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Development of pediatric sleep questionnaires as diagnostic or epidemiological tools: a brief review of dos and
1Department of Pediatrics and Comer Children's Hospital, Pritzker School of Medicine, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637, USA. karenspruyt@uchicago.edu
Insights
This study examines the creation and evaluation of pediatric sleep questionnaires. It highlights potential pitfalls in developing these essential clinical sleep medicine tools.
Area of Science:
- Sleep Medicine
- Pediatric Research
- Psychometrics
Background:
- Questionnaires are vital in sleep medicine and research.
- A significant increase in pediatric sleep questionnaires has led to greater heterogeneity.
- Existing tools vary widely in design and application.
Purpose of the Study:
- To explore the theoretical and practical aspects of questionnaire development.
- To provide guidance on creating and evaluating sleep instruments for children.
- To identify and illustrate common pitfalls in tool development.
Main Methods:
- Review of instrument design principles.
- Analysis of theoretical frameworks for questionnaire creation.
- Examination of evaluation methodologies for research tools.
Main Results:
- Heterogeneity in pediatric sleep questionnaires is a significant challenge.
- Each stage of tool development presents inherent risks and potential errors.
- Illustrative examples highlight common issues in questionnaire design and validation.
Conclusions:
- Standardized approaches are needed for pediatric sleep questionnaire development.
- Careful evaluation is crucial to ensure the reliability and validity of sleep tools.
- Addressing development pitfalls can improve the quality of sleep research instruments.
Abstract:
Questionnaires are a useful and extensively used tool in clinical sleep medicine and in sleep research. The number of sleep questionnaires targeting the pediatric age range has tremendously increased in recent years, and with such explosion in the number of instruments, their heterogeneity has become all the more apparent. Here, we explore the theoretical and pragmatic processes required for instrument design and development, i.e., how any questionnaire, inventory, log, or diary should be created and evaluated, and also provide illustrative examples to further underline the potential pitfalls that are inherently embedded in every step of tool development.
