Revised Conflict Tactics Scale - CTS2

Technical Manual

Script Author: Marisa Okana

Credits:
Millisecond thanks Marisa Okana for sharing her script!

Last Modified: January 11, 2025 by K. Borchert (katjab@millisecond.com), Millisecond

Background

The Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2; Straus, Hamby, Boney- McCoy, & Sugarman, 1996*) is a widely used measure of intimate partner violence consisting of five subscales: physical violence, psychological violence, sexual violence, negotiation, and physical injury.

PERMISSION FOR RESEARCH USE OF THE CTS2: Do NOT administer this instrument without written permission of the authors. 'Permission to reproduce the CTS2 will be granted without charge to persons who agree to carry out and report psychometric analyses (such as reliability and factor analyses), or who agree to provide us with data to use for psychometric analysis. If data are provided, their use will be limited to psychometric analyses and the right to use the data for substantive analyses will rest exclusively with the person or persons providing the data. (Straus et al, 1996, p.305)'

References

Straus, M.A., Hamby, S.L., Boney-McCoy, S. & Sugarman, D.B. (1996). The Revised Conflict Tactics Scales (CTS2): Development and Preliminary Psychometric Data. JOURNALOF FAMILY ISSUES, 17 , 283-316.

Duration

5 minutes

Description

There are 39 items to be answered by respondent for her/his own actions/behaviors and for partner's actions/behaviors (78 items in total)

Scoring

Response Scale Used

The following scale was used to score the initial responses (see Straus et al, 1996, p.305):
"Once in the past year": 1
"Twice in the past year": 2
"3-5 times in the past year": 4 (suggested midpoint)
"6-10 times in the past year": 8 (suggested midpoint)
"11-20 times in the past year": 15 (suggested midpoint)
"More than 20 times in the past year": 25 (suggested midpoint)
"Not in the past year, but it did happen before": 0*

•'Treatment of response Category 7. Response Category 7 ("Not in the
past year, but it did happen before") is used in two ways: (a) When scores
for the previous year are desired (the usual use of the CTS), Category 7 is
scored as 0; and (b) Category 7 can also be used to obtain a relationship
prevalence measure of physical assault-that is, did an assault ever occur?
Respondents who answer 1 through 7 are scored as 1 (yes).' (Straus et al, 1996, p.305)

Binary Response Scoring

To change scoring to obtain a relationship prevalence measure of physical assault (binary) use the following scoring:
/ optionvalues = ("1", "1", "1", "1", "1", "1", "1", "0")

Summary Data

File Name: RevisedConflictTacticsScale2_summary*.iqdat

Data Fields

Name	Description
inquisit.version	Inquisit version number
computer.platform	Device platform: win \| mac \|ios \| android
computer.touch	0 = device has no touchscreen capabilities; 1 = device has touchscreen capabilities
computer.hasKeyboard	0 = no external keyboard detected; 1 = external keyboard detected
startDate	Date the session was run
startTime	Time the session was run
subjectId	Participant ID
groupId	Group number
sessionId	Session number
elapsedTime	Session duration in ms
completed	0 = Test was not completed 1 = Test was completed
phAssaultSelfMax300	Physical Assault cumulative score for Self
phAssaultPartnerMax300	Physical Assault cumulative score for Partner the higher the score, the more Physical Assault used
psAggrSelfMax200	Psychological Aggression cumulative score for Self
psAggrPartnerMax200	Psychological Aggression cumulative score for Partner the higher the score, the more Psychological Aggression used
nSelfMax150	Negotiation cumulative score for Self
nPartnerMax150	Negotiation cumulative score for Partner the higher the score, the more Negotiation used (without violence)
iSelfMax150	Injury cumulative score for Self
iPartnerMax150	Injury cumulative score for Partner the higher the score, the more injuries
scSelfMax175	Sexual Coercion cumulative score for Self
scPartnerMax175	Sexual Coercion cumulative score for Partner the higher the score, the more Sexual Coercion used

Raw Data

File Name: revisedconflicttacticsscale2.iqdat

Data Fields

Name	Description
date	Date the session was run
time	Time the session was run
subject	Participant ID
group	Group number
session	Session number
build	Inquisit version number
q*_response	Response given (in assigned values); see scoring section
q*_latency	How much time (in ms) the participant spent on the surveyPage with this particular question (the last time this particular surveyPage was visited)