Journal of Clinical Child Psychology

Shoemaker, Owen S.; Erickson, Marilyn T.; Finch Jr., A.J.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_1pmid: N/A

Convergent and discriminant validity of measures of depression and anger in 51 third- and fourth-grade boys was examined utilizing a multivariate-multimethod model. Methods included (a) self-report measures — the Child Depression Inventory (Kovacs & Beck, 1977) and the Children's Inventory of Anger (Nelson & Finch, 1978), (b) peer nomination-measures — the Peer Nomination of Anger Control Problems (Finch, Nelson, & Moss, in press) and the Peer Nomination Inventory of Depression (Lefkowitz & Tesiny, 1980), and (c) a teacher report measure—the Child Behavior Checklist-Teacher Report Form (Edelbrock & Achenbach, 1984). The results demonstrated significant convergent validity for the measures but failed to support their discriminant validity. A significant method effect was found. The discussion focused on the lack of correspondence between self-report measures and ratings by others as compared with the moderate agreement between peer nomination and teacher report. Failure to demonstrate discriminant validity may have been due to responder bias, imprecision of measures, and the possible overlap of the symptoms of depression and anger.

McIntyre, Anne; Keesler, Thomas Y.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_2pmid: N/A

The prevalence of psychological disorder, the topology of symptom syndromes manifested, and relative risks for disordered status and individual syndromes were determined for an entire population of 4- to 18-year-olds in foster care. Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL; Achenbach & Edelbrock, 1983) ratings by foster parents were employed to determine clinical status. Nearly half the population manifested evidence of psychological disorder. The full spectrum of syndromes tapped by the CBCL was represented. Relative risks associated with foster status were almost 2 to over 32 times greater than for home-reared children. Regional cultural phenomena and sociohistorical events were hypothesized to explain discrepancies with lower rates reported previously. The need to make foster care a therapeutic intervention in addition to a temporary caregiving arrangement is discussed.

Bendell, R. Debra; Culbertson, Jan L.; Shelton, Terri L.; Carter, Bryan D.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_3pmid: N/A

The early cognitive and motor development and temperament characteristics of 25 infants with interrupted infantile apnea and the degree and source of stress experienced by their mothers were compared to the same dimensions in a sample of 25 control infants and their mothers. No significant differences in development or temperament were found between apneic and control infants with the following exceptions. Contrary to previous research, apneic infants were perceived as more active during sleep. In addition, apneic infants were perceived by their mothers as less "acceptable" than were control infants, contributing to increased stress. There were no significant differences on maternal characteristics contributing to stress with the exception of the high degree of social isolation experienced by the mothers of apneic infants. The findings suggest that, although there were apparently no present developmental ramifications of the apnea, these infants are at risk for being perceived more negatively. In addition, continued support services are needed to alleviate the social isolation experienced by the families of these infants.

Teichman, Yona; Eliahu, Deborah

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_4pmid: N/A

We describe the course of treatment and recovery of an 11-year-old girl suffering from two tics: a grunt and an eyeblinking. A multifaceted treatment program was carried out which included behavioral techniques such as massed practice, self-monitoring and self-control. These techniques were chosen in light of the specific dynamics and structure of the patient's family and were applied along with structural family techniques within the family context. The tics were extinguished within 10 to 14 weeks with no recurrences reported in 6-month and 11-month follow-ups.

Chandler, Louis A.; Shermis, Mark D.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_5pmid: N/A

We describe the development o fan instrument that identifies the behavioral patterns likely to be adopted by children attempting to respond to stress. Empirical support has been found for a theoretical model that predicts five types of response. These response types can be profiled from the scores on a behavior rating scale, the Stress Response Scale (Chandler, 1979, 1983). The purposes of this study were to identify the stress profile types among a population of randomly selected children and to compare the frequency of the profile types with those from a group of clinic-referred children. The results showed that, within the randomly selected population, a mixture of low-level responses is found in a fairly even distribution. Within the clinic-referred group, subgroups labeled for the factors Acting-Out and Repressed were identified as fairly frequent. These results have implications for behavioral classification and for developing intervention strategies.

Luiselli, James K.; Evans, Tracy P.; Boyce, Delma A.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_6pmid: N/A

The present study evaluated the effects of psychotropic medication in concert with comprehensive behavioral intervention on multiple forms of self-injury in a deaf-blind child. Treatment consisted of a combination of reinforcement for noninjurious behaviors, plus brief, response-contingent interruption/immobilization. In addition, the study included programming for cross-setting generalization, training parents as home interventionists, and evaluating maintenance of intervention effects. Using a modified multiple-baseline design, treatment was demonstrated to be successful in reducing self-injurious behaviors to near-zero levels, with results maintained at a 6-month follow-up, Therapeutic effects were established across program settings and within the child's home. Psychotropic medication did not have a positive influence on the control of self-injury. issues relevant to the comprehensive assessment and management of self-injurious behavior are discussed.

Maisto, Albert A.; German, Michael L.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_7pmid: N/A

An initial sample of 211 developmentally delayed infants (mean age 11 months) were evaluated over four consecutive 3-month intervals by five typical measures of infant development: the Bayley Scales of Infant Development (Bayley, 1969), the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale (Terman & Merrill, 1973), the Receptive-Expressive Emergent Language Scale (Bzoch & League, 1970), the Preschool Language Scale (Zimmerman, Steiner, & Evatt, 1969), and the Doster Motor Development Evaluation (Doster, 1977), The developmental indices under study included fine motor, gross motor, cognitive, expressive language, and receptive language. Approximately 4 years later, a subset of the initial sample was reevaluated with similar measures of development. Data are reported that indicate substantial reliabilities, predictive validities, and intercorrelations o fall the measures for the sample under study. The results are discussed in terms of the implications for multidisciplinary evaluation procedures used with high-risk infants and developmentally delayed children.

Kazdin, Alan E.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_8pmid: N/A

The present investigation examined the acceptability of alternative treatments for disturbed children. Parents of severely disturbed children, as well as their children (N = 96), evaluated alternative treatments. Clinical cases of children who displayed severe behavioral problems at home and at school were presented along with descriptions of two treatments: outpatient psychotherapy and hospitalization. In addition to alternative modalities of treatment, the influence of the therapeutic focus of treatment (either on the child or on both child and parents) on ratings of treatment acceptability was also examined. The results indicated that parents viewed each of the treatments as more acceptable than did the children. Moreover, parents viewed hospitalization as more acceptable than outpatient treatment, although the reverse was true for children. Differences in the perceptions of treatment acceptability between parent and child appeared to be related to differences in the relation of the perceived strength of treatment and treatment acceptability. For parents, the strength of treatment was positively related to acceptability, whereas the reverse was true for children. The implications of these differing perspectives for implementing child treatments are discussed.

Gale, John; Pfefferbaum, Betty; Suhr, Melanie A.; Overall, John E.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_9pmid: N/A

Forty-eight children and adolescents with widely varied presenting problems were interviewed by paired clinician-raters to evaluate the reliability of the Brief Psychiatric Rating Scale for Children (Overall & Pfefferbaum, 1982), a 21-item rating scale that provides a descriptive profile of child and adolescent psychopathology. Eighteen of the 21 scales appeared adequately reliable when examined individually. All seven composite factor scores proved acceptably reliable, suggesting the advantage of using those composite scores for the evaluation of treatment effects in the child and adolescent patient populations.

Taylor, Linda; Adelman, Howard S.

doi: 10.1207/s15374424jccp1504_10pmid: N/A

Those who want young people to be involved in decisions that affect them are confronted with how to do this in an optimal way and how to decide when such involvement is unproductive. This paper briefly highlights the issues related to minors' participation and then proposes strategies related to facilitating and evaluating the impact of such participation. The strategies discussed stem from research with both problem and nonproblem populations.