Family Relationships Judicialization Prediction Questionnaire (C-JUDIFA)

Abstract

The Cuestionario de Predicción de la Judicialización de las Relaciones Familiares (C-JUDIFA), or the Questionnaire for the Prediction of Judicialized Family Relationships, is a specialized psychometric instrument designed to evaluate the risk that conflicts between former partners will escalate and ultimately be resolved through the judicial system. This comprehensive scale comprises 59 items, structured to measure nine critical dimensions believed to contribute significantly to family judicialization.

The development of the C-JUDIFA was informed by established measures, including the Divorce Adjustment Questionnaire (CAD-S; Yárnoz-Yaben & Comino-González, 2010) and the Divorce Unresolved Grief Scale (Yárnoz-Yaben, 2017). The nine assessed dimensions include adjustment to divorce, grief before separation, hatred towards the ex-partner, forgiveness, positive co-parenting, conflict, excessive involvement of families of origin, triangulating dynamics, and the influence of the judicial system. The instrument underwent rigorous psychometric evaluation using data from adults with partner and/or family experiences, featuring expert content analysis for validity, assessment of internal consistency using the omega coefficient, and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to validate its underlying structure against the theoretical model.

Keywords

Judicialization, Breakup Management, Conflict, Divorce, Family Conflict, Post-Conjugal Coparenting, Separation, Systemic Relationships, Adjudication, Marital Separation, Family and Parenting Measures.

Authors

Martín-González, María; Escorial, Sergio; Bolaños, Ignacio; García-Moltó, Amelia.

Purpose

The primary objective of the C-JUDIFA is preventative and clinical. It was explicitly developed to identify and quantify specific psychological and relational factors that significantly predict the likelihood of family disputes—particularly those following separation or divorce—being channeled into the formal judicial system.

The instrument serves as a critical resource for various professional sectors. Practitioners in mediation and family therapy, personnel within family courts, and social services can utilize the C-JUDIFA scores to facilitate early intervention strategies, minimize legal conflict, and promote healthier post-separation co-parenting arrangements by pinpointing areas of high risk for adjudication.

Construct

The C-JUDIFA measures the latent construct of Judicialization Risk in Family Relationships by assessing nine distinct, but theoretically related, dimensions. These dimensions are conceptually grouped into three higher-order factors: Breakup Management, Post-Conjugal Coparenting, and Systemic Relationships. The instrument aims to capture the complexity of post-separation adaptation and ongoing conflict dynamics.

The nine specific dimensions evaluated by the 59 items include the individual’s adjustment to divorce, the presence of unresolved grief before separation, the level of hatred and forgiveness towards the ex-partner, the quality of positive co-parenting efforts, the intensity of conflict with the ex-partner, the extent of excessive involvement by families of origin, the presence of triangulating dynamics, and the individual’s current perception of or influence from the judicial system.

Validity

The validity of the C-JUDIFA was primarily established through comprehensive content validity procedures. This involved meticulous item analysis and consultation with a panel of expert psychologists specializing in mediation and family conflict, ensuring that the items adequately represent the conceptual domain of judicialization risk.

During the expert evaluation process, most scales demonstrated a very high level of perceived relevance and appropriateness. Scales such as “forgiveness to the ex-partner,” “entrenched hatred,” and “influence of the families of origin” achieved an exceptional average evaluation score, approaching 9. Other scales, including “adjustment to divorce,” “parental coordination,” “conflict with ex-partner,” “triangulating dynamics,” “mourning before separation,” and the “judicial system” scale, also received very high average scores, close to 8, confirming strong content alignment across all measured constructs.

Reliability

The reliability of the C-JUDIFA was assessed using the omega reliability coefficient (McDonald, 1999), a statistically robust measure utilized to evaluate internal consistency within the subscales. The analysis demonstrated exceptional levels of consistency across the nine dimensions.

A majority of the individual scales reported reliability coefficients exceeding .90, indicating that the items measuring each construct are highly correlated and reliable. While all scales showed high reliability, the “conflict with ex-partner” scale recorded the lowest coefficient among the dimensions, though still falling within an acceptable range for academic psychometric instruments.

Factor Analysis

Psychometric validation included Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) to verify the theoretical structure of the C-JUDIFA. A parallel analysis confirmed that each of the nine primary scales underlies a single, distinct dimension, supporting the internal coherence of the subscales.

The overall model fit indices supported the proposed one-dimensional structure for each scale, adhering to stringent statistical criteria (Hu & Bentler, 1999). Specifically, RMSEA indices were reported below the acceptable threshold of .08, and CFI (Comparative Fit Index) and GFI (Goodness of Fit Index) metrics exceeded the strong fit criterion of .95. These findings confirmed that the nine scales conform to the initially proposed hierarchical theoretical model, where they are organized and grouped into three distinct, higher-order factors.

Instrument

Test Type: Original

Format: The C-JUDIFA utilizes a 5-point Likert-type scale. Respondents rate their degree of agreement with the described situation, where a score of 1 represents “not in agreement” and a score of 5 represents “strongly agreeing.”

Language Available: Spanish

Population Group: Human; Male; Female

Age Group: Adulthood (18 years & older)

Population Details: The validation study sample included adult individuals residing in Spain who had prior experience in partner or family relationships, making the instrument applicable to a general adult population dealing with relationship dissolution.

Test Methodology: Test Validity; Content Validity; Test Reliability; Internal Consistency; Factor Analysis; Confirmatory Factor Analysis

Keywords

Judicialization; Breakup management; Conflict; Divorce; Family; Post-conjugal coparenting; Separation; Systemic relationships.

Authors

Author ORCID Identifier: No data is Available for listed authors.

Affiliation Email addresses: María Martín-González ([email protected]); No data is Available for Escorial, Bolaños, or García-Moltó.

Correspondence Address: Martín-González, María: [email protected]

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

Permissions: Contact Corresponding Author (Martín-González, María).

Commercial Status: No

Fee: No

Test Year: 2023

References

Martín-González, M., Escorial, S., Bolaños, I., & García-Moltó, A. (2023). Desarrollo y Propiedades Psicométricas del Cuestionario de Predicción de la Judicialización de las Relaciones Familiares (C-JUDIFA) [Development and psychometric properties of the Questionnaire for the Prediction of Judicialized Family Relationships (C-JUDIFA)]. Anuario de Psicología Jurídica, 33(1), 49–55. https://doi.org/10.5093/apj2022a6

Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural equation modeling: a multidisciplinary journal, 6(1), 1–55.

McDonald, R. P. (1999). Test theory: A unified treatment. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Yárnoz-Yaben, S. (2017). Divorce Unresolved Grief Scale.

Yárnoz-Yaben, S., & Comino-González, A. (2010). Divorce Adjustment Questionnaire (CAD-S).

Items of the Cuestionario de Predicción de la Judicialización de las Relaciones Familiares (C-JUDIFA)

This is a 59-item measure, structured across nine subscales grouped into three major factors, as detailed below:

Factors (Scales)

• Breakup management

  • Divorce adaptation

  • Grief due to separation

• Post-conjugal coparenting

  • Positive coparenting

  • Conflict with the ex-partner

  • Pathological hatred towards the ex-partner

  • Forgiveness towards the ex-partner

• Systemic relationships

  • Triangular dynamics

  • Excessive involvement of the family of origin members

  • Judicial system involvement