Linking Informant Discrepancies to Observed Variations in Young Children’s Disruptive Behavior

Abstract

Prior work has not tested the basic theoretical notion that informant discrepancies in reports of children’s behavior exist, in part, because different informants observe children’s behavior in different settings. We examined patterns of observed preschool disruptive behavior across varying social contexts in the laboratory and whether they related to parent-teacher rating discrepancies of disruptive behavior in a sample of 327 preschoolers. Observed disruptive behavior was assessed with a lab-based developmentally sensitive diagnostic observation paradigm that assesses disruptive behavior across three interactions with the child with parent and examiner. Latent class analysis identified four patterns of disruptive behavior: (a) low across parent and examiner contexts, (b) high with parent only, (c) high with examiner only, and (d) high with parent and examiner. Observed disruptive behavior specific to the parent and examiner contexts were uniquely related to parent-identified and teacher-identified disruptive behavior, respectively. Further, observed disruptive behavior across both parent and examiner contexts was associated with disruptive behavior as identified by both informants. Links between observed behavior and informant discrepancies were not explained by child impairment or observed problematic parenting. Findings provide the first laboratory-based support for the Attribution Bias Context Model (De Los Reyes and Kazdin 2005), which posits that informant discrepancies are indicative of cross-contextual variability in children’s behavior and informants’ perspectives on this behavior. These findings have important implications for clinical assessment, treatment outcomes, and developmental psychopathology research.

The Relations among Measurements of Informant Discrepancies within a Multisite Trial of Treatments for Childhood Social Phobia

“…For example, as mentioned previously informant discrepancies may be useful markers of the variable expression of children's behavior across settings (De Los Reyes et al 2009a). However, whether informant discrepancies reflect systematic variations between informants' reports over time has not been empirically tested.…”

“…In contrast, higher disagreements occur when the symptoms assessed are unobservable or subjectively expressed (e.g., anxious worry) and based on behaviors exhibited in school settings (Comer and Kendall 2004). Thus, akin to parent and teacher reports of disruptive behavior (De Los Reyes et al 2009a), parent and child reports of anxiety symptoms vary systematically in terms of the nature and setting of the child's symptoms. However, studies of measurements of informant discrepancies and whether they systematically relate to each other are lacking in empirical work on clinically anxious children.…”

“…However, recent work calls these interpretations into question. For instance, parent-teacher discrepancies in reports of preschoolers' disruptive behavior symptoms predict laboratory observations of the interactions in which these same preschoolers exhibit disruptive behavior (De Los Reyes et al 2009a). Specifically: (a) parent reports (and not teacher reports) predict observed disruptive behavior within parent-child interactions; (b) teacher reports (and not parent reports) predict observed disruptive behavior within interactions between the child and a nonparental adult (clinical examiner); and (c) when combined, parent and teacher reports predict disruptive behavior that is observed across adult-child interactions.…”

Contextual variability of ADHD symptoms: embracement not erasement of a key moderating factor

“…Of great interest is that the severity of ADHD symptoms was moderated by context: highest in the parent-child context and lowest in the examiner engaged-child context. In this study no mapping was made regarding context dependency of ADHD symptoms and differential parent and teacher ratings, but this may be expected given previous results showing that the examiner-contexts seem to serve as a proxy for the child's behavior with a non-parental adult and the parent-context uniquely related to parentidentified disruptive behavior [7]. This is particularly interesting in light of the fact that the DB-DOS does not include a peer context (which would be clinically informative but not feasible), yet the examiner context seems to mirror behaviors in the school setting.…”

“…Below we provide a new perspective on this issue and how to embrace and not erase it in clinical practice and research [9]. We further believe that observational assessment that allows for standardized assessment of cross-contextual variation in child behavior of the child may aid in a more precise measurement of contextual variability of ADHD symptoms in a manner that is clinically feasible and ecologically valid [7]. Observational assessment should be part of the assessment of ADHD for clinical and research purposes in a similar manner as is currently the gold standard for autism spectrum disorder (ASD).…”