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The Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment, Revised (MASA-R): A Study of Technical Adequacy
Eric G Waldon1, Alexander Lesser2, Lydia Weeden2
1University of the Pacific ewaldon@pacific.edu.
Insights
The revised Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment (MASA-R) shows improved construct validity, test-retest reliability, and interobserver agreement in children. Further research with clinical samples is recommended for pediatric use.
Area of Science:
- Child Psychology
- Medical Intervention Support
- Auditory Attention Measurement
Background:
- Attention is crucial for music-based interventions supporting children during medical procedures.
- The original Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment (MASA) required revisions for better administration and reliability.
- Assessing children's ability to attend to musical stimuli is important for intervention design.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the technical adequacy of the revised Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment (MASA-R) in a non-clinical sample of children aged 4-9 years.
- To examine construct validity, test-retest reliability, and interobserver agreement of the MASA-R.
- To compare MASA-R performance with established auditory attention measures.
Main Methods:
- Administered MASA-R and comparator instruments (NEPSY-II Auditory Attention, WJIII-AA) to 69 non-clinical children aged 4-9 years.
- Assessed construct validity by comparing MASA-R scores with comparator instruments.
- Evaluated test-retest reliability over a two-week delay and interobserver agreement between two examiners.
Main Results:
- MASA-R demonstrated shared score variance with comparator auditory attention measures (R² = .16, p = .003).
- Acceptable test-retest reliability was found for MASA-R items (ICC = .88–.91).
- High interobserver agreement was observed for MASA-R items (ICC = .98–.99).
Conclusions:
- The MASA-R shows improved construct validity, test-retest reliability, and interobserver agreement compared to the original MASA.
- Findings suggest promising technical adequacy for the MASA-R in assessing children's auditory attention to music.
- Further validation with clinical pediatric populations is necessary before widespread clinical application.
Background:
Evidence suggests that attention is an important consideration when designing procedural support interventions for children undergoing distressing medical procedures. As such, the extent to which children can attend to musical stimuli used during music-based procedural support interventions would seem important. The Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment (MASA) was designed to assess a child's ability to attend to musical stimuli, but further revisions were deemed necessary to improve administration, test-retest reliability, and interobserver agreement for the measure's items.
Objective:
This study investigated the technical adequacy of the Music Attentiveness Screening Assessment, Revised (MASA-R), with a non-clinical sample of children aged 4 to 9 years by examining (a) Construct validity using comparator instruments measuring auditory attention; (b) Test-retest reliability following a two-week delay; and (c) Interobserver agreement when administered by two independent examiners.
Methods:
This non-clinical sample included 69 children who were administered both items from MASA-R and two comparator instruments: the Auditory Attention subtest from the NEPSY-II (NII-AA) for children aged 5 to 9 years (n = 47); and the Auditory Attention subtest from the Woodcock-Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities, 3rd ed. (WJIII-AA), for children aged 4 years (n = 22).
Results:
A significant proportion of score variance was shared by both MASA-R items and the comparator measures: R (2) = .16, F(2, 66) = 6.30, p = .003. MASA-R score estimates with regard to test-retest reliability (Item I, intra-class correlation [ICC] = .88; Item II, ICC = .91) and interobserver agreement (Item I, ICC = .99; Item II, ICC = .98) also fell into acceptable ranges.
Conclusions:
Estimates of MASA-R score construct validity, test-retest reliability, and interobserver agreement appear improved over its predecessor, MASA. While findings are promising, additional investigation of its use with a clinical sample is needed before it can be confidently used in pediatrics.
