Relationship Change Scale (RCS)

Abstract

The Relationship Change Scale (RCS) is a self-report psychometric instrument developed by Stephen P. Schlein and Bernard G. Guerney Jr. (1971; Guerney, 1977) designed to assess perceived directional changes in dyadic functioning, communication competency, interpersonal empathy, and relational satisfaction. Rooted in the clinical and educational framework of Relationship Enhancement (RE) therapy, the RCS was primarily constructed to evaluate pre- to post-intervention outcomes across preventive, educational, and therapeutic couples programs. Comprising 27 items, the scale prompts respondents to evaluate shifts in their relationship across a 5-point Likert response format anchored from “Much Less” (1) to “Much More” (5), with “No Change” (3) serving as the neutral reference point. Over five decades of empirical utilization, the RCS has demonstrated strong psychometric properties, consistently exhibiting excellent internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha coefficients typically ranging between α = .90 and α = .96) and robust construct validity. The instrument demonstrates significant sensitivity to clinical interventions, strong convergent validity with established measures such as the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS) and the Marital Adjustment Test (MAT), and substantial discriminant validity against unrelated affective states. In addition to couples therapy outcome research, the RCS has been applied to normative developmental transitions (such as the transition to parenthood) and clinical health psychology contexts (such as dyadic adaptation following chronic illness or cerebrovascular accidents). This article provides a comprehensive psychometric review of the RCS, detailing its theoretical underpinnings, dimensional architecture, structural validity, internal consistency, administration procedures, and full authentic scale items.

Keywords

Relationship Change Scale, Relationship Enhancement, Bernard Guerney, Stephen Schlein, dyadic communication, marital satisfaction, couples therapy evaluation, interpersonal competence, empathic communication, psychometrics

Authors

The Relationship Change Scale was originally conceptualized and formulated by Stephen P. Schlein, Ph.D., under the doctoral mentorship of Bernard G. Guerney Jr., Ph.D. (1930–2019), at The Pennsylvania State University.

• Stephen P. Schlein, Ph.D.: Clinical psychologist, researcher, and co-developer of early Relationship Enhancement skill-training curricula for premarital and dating couples. His seminal 1971 doctoral dissertation established the initial psychometric operationalization and validation of the scale.
• Bernard G. Guerney Jr., Ph.D.: Professor Emeritus of Human Development and Family Studies at The Pennsylvania State University, founder and director of the National Institute of Relationship Enhancement (NIRE), and recipient of the American Psychological Association (APA) Award for Distinguished Contributions to Applied Psychology. Dr. Guerney was a pioneering figure in client-centered skill-training therapies, filial therapy, and psychoeducational couples interventions.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Relationship Change Scale (RCS) is to measure subjective, self-perceived quantitative and qualitative shifts in dyadic relationship dynamics over time or as a consequence of specific therapeutic, educational, or life-stage events. Unlike static relationship satisfaction inventories (which assess current status at an isolated cross-section), the RCS was engineered specifically as an outcome and transition measure sensitive to directional trajectories of relational competence, interpersonal emotional climate, and dyadic synergy.

In clinical contexts, the RCS functions as an evaluative benchmark for couples undergoing structured psychotherapy, particularly interventions derived from humanistic, behavioral, and skills-based traditions such as Relationship Enhancement (RE) therapy. It enables practitioners to identify whether specific intervention modules—such as expressive skill training, empathic responding, or collaborative problem resolution—translate into felt improvements across multiple domains of intimacy, mutual trust, and sexual satisfaction. Because each item explicitly captures the direction and magnitude of change (deterioration, stasis, or enhancement), clinicians can rapidly discern whether therapy has facilitated global progress or produced selective improvements while leaving other relational vulnerabilities unaddressed.

In academic and longitudinal research, the RCS serves as an empirical instrument for capturing the impact of normative and non-normative life transitions on couples. Researchers have deployed the RCS to track relationship trajectories during the third trimester of pregnancy and the postpartum period (Rankin & Campbell, 1983), the onset of chronic medical conditions and neurological rehabilitation (Vanhook, 2007), and family-level crisis resolution. The theoretical rationale rests on the assertion that relational health is inherently dynamic; assessing the perceived vector of change provides a nuanced understanding of relationship resilience, marital durability, and therapeutic maintenance that static assessments often fail to detect.

Psychological Construct

The psychological construct assessed by the RCS is Perceived Relational Change, defined as an individual’s subjective appraisal of directional alterations across fundamental cognitive, affective, communicative, and behavioral dimensions within a romantic partnership. Rather than conceptualizing dyadic functioning as a monolithic, static trait, the RCS operationalizes it as a multifaceted, dynamic system comprising several interconnected domains:

1. Relational Satisfaction and Mutual Regard

This dimension examines shifts in global evaluation of the partnership, personal satisfaction with one’s own relational performance, evaluation of the partner, and perceived reciprocal regard (e.g., Item 1: “My satisfaction with myself in this relationship is:”; Item 3: “I think my partner considers me a satisfactory mate:”). This sub-construct captures the emotional climate of mutual acceptance and validation.

2. Empathy and Cognitive Perspective-Taking

A core pillar of Guerney’s model is interpersonal empathy. This dimension evaluates changes in the respondent’s ability to accurately decode, interpret, and validate the partner’s internal emotional states, desires, preferences, and aversions (e.g., Item 6: “I am aware of my partner’s needs and desires in our relationship:”; Item 9: “My ability to understand my partner’s feelings is:”; Item 14: “My ability to understand my partner’s likes and dislikes is:”).

3. Emotional Self-Awareness and Differentiation

Before effective communication can transpire, individuals must possess clear intrapsychic awareness of their own emotional needs and psychological boundaries. The RCS measures perceived growth in self-understanding within the relational matrix (e.g., Item 7: “I understand my own feelings about our relationship”; Item 8: “I understand my own needs and desires in our relationship:”).

4. Expressive and Receptive Communication Competence

This construct evaluates shifts in verbal and non-verbal interactive behaviors, including active listening, self-disclosure, transparency, and ease of interaction (e.g., Item 10: “Our ability to communicate is:”; Item 13: “My self-expression and openness in relation to my partner is:”; Item 15: “My ability to listen well to my partner is:”; Item 21: “My ease in talking with my partner is:”).

5. Affective Intimacy, Trust, and Vulnerability

This facet assesses the relational security baseline, measuring alterations in perceived closeness, warmth, interpersonal trust, and confidence in the partnership’s enduring viability (e.g., Item 12: “My concern and warmth toward my partner is:”; Item 16: “My trust in my partner is:”; Item 17: “My feeling of intimacy with my partner is:”; Item 18: “My confidence in our relationship is:”).

6. Constructive Conflict Management and Affect Regulation

A major indicator of long-term relational health is the capacity to process negative affect without destructive escalation. The RCS gauges changes in constructive disagreement processing, expressing difficult emotions, and receiving negative feedback from the partner without retaliatory defensiveness (e.g., Item 19: “Our ability to handle disagreements constructively is:”; Item 23: “My ability to constructively express negative feelings towards my partner is:”; Item 26: “My capacity to deal constructively with negative feelings my partner expresses toward me is:”).

Theoretical Framework

The RCS is grounded in the theoretical intersection of Relationship Enhancement (RE) theory, Rogerian humanistic psychology, social learning theory, and interdependence theory.

Guerney’s foundational proposition was that interpersonal distress rarely stems from irreconcilable personality defects; rather, it emerges from systemic deficits in specific, learnable psychological and communicative skills. Integrating Carl Rogers’ core conditions of therapeutic change—unconditional positive regard, congruence (genuineness), and accurate empathic understanding—Guerney reconceptualized these clinical attributes not merely as therapist-offered conditions, but as behavioral competencies that romantic partners can directly master and offer to each other.

Under this educational-developmental paradigm, relational distress is mitigated when partners are systematically trained in specific behavioral roles: the Expresser Mode (congruent, vulnerable self-disclosure of underlying feelings without accusation), the Empathizer Mode (active listening, non-defensive summarization, and deep validation of the partner’s subjective reality), and the Problem-Solving/Facilitator Mode (collaborative, non-coercive conflict resolution). The RCS was engineered as the primary quantitative proxy to track whether individuals successfully internalize these interpersonal skills and perceive systemic reciprocal changes in their relational environment.

Furthermore, the scale reflects Thibaut and Kelley’s Interdependence Theory by evaluating the subjective cost-reward structure within the dyad. As empathy and constructive conflict management increase, the psychological costs of relational vulnerability decrease, yielding elevated levels of dyadic trust, intimacy, and sexual satisfaction. The RCS operationalizes these systemic shifts through its balance of intrapsychic items (self-awareness), dyadic-process items (mutual communication), and partner-directed perceptions.

Validity

Empirical investigations across educational, clinical, and developmental contexts have established strong validity evidence for the Relationship Change Scale.

Construct and Discriminant Validity

Construct validity was initially established through controlled experimental trials conducted by Schlein (1971), Guerney (1977), and subsequent researchers at Penn State University and the National Institute of Relationship Enhancement (NIRE). In true experimental designs with dating and married couples randomly assigned to either Relationship Enhancement programs, traditional couples counseling, or waitlist control conditions, the RCS demonstrated marked sensitivity to therapeutic change. Couples receiving systematic communication and empathy training exhibited statistically significant, robust increases in RCS scores compared to control participants, who remained clustered tightly around the scale midpoint (3 = “No Change”) or showed minor downward drift under conditions of sustained relational conflict.

Discriminant validity has been demonstrated by showing that RCS scores do not correlate substantially with generalized social desirability response sets (e.g., Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale, typically r < .20) or transient negative affective states like non-clinical depressive symptomatology, confirming that the instrument assesses dyadic relational evolution rather than generalized positive response bias or individual mood variance.

Convergent and Predictive Validity

The convergent validity of the RCS is supported by moderate to high correlations with established instruments measuring marital satisfaction, dyadic adjustment, and empathic resonance:

• Correlations with the Dyadic Adjustment Scale (DAS; Spanier, 1976) consistently range from r = .55 to r = .72 across post-treatment evaluations, demonstrating that perceived positive change closely aligns with overall dyadic adjustment.
• Significant positive correlations have been reported with the Primary Communication Inventory (PCI) and the Barrett-Lennard Relationship Inventory (BLRI), particularly along the empathy and regard subscales (correlations typically between r = .48 and r = .68).
• Predictive validity is evidenced by longitudinal follow-up evaluations (Guerney, 1977; Guerney et al., 1985), where post-intervention RCS scores predicted marital stability, low relationship dissolution rates, and sustained conflict resolution gains at 6-month and 12-month follow-up assessments.

In health psychology and family development studies, such as Rankin and Campbell’s (1983) research on the third trimester of pregnancy, the RCS demonstrated sensitivity to subtle developmental adjustments, capturing variations in emotional support and physical intimacy. Similarly, Vanhook (2007) utilized the RCS to document interpersonal relationship shifts in Appalachian female stroke survivors, confirming that post-stroke cognitive and physical functional status significantly correlated with changes in dyadic intimacy and communication as captured by the scale.

Reliability

The Relationship Change Scale has repeatedly demonstrated high reliability across diverse cohorts, clinical samples, and non-clinical research populations.

Internal Consistency

In Schlein’s (1971) seminal developmental validation study, the instrument yielded an overall internal consistency reliability coefficient (Cronbach’s α) of .92 for the full 27-item composite score. Guerney (1977) reported internal consistency coefficients ranging between α = .91 and α = .95 in clinical and psychoeducational samples of married couples. Subsequent cross-sectional and longitudinal investigations have consistently confirmed this high internal reliability:

• Rankin and Campbell (1983) reported Cronbach’s alpha coefficients exceeding .90 in their perinatal sample of couples navigating the transition to parenthood.
• Vanhook (2007) observed a Cronbach’s alpha of .96 among adult clinical rehabilitation populations and their partners, indicating exceptional item homogeneity and minimal measurement error.
• Split-half reliability coefficients reported across earlier validation dissertations consistently exceeded r = .88 (corrected via the Spearman-Brown prophecy formula).

Temporal Stability (Test-Retest Reliability)

Evaluating test-retest reliability for a change-measurement scale presents unique methodological considerations, as the instrument is designed to register real psychological transitions over time. However, in untreated waitlist control groups measured across an identical 8- to 10-week interval where no intervention took place, the RCS exhibited strong stability coefficients ranging from r = .76 to r = .84, with mean scores consistently remaining at the “No Change” baseline (group means approximately 81.0, matching the theoretical neutral total score of 27 × 3). This stability in non-intervention groups underscores that the scale is stable in the absence of treatment and does not suffer from arbitrary temporal drift.

Factor Analysis

Both exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and subsequent confirmatory examinations of the RCS reveal that while the scale possesses a strong, robust primary general factor of Perceived Relationship Enhancement, it also encompasses clearly identifiable multidimensional sub-facets representing distinct communicative and emotional domains.

In the original factor analyses conducted by Schlein (1971), an unrotated principal component analysis indicated that the first factor accounted for a substantial portion of the total common variance (often exceeding 45–52%), supporting the psychometric practice of aggregating all 27 items into a single, global index of overall relational change. However, when subjected to oblique (Promax) and orthogonal (Varimax) rotations, a clear multidimensional structure emerged, typically loading onto four to six distinct sub-factors:

• Factor 1: Empathic Communication and Mutual Understanding (Items 6, 9, 10, 11, 14, 15, 21) — Items characterizing active listening, understanding emotional nuances, and sensitivity to the partner load heavily on this factor (factor loadings ranging from .58 to .82).
• Factor 2: Affective Intimacy and Dyadic Security (Items 1, 2, 5, 12, 16, 17, 18, 20) — High loadings (.54 to .79) for items reflecting satisfaction, warmth, trust, sexual satisfaction, and confidence in the enduring viability of the bond.
• Factor 3: Constructive Conflict Resolution and Negative Affect Processing (Items 19, 23, 26) — Specific loadings (.60 to .84) reflecting the ability to manage disagreements and constructively express/receive negative emotional states without destructive defensiveness.
• Factor 4: Expressive Openness and Self-Disclosure (Items 13, 22, 24, 25) — Loadings (.51 to .75) highlighting voluntary vulnerability, sharing personal concerns, and accepting positive validation.
• Factor 5: Intrapsychic Clarity and Future Relational Orientation (Items 7, 8, 27) — Self-directed emotional clarity regarding individual needs and long-term partnership goals.

In contemporary confirmatory factor analytic (CFA) evaluations, a hierarchical (bifactor) model—consisting of a broad general Relational Change factor alongside specific communicative-emotional group factors—consistently exhibits adequate to superior fit indices (e.g., Comparative Fit Index [CFI] > .92; Root Mean Square Error of Approximation [RMSEA] < .06) compared to strict single-factor models, corroborating both the total composite scoring convention and subscale profile analysis in clinical practice.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Instrument Name: Relationship Change Scale
• Acronym: RCS
• Authors / Developers: Stephen P. Schlein, Ph.D., and Bernard G. Guerney Jr., Ph.D.
• Publication Year: 1971 (dissertation validation); 1977 (formal book chapter publication)
• Primary Construct Measured: Subjective perceived directional change in relationship quality, communication skills, dyadic empathy, intimacy, trust, and conflict management
• Administration Type: Self-report paper-and-pencil or digital questionnaire; suitable for individual partner completion or simultaneous dyadic administration
• Item Count: 27 items
• Response Scale: 5-point Likert-type scale reflecting directional change:
  • 1 = Much Less
  • 2 = Less
  • 3 = No Change
  • 4 = More
  • 5 = Much More
• Scoring Protocol:
  • Each item is scored from 1 to 5 points.
  • There are no reverse-coded items in the standard authentic form, as all items are phrased positively toward adaptive relational qualities.
  • Total Score Range: 27 to 135 points.
  • Neutral Baseline (Midpoint): A score of 81 (27 items × 3 points) signifies perceived stability or absolute net “No Change” across all measured relational domains.
  • Scores > 81: Indicate positive relational growth, skill acquisition, improved intimacy, and perceived therapeutic improvement. Scores approaching the maximum of 135 reflect dramatic, broad-spectrum relational enhancement.
  • Scores < 81: Indicate perceived relational deterioration, erosion of trust, diminished communication effectiveness, or mounting interpersonal distress.
• Administration Time: Approximately 5 to 10 minutes.
• Target Population: Dating couples, premarital partners, cohabiting couples, married individuals, and clinical or rehabilitation dyads.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Relationship Change Scale was originally formulated in 1971 as part of Stephen P. Schlein’s doctoral dissertation at The Pennsylvania State University, and later formally published within Bernard G. Guerney Jr.’s seminal work, Relationship Enhancement: Skill-Training Programs for Therapy, Problem Prevention, and Enrichment (Jossey-Bass, 1977).

Regarding accessibility and intellectual property, the RCS resides primarily within the academic research commons. The items and scoring guidelines were published in non-commercial academic dissertations and scholarly volumes for educational, clinical research, and training purposes. Researchers and mental health professionals generally utilize the scale for non-commercial research, academic theses, and clinical evaluations without licensing fees, provided that appropriate attribution and formal citation are accorded to Schlein (1971) and Guerney (1977). Clinicians seeking formal training in the broader clinical model of Relationship Enhancement Therapy or utilizing branded intervention materials are encouraged to consult the National Institute of Relationship Enhancement (NIRE).

References

• Guerney, B. G., Jr. (1977). Relationship Enhancement: Skill-training programs for therapy, problem prevention, and enrichment. Jossey-Bass.
• Guerney, B. G., Jr. (1977). Basic skills of relationship enhancement programs. In B. G. Guerney Jr. (Ed.), Relationship Enhancement (pp. 25–53). Jossey-Bass.
• Guerney, B. G., Jr., Guerney, L. F., & Cooney, T. (1985). Marital Relationship Enhancement. In D. H. Olson & B. C. Miller (Eds.), Family studies review yearbook (Vol. 3, pp. 248–264). SAGE Publications.
• Rankin, E. A., & Campbell, N. D. (1983). Perception of relationship changes during the third trimester of pregnancy. Issues in Health Care of Women, 6(5–6), 351–359. https://doi.org/10.1080/07399338309515632
• Rogers, C. R. (1957). The necessary and sufficient conditions of therapeutic personality change. Journal of Consulting Psychology, 21(2), 95–103. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0045357
• Schlein, S. P. (1971). Training dating couples in empathic and open communication: An experimental evaluation of a potential preventative mental health program (Unpublished doctoral dissertation). The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
• Schlein, S. P., & Guerney, B. G., Jr. (1971). Relationship enhancement. Jossey-Bass.
• Spanier, G. B. (1976). Measuring dyadic adjustment: New scales for assessing the quality of marriage and similar dyads. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 38(1), 15–28. https://doi.org/10.2307/350547
• Vanhook, P. M. (2007). Comeback of Appalachian female stroke survivors: The interrelationships of cognition, function, self-concept, interpersonal, and social relationships (Doctoral dissertation, East Tennessee State University). Electronic Theses and Dissertations, Paper 2246. https://dc.etsu.edu/etd/2246

Items of the Scale