A comparison between the handicaps behaviour and skills schedule and the psychoeducational profile

Comparisons were made of developmental scores (administered with the Psychoeducational Profile [PEP] and the Handicaps Behaviour and Skills Schedule [HBS] for a group of 72 children ages 23 to 148 months. All children had been referred to the Centre of Autism in Leiden, the Netherlands. This Centre is a collaboration between the University clinic of special education and the regional health service. Forty-five children were diagnosed as autistic and 27 as nonautistic but suffering from another disorder. In this study, the correlation between the two instruments is higher than expected, in particular for the group of autistic children (.83). The internal consistency of the subscales of the PEP and the HBS are overall very satisfactory. The Cronbach's alphas of the PEP scales vary from .79 to .96 for the total group and from .77 to .95 for the autistic group. The alphas for the HBS vary from .74 to .92 for the total group and from .20 to .87 for the autistic group, there is one alpha at .20, the rest are .60 or higher.