Assessing Intimacy With the Best Friend and the Sexual Partner During Adolescence: The PAIR-M Inventory

Abstract

The present study had 3 goals: (a) to provide a preliminary investigation of the dimensions involved in the capacity for intimacy toward the best friend and the sexual partner during adolescence; (b) to determine whether the specific areas of the capacity for intimacy toward the best friend are the same as toward the sexual partner; and (c) to consider the usefulness of conceiving the capacity for intimacy as a multidimensional concept. Canadian high school students (N % 465; 257 girls, 208 boys) completed a questionnaire on the capacity for intimacy, best friend version; 232 of them completed the partner version of the questionnaire. Factorial analysis on the best friend version of the questionnaire identified 3 factors: Social Intimacy, Positive Intimacy, and Negative Intimacy. Factorial analysis on the partner version of the questionnaire identified 4 factors: Social Intimacy, Positive Intimacy, Negative Intimacy, and Sexual Intimacy.