Introduction:

A high level of Adoption of the Maternal Role (AMR) among teenage mothers is essential because, during adolescence, the behaviors of responsibility and decision are not fully developed and thus, the care of the baby could be compromised. The AMR Theory of Ramona Mercer is the framework for the present study.

Objective:

To use the AMR scale of Garrido and Marchan among mexican adolescent mothers in order to test its validity and reliability.

Methods:

This is a descriptive and inferential study with sequential and exploratory design and with semantic adequation. Ten expert judges were included in the validation process. A pilot test was developed and tested on 30 mexican adolescent mothers. The final version of the instrument was given to 90 mothers with ages ranging from 10 to 19 years old. Anonymity and confidentiality were guaranteed; and the informed consent from all the participants was obtained.

Results:

The word milk-feeding was replaced by breastfeeding. From the expert judges' analysis, an Item Validity Index of 7, a Validity Criterion of 12.9%, and a Validity of Context Index of 8.7 were obtained. No changes were made on the test pilot structure. The final version of the instrument showed a Cronbach Alpha of .824. The average age of the participants was 17.2 ± 1.6.

Discussion:

The validated version of the scale demonstrates consistency for the context of Mexico. Therefore, this scale can be used to identify the level of Adoption of the Maternal Role among mexican adolescent mothers.

Conclusions:

The AMR Scale of Garrido and Marchan is valid and reliable to be used in mexican teenage mothers. Moreover, this tool can help strengthen the nursing interventions aimed at improving the health results of this population group.