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Reliability of children's self-reported internalizing symptoms over short to medium-length time intervals
1Center for Persons with Disabilities, Utah State University, Logan, USA.
Objective:
To determine whether children between the ages of 8 and 12 years are able to reliably report internalizing symptoms over short to medium-length time intervals as measured by an objective self-report instrument of internalizing symptoms.
Method:
The Internalizing Symptoms Scale for Children (ISSC) was group-administered initially to 131 children and at subsequent intervals of 2 weeks, 4 weeks, and 12 weeks.
Results:
Pearson product-moment correlations for the ISSC total scores of the participants were computed across the various retest intervals. At 2 weeks, the correlation was .84. At 4 weeks, the correlation was .76. After 12 weeks, the correlation was .74.
Conclusions:
These data indicate that children between 8 and 12 years old can reliably report their experience over short to medium-length intervals. These findings provide strong support for the ISSC as a research and clinical instrument for the assessment of internalizing symptoms in children between 8 and 12 years of age, which may ultimately prove beneficial in the identification and treatment of childhood internalizing disorders. Limitations and recommendations for future research are discussed.