The purpose of this study was to investigate the structure of parental identity. A new developed parental identity scale was employed in a study of 216 mothers of young children. Factor analysis of the data indicated that the parental identity is composed of three factors, namely, “comprehension ofparental-role”, “self-evaluation of parental-role”, “acceptance of parental-role”.

　　The main findings were as follows: 1) Mothers thinking of themselves as “full-fledged” took higher scores on the scale. 2) Well-educated mothers or mothers with children more than two years registered higher scores in “comprehenshion of parental-role”. 3) Employed mothers and mothers with children under five years scored higher in “acceptance of parental-role”.

　　These findings suggest that every dimension in parental identity will probably change as: a mother's children develop, the mothers themselves develop and/or, the mothers themselves develop and/or various experiences in crease in performing the role of parents.

　　The purpose of the present study was to investigate the reference to the self, parents, friend, and favorite member of the opposite sex in late adolescence. The reference of self in relation to ego identity, and gender difference were examined. 631 college students completed the questionnaire for reference-object, and the ego identity status judgings cale. The results were as follows : (a) In almost all cases, the reference to the self was higher than to the others. (b) Gender difference was remarkable regarding the reference to parents. (c) Reference to the self in club activities tended to differ by the ego identity statuses. (d) In female subjects, reference to the self correlated to the dimension of past crises of the ego identity judging scale. I found that examining reference-object was an effective method in clarifying the development of interpersonal relationships in late adolescence.

　　This study compared the concepts of healthy family functioning held by therapists with those of families in Japan. A Japanese translation of a previously developed English questionnaire, which measures perceptions of healthy family functioning in three dimensions (cohesion, adaptability, and communication) on the family circumplex model, was given to 106 therapists and 347 family members. Following the manner of the previous studies, the respondents were asked to rate 34 aspects of healthy family functioning on the Likert Scale, and rank in order their top seven choices in terms of important aspects for healthy family functioning.

　　The findings of this study supported the results from the previous research on the perceptions of therapists and families in America. Therapists tended to value adaptability, whereas family members held cohesion and family unity to be more important. Especially in the ranking of the aspects, therapists ranked aspects of adaptability such as “flexibility,” “rules,” and “roles” higher than those of family members.

　　In this study, these results, as well as their implications, are discussed.

　　The purpose of this study was to clarify the relationship among family communication in meals, psychological health of family, and parent-child psychological connection. The questionnaire was distributed to 77 elementary school children in fifth and sixth grade, and thier parents.

　　The main results were as follows:

　　1. The families in higher levels of psychological health of family had more positive and frequent communication in meals than the families in lower level.

　　2. The children in psychologically healthy families had strong psychological connections with their parents and recognized thier meal situation as being positive.

　　3. The children in psychologically healthy families drew pictures of their meal situations in a good atomosphere.

　　Protocol analysis and the reliability test were conducted to investigate the validity and reliability of Family Image Method. For the protocol analysis study, questions concerningt he family image (i.e regarding seal placement, shades of seals) were asked of the 10 subjects who completed the images. From this study, we found five important variables regarding the father, mother, and child seals: power image, vertical presentation of the seals, direction of the seals, force of bond, and distance between the seals. For the reliability study, test-retest reliability of seven variables (placement of parent seals and generation border variables were added to the above five) was investigated by a survey of 41 participants. The reliability study confirmed the test-retest reliability of the above seven variables. These findings confirm the usefulness of Family Image Method in group surveys. The possibilities of Family Image Method as a screening test of psychopathology were also discussed.