. (1990). Physical violence in American families: Risk factors and adaptations to violence in 8,145 families. Transaction Publishers.
• Straus, M. A., & Hamby, S. L. (1997). Measuring physical and psychological maltreatment of children with the Conflict Tactics Scales. In G. K. Kantor & J. L. Jasinski (Eds.), Out of the darkness: Contemporary research perspectives on family violence (pp. 119–135). SAGE Publications.
• Straus, M. A., Hamby, S. L., Boney-McCoy, S., & Sugarman, D. B. (1996). The Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2): Development and preliminary psychometric data. Journal of Family Issues, 17(3), 283–316. https://doi.org/10.1177/019251396017003001
• Straus, M. A., Hamby, S. L., Finkelhor, D., Moore, D. W., & Runyan, D. (1998). Identification of child maltreatment with the Parent-Child Conflict Tactics Scales: Development and psychometric data for a national sample of American parents. Child Abuse & Neglect, 22(4), 249–270. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0145-2134(97)00174-9

13. Items of the Scale (Questionnaire)