Description of Measure Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children Briere, J. 1996 Purpose To assess the effects of childhood trauma through the child s self-report. Conceptual Organization The 54-item Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children (TSCC) consists of two validity scales (Underresponse and Hyper-response), six clinical scales (Anxiety, Depression, Post-traumatic Stress, Dissociation, Anger, and Sexual Concerns) and 8 critical items which examine situations that may require follow -up, such as suicidality (Briere, 1996). The measure is appropriate for children ages 8-16. The author reports it may also be used with 17 year-olds, with the caution that the wording may be overly simple for this age (Briere, 1996). Item Origin/Selection Process Items were selected based on factor analyses and consultation with experts in the field of psychopathology. Materials Test and manual are available from the publisher. Time Required 10 minutes Administration Method May be self or interviewer administered in an individual or group setting. Privacy for respondents is required. Training Interviewers need to be thoroughly familiar with the manual. Scoring Score Types For each item, (e.g., feeling lonely; wanting to yell at people), the child records the frequency with which the statement pertains to her/him on a 4-point scale ranging from 0 (never) to 3 (almost all the time). Raw scale scores are derived by summing the response values for all items comprising the scale, and then dividing by the number of items within the scale. Please see Briere, 1996, for additional scoring information. Score Interpretation A higher score reflects greater symptomatology. T scores at or above 65 for any clinical scale are considered clinically significant. Norms and/or Comparative Data The TSCC was normed on 3008 children from three non-clinical samples. Please see Briere, 1996, for more information.
Psychometric Support Reliability The author reports that the TSCC clinical scales demonstrate good internal consistency reliability. See Briere, 1996, for more information. Validity Results of the TSCC are congruent with those derived from similar measures including the Child Behavior Checklist and Youth Self Report (Achenbach, 1991)(see Table 3 below), indicating good concurrent validity. Also, among populations in which trauma symptomatology is expected to be substantial, for example, children with histories of abuse, scores have been high. Among children receiving treatment for traumatic experiences, scores on the TSCC tend to decrease over time (Lanktree & Briere, 1990; 1995). LONGSCAN Use Data Points Ages 8 (TSCC-Alternate Version), 12, 16 Respondent Youth Mnemonic and Version Item-level dataset: TSA (Age 8), TSCB (Ages 12 & 16) Scored dataset: TSSS (Ages 8, 12, & 16) Rationale LONGSCAN chose to use the TSCC because it is a standardized and valid child self-report measure of internalized distress, and includes symptoms associated with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Results Descriptive Statistics For descriptive statistics of the Age 8 Trauma Symptom Checklist, please refer to the 2 nd volume of the measures manuals (Hunter et al., 2003). Table 1 provides descriptive statistics for the Age 12 Trauma Symptom Checklist T scores by sample demographics. The percentage of LONGSCAN children scoring in the clinical range on each of the clinical scales is low (2% across the T scores presented). Table 1. Descriptive Statistics for the Age 12 Trauma Symptom Checklist T scores by Demographics Anger Anxiety Depression PTSD Dissociation N %* M (SD) % M (SD) % M (SD) % M (SD) % M (SD) Overall 838 2.4 40.6 (8.1) 2.2 41.2 (9.6) 2.0 39.8 (8.7) 2.2 41.2 (8.5) 2.2 42.5 (8.2) Gender Male 411 1.0 39.8 (7.8) 0.8 41.0 (9.2) 0.6 38.9 (8.3) 0.8 41.3 (8.2) 0.8 41.9 (8.1) Female 427 1.4 41.4 (8.3) 1.4 41.4 (9.9) 1.4 40.8 (8.9) 1.4 41.3 (8.7) 1.4 43.1 (8.3) Study Site EA 184 0.7 40.8 (8.9) 0.7 40.4 (10.5) 0.6 39.5 (9.9) 0.6 40.8 (9.5) 0.6 41.9 (9.1) MW 110 0.1 40.1 (7.8) 0.2 40.4 (8.8) 0.0 38.2 (6.4) 0.1 40.5 (8.1) 0.2 41.2 (7.3) SO 159 0.2 42.1 (8.2) 0.6 41.8 (8.4) 0.2 40.7 (7.5) 0.4 42.1 (7.9) 0.5 43.6 (7.8) SW 216 1.0 40.7 (8.5) 0.6 42.5 (10.2) 1.0 41.1 (9.5) 0.8 42.0 (9.0) 0.6 43.0 (8.6) NW 169 0.4 39.3 (6.4) 0.1 40.3 (9.0) 0.2 39.0 (8.1) 0.4 40.5 (7.2) 0.4 42.2 (7.6) * % represents youth who had a T score that is borderline/clinical (>= 65) at age 12. Reliability As can be seen in Table 2, internal consistency for the TSCC scales using the LONGSCAN sample was good (ranging from.81 to.87) and comparable to alpha reliabilities reported by the author (Briere, 1996). Table 2. Cronbach Alphas for the Age 12 Trauma Symptom Checklist T scores Anger Anxiety Depression PTSD Dissociation N α α α α α Overall 826.82.87.81.84.82
Validity Table 3 provides correlations between the Age 12 Trauma Symptom Checklist T Scores and T scores from the Child Behavior Checklist, and Youth Self Report Form. There are significant correlations (ranging from.07 to.56) between Trauma Symptom Checklist T Scores and these outcome measures. Table 3. Correlations between Age 12 Trauma Symptom T Scores and other Select Age 12 Outcomes N Anger Anxiety Depression PTSD Dissociation Child Behavior Checklist T Scores Internalizing Problems 817.15***.15***.20***.15***.16*** Externalizing Problems 817.18***.07*.16***.09**.12*** Total Problems 817.17***.13***.20***.14***.17*** Youth Self Report T Scores Internalizing Problems 824.47***.52***.54***.48***.51*** Externalizing Problems 824.56***.37***.41***.36***.42*** Total Problems 824.55***.52***.53***.49***.55*** * <.05, ** <.01, *** <.001 Publisher Information Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc. P.O. Box 998 Odessa, FL 33556 (800) 331-TEST Website: http://www.parinc.com/product.cfm?productid=150 References and Bibliography Achenbach, T. M. (1991). Manual for Child Behavior Checklist/ 4-18 and 1991 Profile. Burlington, VT: University of Vermont, Dept. of Psychiatry. Achenbach, T.M. (1991) Manual for the Youth Self Report/4-18, and 1991 Profile. Burlington, VT: University of Vertmont, Dept of Psychiatry. Briere, J. (1996). Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children: Professional Manual. Odessa, FL: Psychological Assessment Resources, Inc. Evans, J. J., Briere, J., Boggiano, A. K., & Barrett, M. (1994). Reliability and validity of the Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children in a normal sample. Paper presented at the San Diego Conference on Responding to Child Maltreatment, San Diego, CA. Hunter, W. M., Cox, C. E., Teagle, S., Johnson, R. M., Mathew, R., Knight, E. D., & Leeb, R.T. (2003). Measures for Assessment of Functioning and Outcomes in Longitudinal Research on Child Abuse. Volume 1: Early Childhood. Accessible at the LONGSCAN web site (http://www.iprc.unc.edu/longscan/).
Hunter, W. M., Cox, C.E., Teagle, S., Johnson, R. M., Mathew, R., Knight, E. D., Leeb, R. T., & Smith, J. B. (2003). Measures for Assessment of Functioning and Outcomes in Longitudinal Research on Child Abuse. Volume 2: Middle Childhood. Accessible at the LONGSCAN web site (http://www.iprc.unc.edu/longscan/). Lanktree, C. B., & Briere, J. (1990). Early data on the Trauma Symptom Checklist for Children (TSC-C). Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychological Association, Boston, MA. Lanktree, C. B., & Briere, J. (1995). Outcome of therapy for sexually abused children: A repeated measures study. Child Abuse and Neglect, 19, 1145-1155.