Abstract
BackgroundParticipation in education is a vital component of adolescents’ everyday life and a determinant of health and future opportunities in adult life. The School Setting Interview (SSI) is an instrument which assesses student-environment fit and reflects the potential needs for adjustments to enhance students’ participation in school activities. The aim of the study was to investigate the psychometric properties of the SSI for students with special educational needs in regular high school.MethodsA sample of 509 students with special educational needs was assessed with the SSI. The polytomous unrestricted Rasch model was used to analyze the psychometric properties of the SSI regarding targeting, model fit, differential item functioning (DIF), response category functioning and unidimensionality.ResultsThe SSI generally confirmed fit to assumptions of the Rasch model. Reliability was acceptable (0.73) and the SSI scale was able to separate students into three different levels of student-environment fit. DIF among gender was detected in item “Remember things” and in item “Homework” DIF was detected among students with or without diagnosis. All items had disordered thresholds. The SSI demonstrated unidimensionality and no response dependence was present among items.ConclusionThe results suggest that the SSI is valid for use among students with special educational needs in order to provide and evaluate environmental adjustments. However, the items with the detected DIF and the SSI rating scale with its disordered thresholds needs to be further scrutinized.
Highlights
Participation in education is a vital component of adolescents’ everyday life and a determinant of health and future opportunities in adult life
The aim of the present study was to investigate the psychometric properties of the School Setting Interview (SSI) for students with special educational needs in regular high school
Targeting and reliability The SSI items targeted most of the person locations (Fig. 2)
Summary
Participation in education is a vital component of adolescents’ everyday life and a determinant of health and future opportunities in adult life. The concept of special educational needs is internationally used to describe students who temporarily or permanently experience difficulties in their learning. Common diagnoses among students with special educational needs are Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Asperger’s syndrome and dyslexia [2]. Symptoms of these diagnoses often include difficulties to concentrate, follow instructions, organize and conduct tasks, and/or read and write [2,3,4]. Student’s unique abilities and the characteristics of the specific school environment must be considered and should form the basis for adjustments to give students with different types of disabilities equal opportunities for participation in education [14]
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