Behavioral Intent Scale Adapted from Slaby, R. G. and Guerra, N. G. 1988

Transcription

1 Behavioral Intent Scale Adapted from Slaby, R. G. and Guerra, N. G Description of Measure Purpose To assess children's problem-solving strategies. Conceptual Organization Imaginary scenarios are presented in which the subject child is confronted with a social problem. The child is asked to describe what he or she would do in such a situation. After providing a first response the child is then asked what else he or she might do, in order to assess the ability to generate alternative solutions to social problems. Item Origin/Selection Process The scenarios were adapted from the Social Problem Solving Assessment developed by Slaby and Guerra (1988; Guerra & Slaby, 1990) who adapted their measure from Marsh s (1982) Interpersonal Problem Solving Analysis. Slaby modified the instrument for pre- and post-measure in a 1989 violence intervention project by adding 5 alternative responses to each of seven scenarios: physical aggression, verbal aggression, help-seeking, avoiding the problem, and pro-social behavior (Slaby & Stringham, 1994; R. Slaby, personal communication, February 28, 1994). Materials Non-copyrighted LONGSCAN version of the measure, included in this manual. Time Required 10 minutes Administration Method Interviewer-administered 22

2 Training Approximately 2-3 hours of training are required to teach proper administration methods, including probing strategies. It is necessary to establish high inter-rater reliability among coders during the training phase. Scoring Score Types In the authors original work (Slaby & Guerra, 1988, 1989), responses were scored as noneffective (aggressive) or effective (non-aggressive). The number of secondary responses that are non-duplicative with the first response is an indicator of the child s ability to generate alternative solutions. Non-duplicative responses may be in the same category of response as the first. In the 1989 intervention study, Slaby computed rankings of the types of responses across the seven items and average ranking scores for each of the five types of behavioral responses (R. Slaby, personal communication, February 28, 1994). Psychometric Support Reliability In the 1989 intervention study, alphas for the average ranking scores of each category of response were between Interrater reliability for coding of responses as effective or noneffective and secondary responses as non-duplicative was.94. (R. Slaby, personal communication, February 28, 1994). Validity Slaby & Guerra (1988) found that the effectiveness of the first solution, effectiveness of the second solution, and the number of solutions generated were positively correlated with each other as well as with the number of potential consequences the child could generate (What are all the things that could happen if you do this?), and inversely correlated with the child's perceived hostility in defining the problem and identifying the goal in solving the problem. 23

3 LONGSCAN Use Data Points Age 8 Respondent Child Mnemonic and Version BIA Administration and Scoring Notes In order to avoid the possibility of socially desirable response sets and because LONGSCAN is interested in children's ability to generate responses, Slaby s seven scenarios were used, but open-ended responses were used rather than rankings of different possible responses as were used by Slaby & Stringham (1994). Interviewers read each scenario to the child and queried, What would you do? The child was then asked, What else might you do? Children s responses were recorded verbatim. A duplicative response (i.e., the exact same response) was not included as a legitimate secondary response. All responses were later coded to one of seven categories: (1) verbal assertion, (2) physical aggression, (3) verbal aggression, (4) help-seeking, (5) avoidance/ non-confrontation, (6) bargaining or compromise, (7) physical assertion. Secondary responses could be classified in the same category as the first responses. In scoring, verbal assertion (1), bargaining/compromise (6), and physical assertion (7) may be combined into a single prosocial category. Help seeking (4) may also be included in this category. Rationale The literature suggests that physically abused children may be biased toward attributing hostile intent to ambiguous provocations, and are less likely to generate competent solutions to social problems than children who have not been abused (Dodge, Bates, & Pettit, 1990). 24

4 Results Descriptive statistics Table 1 gives the means and standard deviations of the ratios of the number of first responses to all responses for each of the seven response categories. These are derived by dividing the number of responses of each type by the number of Slaby's seven scenarios for which the child gave a response. Verbal assertion was the most frequent response, followed by avoidance and then help seeking. A number of children also gave responses classified as physical aggression. Results were fairly consistent across race. Black children were most likely to give a physically aggressive response. The results were similar by site, except that the children from the EA site, which has the highest proportion of Blacks (94%) and is located in an urban area, gave the highest proportion of responses classified as physically aggressive. In this sample the proportion of responses classified as physically aggressive was higher than the proportion of responses classified as help seeking. Table 1 about here Reliability Inter-rater reliability was assessed by blind coding a random sample of 20% of the forms collected at each site by the trainer at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center. References and Bibliography Dodge, K. A., Bates, J. E., & Pettit, G. S. (1990). Mechanisms in the cycle of violence. Science, 250, Guerra, N.G., & Slaby, R. G. (1990). Cognitive mediators of aggression in adolescent offenders: II. Intervention. Developmental Psychology, 26, Marsh, D. T. (1982). The development of interpersonal problem solving among elementary school children. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 140,

5 Slaby, R. G., & Guerra, N. G. (1988). Cognitive mediators of aggression in adolescent offenders: I. Assessment. Developmental Psychology, 24, Slaby, R. G., & Guerra, N. G. (1989). Evaluative factors in social problem solving by aggressive boys. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 17, Slaby, R. G., & Stringham, P. (1994). Prevention of peer and community violence. Pediatrics, 94,

6 Table 1. Means and Standard Deviations for First Responses (Ratio of 1 st Respondents to All Responses ) to Slaby's 7 Scenerios by Race and Study Site. Age 8 Interview Verbal Assertion Physical Aggression Verbal Aggression Help Seeking Response Avoidance Compromise Physical Assertion N M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) M (SD) Total (0.24) 0.12 (0.19) 0.03 (0.08) 0.19 (0.20) 0.24 (0.17) 0.01 (0.04) 0.06 (0.11) Race White (0.23) 0.09 (0.16) 0.03 (0.08) 0.19 (0.19) 0.25 (0.18) 0.01 (0.05) 0.05 (0.08) Black (0.23) 0.14 (0.20) 0.04 (0.07) 0.18 (0.20) 0.23 (0.17) 0.01 (0.03) 0.08 (0.12) Hispanic (0.26) 0.06 (0.12) 0.02 (0.07) 0.22 (0.24) 0.24 (0.18) 0.01 (0.03) 0.05 (0.08) Multiracial (0.24) 0.11 (0.20) 0.04 (0.08) 0.18 (0.20) 0.22 (0.16) 0.02 (0.06) 0.03 (0.07) Other (0.22) 0.08 (0.14) 0.01 (0.04) 0.23 (0.27) 0.22 (0.16) 0.01 (0.04) 0.10 (0.15) Site EA (0.23) 0.19 (0.23) 0.04 (0.08) 0.14 (0.18) 0.22 (0.18) 0.01 (0.05) 0.10 (0.14) MW (0.25) 0.15 (0.19) 0.04 (0.07) 0.19 (0.20) 0.19 (0.17) 0.01 (0.03) 0.07 (0.10) SO (0.20) 0.09 (0.14) 0.03 (0.07) 0.20 (0.20) 0.24 (0.15) 0.01 (0.03) 0.08 (0.11) SW (0.24) 0.09 (0.14) 0.03 (0.07) 0.20 (0.20) 0.24 (0.15) 0.01 (0.03) 0.08 (0.11) NW (0.24) 0.08 (0.16) 0.04 (0.09) 0.20 (0.19) 0.25 (0.18) 0.02 (0.06) 0.03 (0.07) Source. Based on data received at the LONGSCAN Coordinating Center through 8/24/01. 27