The sample consisted of 162 pairs of mothers/maternal guardians who were evaluated for abuse potential and their children (ages 6-13). A total of 105 of these children were nonpatients recruited from the community (nonreferred); the remaining 57 participants were patient cases recruited from a psychiatric setting (referred). All parents and children were administered a battery of psychosocial measures by highly trained research assistants. Parents completed several measures of child, parent, and family behavior before completing the Child Abuse Potential Inventory (CAP). The CAP discriminates abusive from control or neglectful parents, classified physically abusive and nonabusive parents with high accuracy, and has yielded evidence of predictive and construct validity. Dependent measures were selected to represent four primary domains of functioning: child psychopathology and antisocial behavior, child temperament and social/adaptive behavior, parent functioning/practices, and family functioning/environment. Group comparisons revealed that high-abuse-potential mothers reported greater child externalizing and depressive symptoms, child rejection, personal psychological dysfunction, stressful life events, and family problems, but there were few differences in reports of parent management practices or family violence. Child reports indicated a few group differences in child dysfunction and violence. The results are in accord with interactional models and extend prior research by elaborating possible correlates of physical abuse. 3 tables and 67 references