Adaptation and Standardization of Child Symptom Inventory-4 (CSI-4)

The purpose of this research was adaptation and standardization of Child Symptom Inventory-4 (CSI-4). 1134 students aging 6 to 12 years old were selected from primary and secondary schools, and assigned in two groups: Normal, (N = 715 from mainstream schools of Tehran) and children with emotional and behavioral disorders (N = 419), from four hospitals in Tehran. The parents and teachers questionnaires of the inventory were filled by mothers and fathers. After studying the psychometric characteristics of the questionnaire (reliability by the internal correlation, internal consistency of coefficient) and validity (Content validity, criterion validity and differentiated validity, the results showed that internal consistency (for severe scores) for disorders of CSI-4 suggested correlation between items and the same underlying structure for scale items. The comments and the positive judgments of professionals related to the content of CSI-4 with the tested area has validated content validity of the questionnaire as a tool for identification and screening the behavioral and emotional disorders in children. Comparing the scores of categories of questionnaire with the psychiatric-based diagnosis, criterion validity was assessed and high sensitivity and specificity of the most of the disorders of the questionnaire, particularly parent's questionnaire, suggests criterion validity of this instrument. The significant difference of the scores for normal and clinical groups, for all disorders, shows the differentiated validity. Finally, symptom severity scores for each category were translated to the standards scores and tables’ standards for parent’s and teacher’s questionnaires for both boys & girls were provided. This study supports that CSI-4 could be used to identify and screen children with emotional and behavioral disorders.