Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire (MCPQ)

Abstract

The Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire (MCPQ) is a psychometric instrument developed by Miriam Chasson and Orit Taubman – Ben-Ari (2025) designed to operationalize and assess the multifaceted affective and cognitive experiences of maternal caregiving during the first year of an infant’s life. Drawing upon foundational paradigms of compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, and self-compassion within caregiving dyads, the instrument adapts professional caregiving constructs to the normative yet taxing domain of early motherhood. Originating from an initial pool of 40 items derived from qualitative investigations and established psychological scales, the final version comprises 29 items configured across three empirically validated subscales: Maternal Compassion Fatigue, Maternal Compassion Satisfaction, and Maternal Self-Compassion. Administered via a 5-point Likert scale ranging from 0 (Never) to 4 (Very often), the MCPQ captures both the psychological costs and profound rewards inherent in maternal primary preoccupation. Psychometric validation among mothers of infants aged up to 12 months demonstrated robust structural integrity via confirmatory factor analysis (CFA: $\chi^2/df = 1.60$, $\text{CFI} = .936$, $\text{TLI} = .928$, $\text{RMSEA} = .049$, $\text{SRMR} = .056$) and demonstrated measurement invariance across independent maternal samples. Internal consistency estimates across subscales range from adequate to excellent (Compassion Fatigue: $\alpha = .943$, $\omega = .945$; Compassion Satisfaction: $\alpha = .680$, $\omega = .677$; Self-Compassion: $\alpha = .784$, $\omega = .783$). The MCPQ exhibits rigorous convergent and discriminant validity, correlating meaningfully with postpartum depression, maternal role satisfaction, and mindfulness. It provides clinicians and developmental researchers with a nuanced tool to differentiate adaptive maternal bonding from caregiver burnout.

Keywords

Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire, MCPQ, compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, self-compassion, postpartum mental health, maternal-infant attachment, primary maternal preoccupation, parental burnout, psychometrics

Authors

The Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire was developed by researchers at the Louis and Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work at Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel:

• Miriam Chasson, Ph.D. — Louis and Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. ORCID: 0000-0002-5502-673X. Correspondence: [email protected].
• Orit Taubman – Ben-Ari, Ph.D. — Professor, Louis and Gabi Weisfeld School of Social Work, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan, Israel. ORCID: 0000-0001-9308-4052.

Purpose

The primary purpose of the Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire (MCPQ) is to provide an empirically validated, clinically sensitive instrument capable of capturing the complex emotional topography of maternal care during infancy. Transitioning to motherhood involves profound psychological, neurobiological, and behavioral reorganization—a state classic psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott historically termed primary maternal preoccupation. Although this heightened focus facilitates maternal sensitivity and ensures the survival of the neonate, continuous and unrelenting immersion in the physical and emotional needs of an infant can deplete psychological resources.

Prior psychological assessment models in perinatal psychology often dichotomized maternal functioning into clinical pathology (such as postpartum depression or postpartum anxiety) versus normative adaptation. However, these screening tools frequently fail to assess the specific psychological mechanisms underlying caregiver depletion within non-clinical and sub-clinical populations. The MCPQ addresses this gap by transposing the constructs of professional compassion fatigue and satisfaction—traditionally evaluated in healthcare workers, therapists, and emergency personnel—into the domain of early parenting.

The clinical and research applications of the MCPQ are wide-ranging. In research settings, the tool enables developmental and family psychologists to investigate how individual differences in self-directed and child-directed compassion influence parenting stress, marital stability, infant attachment security, and maternal identity consolidation. Clinically, the scale functions as an assessment instrument for post-birth doulas, perinatal clinical social workers, clinical psychologists, and pediatric health visitors. By distinguishing between exhaustion derived from caregiving (compassion fatigue), positive feelings gained from infant interaction (compassion satisfaction), and the mother’s capacity to treat herself kindly amid parental distress (self-compassion), the MCPQ guides targeted psychosocial interventions tailored to specific vulnerabilities rather than applying generic stress-reduction methods.

Psychological Construct

The psychological construct evaluated by the MCPQ is Maternal Compassion Preoccupation, defined as an integrated, triadic psychological state experienced by mothers during early infancy comprising compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, and self-compassion. The scale disaggregates this overall caregiving experience into three distinct operational dimensions:

1. Maternal Compassion Fatigue

Maternal Compassion Fatigue represents the emotional, physical, and cognitive depletion resulting from continuous, intense exposure to an infant’s dependency, crying, and relentless physiological demands. In the context of the MCPQ, this subscale captures experiences of depersonalization, emotional blunting, resentment, feelings of entrapment, and perceived inadequacy. Rather than simple physical fatigue or sleep disruption, compassion fatigue reflects a profound erosion of emotional availability. Items in this domain measure feelings of mechanical caregiving (“on auto-pilot”), alienation, irritability triggered by infant distress, cognitive overload associated with mundane nursery routines, and the existential sentiment of losing one’s personal worth.

2. Maternal Compassion Satisfaction

Maternal Compassion Satisfaction reflects the positive emotional resonance, vitality, and sense of fulfillment derived directly from caring for one’s infant. It captures the caregiver’s capacity to derive joy and psychological replenishment through the relational matrix of the mother-infant dyad. This dimension assesses core affective markers such as experiencing deep connection during caregiving routines, drawing renewed physical and emotional strength from positive infant reciprocal cues (e.g., eye contact, smiling, cooing), and feeling authentic fulfillment when family members share in the joy of the infant. High compassion satisfaction functions as a primary protective buffer against postpartum burnout.

3. Maternal Self-Compassion

Maternal Self-Compassion refers to the mother’s cognitive and emotional disposition toward herself during instances of perceived parental inadequacy, caregiving errors, or emotional distress. Drawing on the framework pioneered by Kristin Neff, this subscale operationalizes three interrelated components specifically contextualized within parenting: self-kindness (treating oneself gently rather than with harsh self-judgment when domestic or parenting tasks falter), common humanity (recognizing that maternal imperfection, fatigue, and struggles are shared universally among mothers rather than reflecting isolated personal failure), and mindfulness (maintaining a balanced perspective on difficult emotions without becoming consumed or overwhelmed by them).

Theoretical Framework

The MCPQ integrates two conceptual frameworks: Charles Figley’s and B. Hudnall Stamm’s models of professional caregiving quality of life, alongside Kristin Neff’s model of self-compassion, synthesized through Winnicottian psychodynamic theories of infant care.

Compassion Fatigue and Satisfaction Framework

In the occupational literature, Charles Figley (1995, 2002) conceptualized compassion fatigue as the “cost of caring” for individuals suffering from emotional or physical pain. Stamm (2002, 2010) integrated this construct into the Professional Quality of Life (ProQOL) framework, proposing that professional caregiving generates two independent outcomes: positive adaptation (compassion satisfaction) and negative strain (compassion fatigue, encompassing burnout and secondary traumatic stress). Chasson and Taubman – Ben-Ari observed that the psychological demands placed on a new mother are theoretically analogous to those faced by professional caregivers: continuous vigilance, immediate empathic responding to non-verbal cues of distress, boundary dissolution, and acute personal responsibility for another human being’s survival. The MCPQ transposes Stamm’s dual-process model into the family domain, proposing that early maternal experience is determined by the dynamic balance between emotional depletion and caregiving-derived reward.

The Self-Compassion Paradigm

To capture the internal regulatory mechanisms mothers deploy to manage caregiving strain, the authors integrated Neff’s (2003, 2011) self-compassion model. Caregiving literature indicates that personal self-judgment exacerbates distress in high-demand roles. When applied to motherhood, cultural expectations often construct unrealistic ideals of the “perfect mother.” When real-world maternal experiences diverge from these internal standards, mothers frequently experience acute shame, guilt, and perceived inadequacy. Self-compassion serves as an internal emotional regulation resource. By viewing maternal challenges through the lens of common humanity, emotional equanimity, and cognitive flexibility, mothers can reduce the likelihood that compassion fatigue will escalate into clinical postpartum mood disorders.

Validity

The psychometric evaluation of the MCPQ demonstrated convergent and discriminant validity across empirical studies conducted by Chasson and Taubman – Ben-Ari (2025):

Discriminant Validity

Discriminant validity was established via rigorous structural equation modeling criteria. The authors compared the average variance extracted (AVE) of each latent factor with the maximum squared bivariate correlation (Fornell-Larcker criterion) across all paired factors. For all three latent constructs, the AVE values exceeded the shared variance estimates between factors, confirming that Maternal Compassion Fatigue, Maternal Compassion Satisfaction, and Maternal Self-Compassion represent empirically distinct psychological constructs rather than divergent manifestations of a singular underlying affective dimension.

Convergent and Criterion Validity

Convergent validity was verified by evaluating associations between MCPQ subscale scores and validated external psychological constructs:

• Postpartum Depression: Maternal Compassion Fatigue demonstrated a strong, statistically significant positive correlation with maternal depressive symptomatology as measured by standard postpartum depression inventories. Conversely, both Maternal Compassion Satisfaction and Maternal Self-Compassion demonstrated statistically significant negative associations with depressive symptoms.
• Parental Role Satisfaction: Mothers who reported higher Compassion Satisfaction and higher Self-Compassion exhibited significantly elevated satisfaction with their parental role, whereas Compassion Fatigue correlated negatively with role satisfaction.
• Mindfulness: Trait mindfulness displayed significant positive correlations with both Compassion Satisfaction and Self-Compassion, and an inverse correlation with Compassion Fatigue, reinforcing the theoretical premise that emotional equanimity supports sustainable maternal caregiving.

Reliability

The MCPQ demonstrates strong internal consistency reliability across its subscales, evaluated using both Cronbach’s alpha ($lpha$) and McDonald’s omega ($\omega$) coefficients:

• Maternal Compassion Fatigue: Demonstrated excellent internal consistency, yielding $lpha = .943$ and $\omega = .945$. These figures reflect high item covariance and measurement precision across its diverse operational indicators of caregiving strain.
• Maternal Compassion Satisfaction: Displayed an internal consistency of $lpha = .680$ and $\omega = .677$. While slightly below the conventional $.70$ benchmark, this is accepted in psychometric testing for brief subscales (4 items) capturing broad emotional domains, maintaining statistical integrity in structural equation modeling.
• Maternal Self-Compassion: Yielded good reliability coefficients of $lpha = .784$ and $\omega = .783$, showing consistent measurement across the items assessing cognitive kindness, common humanity, and emotional balance.

The scale exhibited stable measurement properties across maternal subgroups varying in infant age and parity, indicating structural reliability across natural developmental shifts in early infancy.

Factor Analysis

The structural development of the MCPQ involved a two-stage psychometric protocol combining Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA):

Exploratory Factor Analysis (EFA)

The initial instrument contained 40 items generated from prior qualitative research on maternal subjective experiences (Chasson & Taubman – Ben-Ari, 2020) and adaptations from established measures (Stamm, 2010; Neff, 2003). In an exploratory sample of mothers caring for infants up to 12 months of age, EFA utilizing principal axis factoring and oblique rotation extracted three distinct, theoretically coherent factors. Eleven items were iteratively eliminated due to low factor loadings ($< .40$), substantial cross-loadings across factors ($> .30$ discrepancy threshold), or poor conceptual fit, resulting in a refined 29-item instrument.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA)

The 29-item three-factor structure was evaluated using CFA on an independent cross-validation sample of mothers. The structural model displayed strong fit indices that surpassed standard psychometric benchmarks:

• Chi-Square / Degrees of Freedom: $\chi^2 = 574.50$, $df = 360$, $p < .001$; with$chi^2/df = 1.60$, well below the conventional conservative cutoff of$2.0$ or $3.0$.
• Comparative Fit Index (CFI): $.936$ (exceeding the standard $.90$ threshold for acceptable fit).
• Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI): $.928$.
• Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA): $.049$ ($90% \text{ CI } [.042, .056]$), demonstrating close model fit ($< .05$).
• Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR): $.056$ (below the $.08$ cutoff).

Furthermore, multigroup CFA demonstrated full metric and scalar measurement invariance across maternal samples, confirming that the factor structure and item intercepts function consistently across different groups of mothers.

Instrument / Measurement Tool

• Test Type: Self-report psychological questionnaire / rating scale.
• Construct Measured: Maternal Compassion Preoccupation (Compassion Fatigue, Compassion Satisfaction, and Self-Compassion).
• Target Population: Mothers caring for young infants (birth through 12 months postpartum; evaluated in adult women aged 21–47 years).
• Item Count: 29 items.
• Factor Structure / Subscales:
  • Maternal Compassion Fatigue: 17 items (Items 2, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16, 17, 19, 20, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28).
  • Maternal Compassion Satisfaction: 4 items (Items 1, 3, 6, 15).
  • Maternal Self-Compassion: 8 items (Items 4, 5, 9, 13, 18, 21, 23, 29).
• Response Format: 5-point Likert rating scale:
  • 0 = Never
  • 1 = Rarely
  • 2 = Sometimes
  • 3 = Often
  • 4 = Very often
• Administration Mode: Electronic/online survey or paper-and-pencil clinical inventory.
• Scoring Procedure: Subscale scores are calculated by averaging or summing the corresponding item scores within each factor. Higher scores on the respective dimensions indicate greater levels of compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, or maternal self-compassion. Items are scored directly without reverse coding when analyzed within their designated subscales.

Permissions & Fee and Test Year

The Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire (MCPQ) was officially published in 2025 by Miriam Chasson and Orit Taubman – Ben-Ari in the Journal of Family Psychology. The instrument is available for use free of charge for non-commercial research, academic inquiry, and educational purposes. Researchers and clinicians wishing to utilize, translate, or adapt the scale are encouraged to contact the corresponding author, Dr. Miriam Chasson, via email at [email protected]. Commercial applications require formal written permission from the copyright holders and the publisher (American Psychological Association).

References

• Chasson, M., & Taubman – Ben-Ari, O. (2020). Caring for the baby: Primary maternal preoccupation through the lens of compassion fatigue and satisfaction. Infant Mental Health Journal, 41(5), 654–667. https://doi.org/10.1002/imhj.21868
• Chasson, M., & Taubman – Ben-Ari, O. (2025). The Maternal Compassion Preoccupation Questionnaire (MCPQ): Development and initial validation. Journal of Family Psychology, Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1037/fam0001319
• Delaney, M. C. (2018). Caring for the caregivers: Evaluation of the effect of an eight-week pilot mindful self-compassion training program on nurses’ compassion fatigue and burnout. International Journal of Caring Sciences, 11(2), 701–709.
• Figley, C. R. (1995). Compassion fatigue: Coping with secondary traumatic stress disorder in those who treat the traumatized. Brunner/Mazel.
• Figley, C. R. (2002). Compassion fatigue: Psychotherapists’ chronic lack of self-care. Journal of Clinical Psychology, 58(11), 1433–1441. https://doi.org/10.1002/jclp.10090
• Galiana, L., Arena, F., Oliver, A., Sansó, N., & Benito, E. (2022). Compassion fatigue, compassion satisfaction, and burnout in palliative care: The role of self-compassion. Palliative & Supportive Care, 20(2), 221–227. https://doi.org/10.1017/S147895152100063X
• Neff, K. D. (2003). The development and validation of a scale to measure self-compassion. Self and Identity, 2(3), 223–250. https://doi.org/10.1080/15298860309027
• Neff, K. D. (2011). Self-compassion, self-esteem, and well-being. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 5(1), 1–12. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9004.2010.00330.x
• Stamm, B. H. (2002). Measuring compassion satisfaction as well as fatigue: Professional Quality of Life (ProQOL) Scale. In C. R. Figley (Ed.), Treating compassion fatigue (pp. 107–119). Brunner-Routledge.
• Stamm, B. H. (2010). The Concise ProQOL Manual (2nd ed.). ProQOL.org.
• Winnicott, D. W. (1956). Primary maternal preoccupation. In Collected papers: Through paediatrics to psycho-analysis (pp. 300–305). Tavistock Publications.

Items of the Scale