The tool is designed to measure the intensity of parental stress in parents of adolescents. Parental stress is understood here as a set of processes leading to aversive psychological and physiological reactions, resulting from the attempt to adapt to the requirements of parenthood. The inventory focuses on three main sources: related to the characteristics of the adolescent, related to the characteristics of the parent and the features of the relationship between them. It also allows to measure situational/demographic factors outside the parent-adolescent relationship, which may affect the intensity of the parent's stress.

SIPA consists of 112 items, 90 of which are included in three main scales – the Adolescent  scale, the Parent  scale and the Adolescent-Parent Relationship  scale.

The Adolescent  scale includes the following subscales:

• Moodiness / Emotional Lability (LAB) – measures how a parent perceives their child's mood swing. The items also refer to the energy resources possessed by the parent, needed to cope with the moods and emotional lability of the adolescent.
• Social isolation (IZO) – measures a parent's perception of an adolescent’s social isolation, concerns about his/her lack of social competences, interpersonal development and responses in social situations.
• Delinquency/Antisocial Behavior (AS) – measures the level of stress experienced by a parent as a result of an adolescent’s violating social behavior rules and committing crimes
• Failure to Achieve or Persevere (BOW) – measures how a parent perceives a teenager's lack of perseverance in achieving goals: low motivation at school and a general inability to complete tasks.

The Parent  scale includes the following subscales:

• Life Restrictions (OR) – measures the extent to which the subject perceives the responsibilities of the adolescent's parent as limiting his/her other roles, as well as the extent to which – in the subject’s perception - the adolescent's needs and behaviors force the parent to sacrifice his/her own needs and desires.
• Relationship with Spouse/Partner (RP) – measures the extent to which a parent experiences respect, trust and cooperation in a relationship with a partner in parenting.
• Social Alienation (ALI) – measures how alienated a parent feels and to what extent s/he lacks social support and help in fulfilling parental responsibilities.
• Incompetence /Guilt (PBK) – measures the extent to which a parent experiences anxiety and self-doubt and problems while enforcing ordinary requests from the adolescent; the score on a subscale does not reflect the actual competence possessed by the parent, but rather the subjective sense of competence associated with the difficult emotions experienced in connection with parenthood. 

The scores in the Parent  and Adolescent  scales reflect the content of their component subscales:

• The Parent  scale measures how overwhelmed a parent is with parental responsibilities and has difficulty coping with them.
• The Adolescent  scale measures the level of stress experienced by a parent related to the specific characteristics of an adolescent.
• The Parent-Adolescent Relationship  scale measures how close and mutually supportive relationship a parent has with his/her child; the absence of such a relationship is a major risk factor of dysfunctional parenting.

The Adolescent, Parent, and Relationship Between Parent and Adolescent  scales together form the Total Parenting Stress Index.

For the first 90 items, the subject responds on a five-point scale.

The remaining 22 items form an additional Life Stressors  scale, allowing the identification of sources of stress outside the parent-child system (e.g. divorce, starting a new job, death of an immediate family member, serious injury or health problem). In this case, the respondent answers YES or NO – depending on whether the event took place during the 12 months preceding the assessment.

Materials:

• Kit (original manual, Polish manual, question sheets (25 cop.), multi-layer answer sheets (25 cop.))
• Original manual (translated into Polish)
• Polish manual
• SIPA question sheets (25 copies)
• Multilayer SIPA answer sheets together with key and profile with Polish norms (25 copies)