A LATENT VARIABLE MODEL OF THE FAMILY-OF-ORIGIN SCALE FOR ADOLESCENTS

The Family-of-Origin Scale (FOS) is a recently developed 40-item instr ument originally designed to assess adults' perceptions of the family in which they were raised. A modified version of the FOS has shown pro mise for assessing adolescents' perceptions of the extent to which the ir family fosters autonomy and intimacy. The current study involved ad ministration of the FOS to a large sample of adolescents currently res iding with their family of origin. Confirmatory factor analysis suppor ts the scale's original 13 theoretical constructs and establishes fact orial validity. Follow-up hierarchical tests indicate the current conf irmatory model provides a significant refinement over other plausible models proposed by several different authors finding a similar unitary factor employing exploratory factor analyses.