Childhood Experiences of Violence Questionnaire (Walsh, 2004)

• Populations: Adolescents
• Age ranges: 12-18
• Languages: English
• Countries: Canada

Items

• Sometimes kids get hassled or picked on by other kids who say hurtful or mean things to them
• Sometimes Kids get pushed around, hit or beaten up by other kids or a group of kids
• How many times have you ever seen or heard any one of your parents (step-parents or guardians) say hurtful or mean things to each other or another adult in your home?
• How many times have you ever seen or heard any one of your parents (step-parents or guardians) hit each other or another adult in your home?
• How many times has any one of your parents (step-parents or guardians) said hurtful or mean things to you?
• How many times has an adult spanked you with their hand on your bottom (bum), or slapped you on your hand?
• How many times has an adult slapped you on the face, head or ears or hit or spanked you with something like a belt, wooden spoon or something hard?
• How many times has an adult pushed, grabbed, or shoved you to hurt you?
• How many times has an adult thrown something at you to hurt you?
• How many times has an adult kicked, bit, or punched you to hurt you?
• How many times has an adult choked, burned or phyisically attacked you in some other way?
• Did anyone ever show their private parts to you when you didn’t want them to?
• Did anyone ever make you show them your private parts when you did not want them to?
• Did anyone ever threaten to have sex with you when you didn’t want them to?
• Did anyone ever touch the private parts of your body or made you touch their private parts when you didn’t want them to?
• Did anyone ever have sex with you when you didn’t want them to or sexually force themselves on you in some other way?
• Did anyone ever make you see magazines, pictures, videos, internet sites, etc. that had to do with sex when you did not want to see it?

Sub items:

All Items had several sub questions.  Examples:

• How many times has this happened to you?
• When did this happen? Please mark all that apply.
• Who did this to you? Please mark all that apply.
• Were the police ever called because of this?
• Did anyone go to the hospital because of this?

Short Form

Item stem: How many times before age 16 did an adult...

• slap you on the face, head or ears or hit or spank you with something like a belt, wooden spoon or something hard?
• push, grab, shove, or throw something at you to hurt you?
• kick, bite, punch, choke, burn you or physically attack you in some way?
• do any of the following things when you didn’t want them to: touch the private parts of your body or make you touch their private parts, threaten or try to have sex with you or sexually force themselves on you?

Scoring

“PA [Physical Assault] and SA [Sexual Assault] are determined by frequency on the CEVQ; if at least one item meets the minimum required frequency, then that case is classified as abuse. If at least one item meets the minimum required frequency for severe abuse, the case is classified as severe abuse. The threshold of severity for PA in the CEVQ-SF was set to match the algorithms of the full version. The SA classification in the CEVQ-SF is based on one item that includes several abusive acts ranging in severity; therefore a “severe” SA classification is not possible.” (Tanaka, 2010)

Citations

Walsh, C. A. (2004). Asking Youths about Exposure to Child Sexual Abuse: an Evaluation of the Childhood Experiences of Violence Questionnaire [Doctoral Dissertation, University of Toronto]. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses

Tanaka, M. (2010). Impairment in Young Adults associated with Child Maltreatment [Doctoral Dissertation, McMAster University]. ProQuest Dissertations and Theses

Team comments

The Internal Consistency for CEVQ-SF subscale Sexual Abuse was not reported and our judgement is not applied to that specific subscale.