Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rdxmf Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T02:11:47.191Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Strategic objectives for improving understanding of informant discrepancies in developmental psychopathology research

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 July 2013

Andres De Los Reyes
Andres De Los Reyes*
Affiliation:
University of Maryland at College Park
*
Address correspondence and reprint requests to: Andres De Los Reyes, Comprehensive Assessment and Intervention Program, Department of Psychology, University of Maryland at College Park, Biology/Psychology Building, Room 3123H, College Park, MD 20742; E-mail: [email protected].
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Developmental psychopathology researchers and practitioners commonly conduct behavioral assessments using multiple informants' reports (e.g., parents, teachers, practitioners, children, and laboratory observers). These assessments often yield inconsistent conclusions about important questions in developmental psychopathology research, depending on the informant (e.g., psychiatric diagnoses and risk factors of disorder). Researchers have theorized why informant discrepancies exist and advanced methodological models of informant discrepancies. However, over 50 years of empirical data has uncovered little knowledge about these discrepancies beyond that they exist, complicate interpretations of research findings and assessment outcomes in practice, and correlate with some characteristics of the informants providing reports (e.g., demographics and mood levels). Further, recent studies often yield take-home messages about the importance of taking a multi-informant approach to clinical and developmental assessments. Researchers draw these conclusions from their work, despite multi-informant approaches to assessment long being a part of best practices in clinical and developmental assessments. Consequently, developmental psychopathology researchers and practitioners are in dire need of a focused set of research priorities with the key goal of rapidly advancing knowledge about informant discrepancies. In this paper, I discuss these research priorities, review work indicating the feasibility of conducting research addressing these priorities, and specify what researchers and practitioners would gain from studies advancing knowledge about informant discrepancies in developmental psychopathology research.

Type
Regular Articles
Information
Development and Psychopathology , Volume 25 , Issue 3 , August 2013 , pp. 669 - 682
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Achenbach, T. M. (2006). As others see us: Clinical and research implications of cross-informant correlations for psychopathology. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 15, 94–98.Google Scholar
Achenbach, T. M. (2011). Definitely more than measurement error: But how should we understand and deal with informant discrepancies? Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 80–86.Google Scholar
Achenbach, T. M., McConaughy, S. H., & Howell, C. T. (1987). Child/adolescent behavioral and emotional problems: Implications of cross-informant correlations for situational specificity. Psychological Bulletin, 101, 213–232.Google Scholar
Achenbach, T. M., & Rescorla, L. A. (2001). Manual for the ASEBA school-age forms and profiles. Burlington, VT: University of Vermont, Research Center for Children, Youth, & Families.Google Scholar
Baker, L. A., Jacobson, K. C., Raine, A., Lozano, D. I., & Bezdjian, S. (2007). Genetic and environmental bases of childhood antisocial behavior: A multi-informant twin study. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 116, 219–235.Google Scholar
Baldwin, J. S., & Dadds, M. R. (2007). Reliability and validity of parent and child versions of the Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children in community samples. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 46, 252–260.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Bartels, M., Boomsma, D. I., Hudziak, J. J., van Beijsterveldt, T. C. E. M., & van den Oord, E. J. C. G. (2007). Twins and the study of rater (dis)agreement. Psychological Methods, 12, 451–466.Google Scholar
Borsboom, D., Mellenbergh, G. J., & van Heerden, J. (2004). The concept of validity. Psychological Review, 111, 1061–1071.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Casey, R. J., & Berman, J. S. (1985). The outcome of psychotherapy with children. Psychological Bulletin, 98, 388–400.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Collishaw, S., Goodman, R., Ford, T., Rabe-Hesketh, S., & Pickles, A. (2009). How far are associations between child, family and community factors and child psychopathology informant-specific and informant-general? Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 50, 571–580.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Comer, J. S., & Kendall, P. C. (2004). A symptom-level examination of parent–child agreement in the diagnosis of anxious youths. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 43, 878–886.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A. (2011). Introduction to the special section: More than measurement error: Discovering meaning behind informant discrepancies in clinical assessments of children and adolescents. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 1–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Alfano, C. A., & Beidel, D. C. (2010). The relations among measurements of informant discrepancies within a multisite trial of treatments for childhood social phobia. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 38, 395–404.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Los Reyes, A., Alfano, C. A., & Beidel, D. C. (2011). Are clinicians' assessments of improvements in children's functioning “global”? Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 281–294.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Ehrlich, K. B., Swan, A. J., Luo, T., Van Wie, M., & Pabón, S. C. (2013). An experimental test of whether informants can report about child and family behavior based on settings of behavioral expression. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 22, 177–191.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Los Reyes, A., Goodman, K. L., Kliewer, W., & Reid-Quiñones, K. (2010). The longitudinal consistency of mother–child reporting discrepancies of parental monitoring and their ability to predict child delinquent behaviors two years later. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 39, 1417–1430.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Henry, D. B., Tolan, P. H., & Wakschlag, L. S. (2009). Linking informant discrepancies to observed variations in young children's disruptive behavior. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 37, 637–652.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., & Kazdin, A. E. (2005). Informant discrepancies in the assessment of childhood psychopathology: A critical review, theoretical framework, and recommendations for further study. Psychological Bulletin, 131, 483–509.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., & Kazdin, A. E. (2006). Conceptualizing changes in behavior in intervention research: The range of possible changes model. Psychological Review, 113, 554–583.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Los Reyes, A., & Kazdin, A. E. (2008). When the evidence says, “Yes, no, and maybe so”: Attending to and interpreting inconsistent findings among evidence-based interventions. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17, 47–51.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Los Reyes, A., & Kazdin, A. E. (2009). Identifying evidence-based interventions for children and adolescents using the range of possible changes model: A meta-analytic illustration. Behavior Modification, 33, 583–617.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Kundey, S. M. A., & Wang, M. (2011). The end of the primary outcome measure: A research agenda for constructing its replacement. Clinical Psychology Review, 31, 829–838.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., & Marsh, J. K. (2011). Patients' contexts and their effects on clinicians' impressions of conduct disorder symptoms. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 479–485.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., & Prinstein, M. J. (2004). Applying depression–distortion hypotheses to the assessment of peer victimization in adolescents. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 33, 325–335.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Thomas, S. A., Goodman, K. L., & Kundey, S. M. A. (2013). Principles underlying the use of multiple informants' reports. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 9, 123–149.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
De Los Reyes, A., Youngstrom, E. A., Pabón, S. C., Youngstrom, J. K., Feeny, N. C., & Findling, R. L. (2011). Internal consistency and associated characteristics of informant discrepancies in clinic referred youths age 11 to 17 years. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 36–53.Google Scholar
De Los Reyes, A., Youngstrom, E. A., Swan, A. J., Youngstrom, J. K., Feeny, N. C., & Findling, R. L. (2011). Informant discrepancies in clinical reports of youths and interviewers' impressions of the reliability of informants. Journal of Child and Adolescent Psychopharmacology, 21, 417–424.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Derks, E. M., Hudziak, J. J., van Beijsterveldt, T. C. E. M., Dolan, C. V., & Boomsma, D. I. (2006). Genetic analyses of maternal and teacher ratings on attention problems in 7-year-old Dutch twins. Behavior Genetics, 36, 833–844.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dirks, M. A., Boyle, M. H., & Georgiades, K. (2011). Psychological symptoms in youth and later socioeconomic functioning: Do associations vary by informant? Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 10–22.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Dirks, M. A., De Los Reyes, A., Briggs-Gowan, M. J., Cella, D., & Wakschlag, L. S. (2012). Embracing not erasing contextual variability in children's behavior: Theory and utility in the selection and use of methods and informants in the assessment of developmental psychopathology. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53, 558–574.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Donenberg, G. R., & Weisz, J. R. (1997). Experimental task and speaker effects on parent–child interactions of aggressive and depressed/anxious children. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 25, 367–387.Google Scholar
Duhig, A. M., Renk, K., Epstein, M. K., & Phares, V. (2000). Interparental agreement on internalizing, externalizing, and total behavior problems: A meta-analysis. Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice, 7, 435–453.Google Scholar
Fisher, S. L., Bucholz, K. K., Reich, W., Fox, L., Kuperman, S., Kramer, J., et al. (2006). Teenagers are right—Parents do not know much: An analysis of adolescent–parent agreement on reports of adolescent substance use, abuse, and dependence. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 30, 1699–1710.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gonzales, N. A., Cauce, A. M., & Mason, C. A. (1996). Interobserver agreement in the assessment of parental behavior and parent–adolescent conflict: African American mothers, daughters, and independent observers. Child Development, 67, 1483–1498.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goodman, K. L., De Los Reyes, A., & Bradshaw, C. P. (2010). Understanding and using informants' reporting discrepancies of youth victimization: A conceptual model and recommendations for research. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 13, 366–383.Google Scholar
Goodman, S. H., & Gotlib, I. H. (1999). Risk for psychopathology in the children of depressed mothers: A developmental model for understanding mechanisms of transmission. Psychological Review, 106, 458–490.Google Scholar
Granic, I., & Patterson, G. R. (2006). Toward a comprehensive model of antisocial development: A dynamic systems approach. Psychological Review, 113, 101–131.Google Scholar
Grills, A. E., & Ollendick, T. H. (2002). Issues in parent–child agreement: The case of structured diagnostic interviews. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 5, 57–83.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Hartley, A. G., Zakriski, A. L., & Wright, J. C. (2011). Probing the depths of informant discrepancies: Contextual influences on divergence and convergence. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 54–66.Google Scholar
Hawley, K. M., & Weisz, J. R. (2003). Child, parent, and therapist (dis)agreement on target problems in outpatient therapy: The therapist's dilemma and its implications. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 71, 62–70.Google Scholar
Holmbeck, G. N., Li, S. T., Schurman, J. V., Friedman, D., & Coakley, R. M. (2002). Collecting and managing multisource and multimethod data in studies of pediatric populations. Journal of Pediatric Psychology, 27, 5–18.Google Scholar
Hunsley, J., & Mash, E. J. (2007). Evidence-based assessment. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 3, 29–51.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Institute for Scientific Information. (2011). Researcher ID A1712-2002-S. Retrieved July 10, 2011, from www.ISIHighlyCited.comGoogle Scholar
Kassam-Adams, N., Garcia-España, J. F., Miller, V. A., & Winston, F. (2006). Parent–child agreement regarding children's acute stress: The role of parent acute stress reactions. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 45, 1485–1493.Google Scholar
Kiecolt-Glaser, J. K., & Newton, T. L. (2001). Marriage and health: His and hers. Psychological Bulletin, 127, 472–503.Google Scholar
Koenig, K., De Los Reyes, A., Cicchetti, D., Scahill, L., & Klin, A. (2009). Group intervention to promote social skills in school-age children with pervasive developmental disorders: Reconsidering efficacy. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39, 1163–1172.Google Scholar
Kraemer, H. C., Measelle, J. R., Ablow, J. C., Essex, M. J., Boyce, W. T., & Kupfer, D. J. (2003). A new approach to integrating data from multiple informants in psychiatric assessment and research: Mixing and matching contexts and perspectives. American Journal of Psychiatry, 160, 1566–1577.Google Scholar
Kramer, T. L., Phillips, S. D., Hargis, M. B., Miller, T. L., Burns, B. J., & Robbins, J. M. (2004). Disagreement between parent and adolescent reports of functional impairment. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 45, 248–259.Google Scholar
Krosnick, J. A. (1999). Survey research. Annual Review of Psychology, 50, 537–567.Google Scholar
Lapouse, R., & Monk, M. A. (1958). An epidemiologic study of behavior characteristics of children. American Journal of Public Health, 48, 1134–1144.Google Scholar
Loeber, R., Green, S. M., & Lahey, B. B. (1990). Mental health professionals' perception of the utility of children, mothers, and teachers as informants of childhood psychopathology. Journal of Clinical Child Psychology, 19, 136–143.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lorenz, F. O., Melby, J. N., Conger, R. D., & Xu, X. (2007). The effects of context on the correspondence between observational ratings and questionnaire reports of hostile behavior: A multitrait, multimethod approach. Journal of Family Psychology, 21, 498–509.Google Scholar
Mitsis, E. M., McKay, K. E., Schulz, K. P., Newcorn, J. H., & Halperin, J. M. (2000). Parent–teacher concordance for DSM-IV attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in a clinic-referred sample. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 39, 308–313.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Neal, J. W., Cappella, E., Wagner, C., & Atkins, M. S. (2011). Seeing eye to eye: Predicting teacher–student agreement on classroom social networks. Social Development, 20, 376–393.Google Scholar
Nunnally, J. C., & Bernstein, I. H. (1994). Psychometric theory (3rd ed.). New York: McGraw–Hill.Google Scholar
Owens, J. S., Goldfine, M. E., Evangelista, N. M., Hoza, B., & Kaiser, N. M. (2007). A critical review of self-perceptions and the positive illusory bias in children with ADHD. Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review, 10, 335–351.Google Scholar
Randazzo, K. V., Landsverk, J., & Ganger, W. (2003). Three informants' reports of child behavior: Parents, teachers, and foster parents. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 42, 1343–1350.Google Scholar
Renk, K. (2005). Cross-informant ratings of the behavior of children and adolescents: The “gold standard.” Journal of Child and Family Studies, 14, 457–468.Google Scholar
Renk, K., & Phares, V. (2004). Cross-informant ratings of social competence in children and adolescents. Clinical Psychology Review, 24, 239–254.Google Scholar
Richters, J. E. (1992). Depressed mothers as informants about their children: A critical review of the evidence for distortion. Psychological Bulletin, 112, 485–499.Google Scholar
Rogosa, D., Brandt, D., & Zimowski, M. (1982). A growth curve approach to the measurement of change. Psychological Bulletin, 92, 726–748.Google Scholar
Rogosa, D. R., & Willett, J. B. (1983). Demonstrating the reliability of the difference score in the measurement of change. Journal of Educational Measurement, 20, 335–343.Google Scholar
Rosnati, R., Montirosso, R., & Barni, D. (2008). Behavioral and emotional problems among Italian international adoptees and non-adopted children: Father's and mother's reports. Journal of Family Psychology, 22, 541–549.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schmidt, F. L., & Hunter, J. E. (1996). Measurement error in psychological research: Lessons from 26 research scenarios. Psychological Methods, 1, 199–223.Google Scholar
Taber, S. M. (2010). The veridicality of children's reports of parenting: A review of factors contributing to parent–child discrepancies. Clinical Psychology Review, 30, 999–1010.Google Scholar
Tackett, J. L., Waldman, I. D., & Lahey, B. B. (2009). Etiology and measurement of relational aggression: A multi-informant behavior genetic investigation. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 118, 722–733.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Treutler, C. M., & Epkins, C. C. (2003). Are discrepancies among child, mother, and father reports on children's behavior related to parents' psychological symptoms and aspects of parent–child relationships? Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 31, 13–27.Google Scholar
Wakschlag, L. S., Hill, C., Carter, A. S., Danis, B., Egger, H. L., Keenan, K., et al. (2008). Observational assessment of preschool disruptive behavior: Part I. Reliability of the Disruptive Behavior Diagnostic Observation Schedule (DB-DOS). Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 47, 622–631.Google Scholar
Weisz, J. R., Jensen Doss, A., & Hawley, K. M. (2005). Youth psychotherapy outcome research: A review and critique of the evidence base. Annual Review of Psychology, 56, 337–363.Google Scholar
Youngstrom, E. A., Findling, R. L., & Calabrese, J. R. (2003). Who are the comorbid adolescents? Agreement between psychiatric diagnosis, youth, parent, and teacher report. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 31, 231–245.Google Scholar
Youngstrom, E., Izard, C., & Ackerman, B. (1999). Dysphoria-related bias in maternal ratings of children. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 67, 905–916.Google Scholar