Assessing internalizing disorders and sleep in school‐age children: A new parent report Behavioral Health Screen

Abstract

Depression, anxiety, and sleep disturbance are common among school‐age children and can impair functioning. Schools are in a unique position to assess and refer these children for intervention services, but standardized screening is underutilized. One challenge with screening is the lack of psychometrically strong mental health screening tools that can be efficiently and effectively administered in school settings. The Behavioral Health Works program provides a web‐based platform and a multidimensional screening tool (the Behavioral Health Screen [BHS]) that can help overcome implementation barriers. Because parents have unique, valuable perspectives on reporting the mental health concerns of their children, a parent report version for younger children was developed. This study examines the psychometric properties of the internalizing and sleep scales of the BHS parent report version for assessing children (BHS‐PRC). Participants included 420 parents of children ages 6–12, who completed the BHS‐PRC. Results supported evidence of good internal structure, partial measurement equivalence (across race, gender, age, and education groups), discrimination in item response theory analysis, classification accuracy, and convergent and discriminant validity. Overall, the BHS‐PRC demonstrates strong psychometric characteristics and has the potential to assist schools' mental health screening as part of a multitiered system of support.