Abstract
Background and ObjectivesObtaining a multi-informant perspective is important when assessing mental health issues in childhood and adolescence. Obtaining ratings from both parents and teachers also facilitates the evaluation of similarities and contrasts in the nature and severity of symptoms across home and school contexts. However, these informants may differ in their interpretations of observed behaviors, raising questions about the validity of comparing parents’ and teachers’ ratings.MethodsWe evaluated the cross-informant measurement invariance of one of the most widely used measures of child and adolescent mental health: The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). Using data from the UK-population representative Millennium Cohort Study, we evaluated configural, metric, and scalar measurement invariance across parents and teachers when children were aged 7 (N = 10,221) and 11 (N = 10,543).ResultsScalar measurement invariance held at both ages. Parents reported higher levels of symptoms in all domains measured at both ages as well as higher prosociality.ConclusionsFor a UK sample, valid comparisons of parent and teacher SDQ ratings at ages 7 and 11 appear to be possible, facilitating the evaluation of contextual differences in child mental health problems. Further, parents report more problem and prosocial behavior in their children than teachers attribute to them.
Highlights
In some areas of mental health, such as attentiondeficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), clinical diagnosis depends upon demonstrating that symptoms occur across multiple contexts (American Psychiatric Association, 2013), necessitating the inclusion of multiple raters
A key goal of the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) was to ensure that the sample would allow for analyses of the effect of disadvantage and ethnicity, MCS oversampled socially disadvantaged families and families from areas of high ethnic minority concentration Sampling was clustered by electoral wards and for selected wards children were identified based on the Child Benefit register
Descriptive Statistics Descriptive statistics for the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) items are provided in Supplementary Tables S1 and S2
Summary
In some areas of mental health, such as attentiondeficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), clinical diagnosis depends upon demonstrating that symptoms occur across multiple contexts (American Psychiatric Association, 2013), necessitating the inclusion of multiple raters. In these and other areas obtaining a multiinformant perspective is needed to document and explore potential differences in functioning across contexts and in interaction with different adults (De Los Reyes, 2013). Obtaining a multi-informant perspective is important when assessing mental health issues in childhood and adolescence Obtaining ratings from both parents and teachers facilitates the evaluation of similarities and contrasts in the nature and severity of symptoms across home and school contexts. These informants may differ in their interpretations of observed behaviors, raising questions about the validity of comparing parents’
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