her if he or she is going out when at home without an adult; (5) she talks with her child about what he or she does with friends when away from home; and if she knows (6) where the child is, (7) who he or she is with, and (8) when he or she will return when not at home; and (9) whether she knows the first and last names of the friends the child is with. The internal consistency for these 9 items was α=.73, and the average interitem correlation was r=0.40. In no case did the removal of an item result in an overall increase in α of more than .01. Although we refer to this measure as parental monitoring, it likely reflects both parental efforts (and skills) at obtaining information and the child's willingness to inform the parent.37,38
