Japanese Version of the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory: Translation and Validation¹

Abstract

This study assessed the psychometric properties of the Japanese version of the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory (ECBI) in children in clinical and non‐clinical settings in Japan. Validation of the ECBI for clinical and non‐clinical participants (N = 128, 2–7 years of age) was evaluated. First, we evaluated the internal consistency reliability of the ECBI Problem and Intensity scales. We evaluated the construct and criterion‐referenced validity by comparing scores among the subscales of the ECBI, Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL), and Japanese versions of the Parenting Stress Index‐Short Form (PSI‐SF) and the Beck Depression Inventory‐II (BDI‐II). Results showed that Cronbach's alphas for both the Intensity and Problem scores were .91 and .92, respectively, which reflects high internal consistency. Results also showed that both the ECBI Intensity and Problem scores were significantly correlated with all subscales of the CBCL, PSI‐SF, and BDI‐II. These data suggest that the Japanese version of the ECBI is a psychometrically sound measure for assessing behavior problems in Japanese children.

Establishing norms on the Japanese version of the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory

“…Questionnaires from all 1,992 participants were included in the data analysis. The strong reliability found for the ECBI scales replicated findings from the Kamo et al study 23 in this large normative sample of children and their parents in Japan. To verify the normality of our sample, we examined a histogram of ECBI Intensity scores.…”

“…21 In Japan, we conducted a validation study of 128 children aged 2-7 years using the Japanese version of the ECBI as a preliminary study. 22 The results from that study also found that Cronbach's a for the ECBI Intensity and the Problem Scales was 0.91 and 0.92, respectively, reflecting the high internal consistency found in many studies. 7,[12][13][14][15][16][17][18] As mentioned above, normative ECBI data has been established in several countries, but there has been no large-scale survey in Japan, and therefore cutoff points for the identification of clinically significant behavior problems among Japanese children have not yet been established.…”

“…The strong reliability found for the ECBI scales replicated findings from the Kamo et al . study 23 in this large normative sample of children and their parents in Japan.…”

“…The children ranged in age from 2 to 7 years ( M = 4.26, SD = 1.15) and were equally distributed between girls and boys (50.3% male). None of the children had participated in our earlier study of the ECBI 22 . Children whose age or sex were not reported on the questionnaire were also excluded from this study, as well as those with four or more missing items from either the ECBI Intensity or Problem Scale, as recommended in the test manual 7 …”

“…The current methods and results were summarized in the manual of the Japanese version of the ECBI translation, the Eyberg Child Behavior Inventory Japanese edition, 23 to provide the basic data for the creation of the test for clinical users. The publisher, Chiba Test Center, has given permission Author contributions F.I., M.M., Y.M., I.K., S.E., R.B., E.B.K., and T.K designed the current study.…”