Development and psychometric properties of the Children's Assertive Behavior Scale

The purpose of this paper is to present the psychometric properties and individual items comprising the Children's Assertive Behavior Scale (CABS). The CABS is a behaviorally designed self-report instrument for children which measures general and specific social skills and covers many socially relevant situations which are problematic for children. Acceptable psychometric properties of the 27-item test were obtained in several independent investigations across both geographical regions and grade levels. The CABS showed significant concurrent validity with peer, parent, and teacher measures of social competency. The CABS also discriminated trained versus untrained children participating in social skills versus a placebo discussion group. The instrument is presented, along with recommendations for future applications and research.Both authors share equal responsibility for the development and evaluation of the Children's Assertive Behavior Scale.     

Children's social behavior: Reliability and concurrent validity of two self-report measures

In this study the psychometric qualities of Deluty's Children's Action Tendency Scale (CATS) and Michelson and Wood's Children's Assertive Behavior Scale (CABS) were assessed with 157 Dutch children. Both instruments are designed to assess children's self-reported responses to interpersonal situations, whereby aggressive, assertive, and submissive scores are obtained. In general acceptable psychometric properties were obtained for both the CATS and the CABS, except for the assertive scale of the CATS. Furthermore, it was found that the ability of both the CATS and the CABS to discriminate between submissiveness and assertiveness was low. Important gender differences that were found regarding the relations with measures of perceived competence and social desirability are offered as a possible explanation for the relative failure of the CABS and the CATS to unbind submissive from assertive behavior. The parent version of the CABS is offered as a possible alternative or additional source of information for the assessment of children's submissiveness. Recommendations for future applications and research are presented.This research was supported by Grant 2843 from the NFGV to the second author.     

Assessment of Parenting Practices Related to Conduct Problems: Development and Validation of the Management of Children's Behavior Scale

We report on the development and initial validation of the parent-report scale, Management of Children's Behavior Scale (MCBS), designed to evaluate parenting practices related to conduct problems in children. Children (N=396, ages 2-14) referred for outpatient treatment and their parents served as participants. We evaluated the composition and consistency of the scale and provided evidence pertaining to concurrent, predictive, and incremental validity. Evidence for each type of validity was consistent with the conceptualization of the scale and the pertinence to child conduct problems. The measure also was sensitive to therapeutic changes. Parenting practices targeted in treatment (parent management training) improved as predicted over time. The results suggest the measure may be useful in evaluating parenting practices known to relate to conduct problems and often targeted for intervention in parent- and family-based treatment.     

Peer Ratings of Children's Assertive and Unassertive Behavior:

The purpose of this investigation was to explore children's judgements of peers' assertive and unassertive behavior in positive and negative interactions. Subjects were 142 third and fourth graders, 8 to 11 years of age. Stimulus materials were sets of three short videotaped scenes in which a female target child behaved either assertively or unassertively with a female peer. Four types of scenes were utilized: positive situations and assertive behavior (PA), positive situations and unassertive behavior(PU), negative situations and assertive behavior (NA), and negative situations and unassertive behavior (NU). Groups of 8 to 10 male and female subjects each viewed one set of scenes and then completed a 10-item questionnaire assessing their judgements of the target children's social skillfulness and likability. Results indicate that subjects rated assertive behavior in positive situations significantly higher than in negative situations for the majority of the items. Also, ratings for the PA and NU scenes and for the NA and PU scenes generally did not differ significantly. No significantly main effect of target child or gender of subject was demonstrated although some trends were noted. These findings strongly suggest that children's judgments of peers' assertive and unassertive behavior are situationally specific. Results of the present study have important implications for children's social skills training.     

THE EFFECTIVENESS OF INTERPERSONAL SKILLS TRAINING ON THE SOCIAL SKILL ACQUISITION OF MODERATELY AND MILDLY RETARDED ADULTS

Sixteen moderately and mildly retarded adults were selected from a group residential facility and randomly assigned to experimental and control groups. The experimental group received a 12-session interpersonal skills training program consisting of instruction in the following areas: (1) Introductions and Small Talk, (2) Asking for Help, (3) Differing with Others, and (4) Handling Criticism. The social skills instructional package included verbal instruction, modeling, role playing, feedback, contingent incentives, and homework. As a result of this training program, moderately and mildly retarded adults acquired new social skills as evidenced by performance on a situation role play assessment. These gains generalized to untrained role play situations but did not result in significant group differences when assessed in a more natural setting (i.e., local grocery store).     

Structural Validation of the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale

Despite the prolific use of the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS), there have been no prior studies using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to compare competing HDRS latent structures. The current study undertakes this task, examining CFAs on 397 older adults on the most stable latent models previously posited and a new rationally derived model by Cole and Motivala. CFAs were evaluated in their original first-order structure and in hierarchically related counterparts. All hierarchical models performed significantly better than their first-order counterparts. Moreover, the hierarchical Cole and Motivala model was significantly better on all comparative criteria than any of the other models. However, none of the tested models obtained sufficient fit with the data suggesting psychometric, scoring, or content limitations of the scale.     

Development and Validation of the Shy Bladder Scale

Paruresis, characterized by the difficulty or inability to urinate in a variety of social contexts, is a scientifically under-studied phenomenon. One reason for this state of affairs is the paucity of reliable and valid measures for assessing this problem. The present article attempted to address this limitation by investigating the psychometric properties and validity of a new measure of paruresis: the Shy Bladder Scale (SBS). In two undergraduate samples, the SBS demonstrated excellent internal consistency and a stable factor structure assessing difficulty urinating in public, impairment and distress, and paruresis-related fear of negative evaluation. Undergraduate students evidenced very low levels of paruresis-related concerns. In contrast, SBS scores were markedly elevated among individuals recruited from an online support network who appeared to meet diagnostic criteria for paruresis-specific social phobia. Our findings highlight the SBS's potential utility as a measure of paruresis in clinical and research contexts.     

Risk-Taking Behavior as a Mediator of the Relationship between Children's Temperament and Injury Liability

The relationship between childhood temperament, risk-taking behavior and injury liability is investigated in a sample of 209 two- to nine-year-old children using parental report. Temperament was found to be significantly related to both risk-taking behavior and the number of injuries sustained; moreover, risk-taking behavior was a significant predictor of injuries. A mediational model was tested and risk-taking behavior was found to mediate the relationship between temperament and injury liability. The implications of these findings are discussed within the context of preventive actions.     

Psychometric properties of the Wolpe-Lazarus assertiveness scale with community-dwelling older adults

The psychometric properties of the Wolpe-Lazarus Assertiveness Scale (WLAS) were examined with an older community-dwelling, nonclinical, adult population. Three hundred twenty-seven older adults (ages, 57–96; mean, 75.68) who were not psychiatrically impaired completed a demographic questionnaire and the WLAS. Fifty-seven of the 327 subjects also filled out the WLAS on a repeated basis after 3 or 4 weeks in order to determine the test-retest reliability. Results indicate that the WLAS has an adequate internal consistency (Cronbach's=.75) and test-retest reliability (r=.81). WLAS cutoff scores of 14 and under identify unassertiveness. Older adults who are (1) African-American or (2) of lower SES tend to be significantly less assertive. Also, five factors emerged from a principal-components analysis accounting for 34.7% of the total variance.This research is based on the senior author's doctoral dissertation in partial fulfillment of the Ph.D. under the direction of the second, third, and fourth authors.     

Validation of the Life Role Salience Scale in a South African setting

This study aimed to validate the Life Role Salience Scale (LRSS) in a South African context. Respondents were 300 working adults (72.3% = women; 57.9% = non-white; mean age = 35.12 years, SD = 10.25 years; mostly from the finance sector = 35.6%). Confirmatory factor and exploratory factor analyses were conducted to determine the LRSS’s factor structure and reliability of scores from the scale for the South African sample. Results yielded five factors emerging from the analyses: Homecare role reward value and homecare role commitment; marital role reward value and marital role commitment; occupational role commitment; occupational role value reward; and parental role reward value. The reliability of scores from the LRSS ranged from 0.79 (parental role reward value) to 0.95 (homecare role reward value and homecare role commitment). The LRSS shows validity for research use in South Africa.     

儿童社会退缩行为影响因素的追踪研究

本研究以110名儿童为被试,从2岁追踪到4岁,使用观察法探讨儿童2岁时的气质特征、母亲教养行为、亲子关系对4岁时退缩行为的影响。路径分析结果表明三者对退缩行为都有影响。但是不同退缩行为的影响因素及其路径是不同的。     

Validation of the Norwegian version of the Social Functioning Scale (SFS) for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder

Hellvin, T., Sundet, K.,Vaskinn, A., Simonsen, C.,Ueland, T., Andreassen, O.A. & Melle, I. (2010). Validation of the Norwegian version of the Social Functioning Scale (SFS) for schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology 51, 525–533. Studies of social functioning in severe mental disorders are disadvantaged by the multitude of different assessment instruments in use. The present study aims to establish reliability and validity of the Norwegian version of the Social Functioning Scale (SFS) and to examine social functioning in bipolar disorder (BD) compared to schizophrenia (SZ) and healthy controls (HC). SFS, a 76 item questionnaire divided into seven subscales measuring various aspects of daily life functioning, was administered to samples diagnosed with BD (n = 100) or SZ (n = 100) and to HC (n = 100), recruited from the ongoing Tematic Organized Psychosis (TOP) study. Reliability analyses prove adequate psychometric properties both for the composite full scale score (α: 0.81) as well as for the seven subscale scores (α: 0.60–0.88). Principal component analysis of the subscales confirms a one‐component structure, explaining 59% of the variance. Although significantly correlated with the Global Assessment of Functioning, our results indicate that the SFS measures different aspects of social functioning, is less influenced by demographic and clinical characteristics, but differentiates at the same time significantly BD from SZ. Thus, SFS adds valuable information as a supplement to standard clinician‐rated assessment tools of social functioning, suited both for research and clinical work.     

Age discrimination in the workplace: Validation of the Nordic Age Discrimination Scale (NADS)

Furunes, T. & Mykletun, R. J. (2010). Age discrimination in the workplace: Validation of the Nordic Age Discrimination Scale (NADS). Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 51 , 23–30.
Due to population ageing, older workers will make up a larger proportion of the workforce. However, recent reports show an increase in perceived age discrimination among older employees. Previous research found that age discrimination may result in negative feelings, such as uselessness, powerlessness and lower self-esteem. This study develops and validates a scale for monitoring age discrimination in the workplace. The validation study draws on three datasets, from Norway, Sweden and Finland respectively. The study provides a psychometric contribution to the study of the behavioral component of ageism.     

Character Disposition and Behavior Type: Influences of Valence on Preschool Children's Social Judgments

The authors studied the influences of valence information on preschool children's (n = 47) moral (good or bad), liking (liked or disliked by a friend), and consequence-of-behavior (reward or punishment) judgments. The authors presented 8 scenarios describing the behavior valence, positive valence (help, share), negative valence (verbal insult, physical aggression), and disposition valence (nice or mean) of characters in social interaction with a friend. Overall, character disposition and behavior valence significantly influenced children's judgments. Moral, liking, and consequence-of-behavior judgments varied significantly by character disposition for both positive behavior scenarios. In contrast, there were fewer significant findings as a function of character disposition for negative behavior scenarios, suggesting that the negative behavior cue somewhat diminished the effect of character disposition on children's judgments. The authors discuss preschool students’ coordination of information about valence of behavior and character disposition and the students’ reluctance to judge that misbehavior warrants punitive consequence.     

Adaptation of the Children's Friendship Training Program for Children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders

ABSTRACT

Previous research attests to the marked impairments in social functioning exhibited by children with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD), suggesting that such children are in need of social skills intervention. Recently, an existing evidence-based manualized behavioral treatment for improving children's friendships was implemented and demonstrated to be effective with children aged 6–12, diagnosed with FASD. In the present report, we describe methods for adapting this behavioral intervention in line with the specific cognitive and behavioral deficits seen in children with FASD and other developmental disabilities to enhance treatment efficacy.     

自我韧性量表与Connor-Davidson韧性量表的应用比较

目的:考察自我韧性量表中文版的心理测量学指标,探讨其与Connor-Davidson韧性量表的关系,比较两者在中国人群中的应用效果。方法:在社区人群中施测自我韧性量表和Connor-Davidson韧性量表的中文版,以及自尊量表、生活满意度指数A问卷、大五人格问卷。结果:自我韧性量表中文版的内部一致性系数为0.77,略低于Connor-Davidson韧性量表。自我韧性量表与Connor-Davidson韧性量表的相关系数为0.61。在以自尊、生活满意度、大五人格为效标时,偏相关分析表明控制了Connor-Davidson韧性量表得分后,自我韧性量表与效标的相关未达到显著水平(除大五人格的外向性维度外);但控制了自我韧性量表得分后,Connor-Davidson量表与效标的相关仍达到显著水平(除开放性维度外)。结论:在我国人群的应用中,Connor-Davidson韧性量表优于自我韧性量表,是值得推广的韧性测量工具。