The Early Childhood HOME Inventory and HOME-Short Form in Differing Racial/Ethnic Groups

Abstract

In this article, we examine differences across three racial/ethnic groups in (a) the psychometric properties of the Early Childhood HOME Inventory and the HOME-Short Form and (b) the prediction of the two versions of the HOME Inventory to cognitive and behavioral outcomes among preschool children. Data are taken from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-Child Supplement (NLSY-CS) and the Infant Health and Development Program (IHDP) sample. Findings suggest few racial/ethnic differences in the psychometric properties of either version of the HOME scale. Both show better prediction of cognitive child outcomes for all three racial/ethnic groups. Both show better prediction of child outcomes generally for European American than for Hispanic and African American families. Findings suggest that although certain aspects of parenting are common, these dimensions of parenting are not equally important in explaining child outcomes for different racial/ethnic subgroups.

Do Parenting and the Home Environment, Maternal Depression, Neighborhood, and Chronic Poverty Affect Child Behavioral Problems Differently in Different Racial-Ethnic Groups?

“…It has been used in different racial/ ethnic groups and shown to have few differences in psychometric properties in different groups. 8,[30][31][32][33] This study uses items from Part C, which pertain to children between the ages of 6 and 9 years. Standardized percentile scores were used in these analyses.…”

Adaptation and validation of the HOME-SF as a caregiver-report home environment measure for use in the Taiwan Birth Cohort Study (TBCS)

“…Given the small number of items, the five-point scoring on each item increases the likelihood of reliability and discriminant validity (Linver et al, 2004). For instance, both cognitive stimulation and emotional support yield a Cronbach's alpha greater than 0.70, a level higher than that in other studies (Baker et al, 1993;Cooley & Unger, 1991;Sugland et al, 1995). Finally, it would seem to be advantageous that the items contained in a brief measure were derived from a widely used measure of the home environment, the HOME Inventory, and that the covariance structure looks similar to those reported for the HOME Inventory in other societies (Bradley & Corwyn, 2006).…”

“…Reliabilities of the HOME-SF reflected by Cronbach's alpha are usually higher for cognitive stimulation (0.50-0.71) than emotional support (0.35-0.63; Baker et al, 1993;Cooley & Unger, 1991;Sugland et al, 1995). For the original HOME Inventory, the instrument that served as the base for the HOME-SF, inter-rater agreement typically reaches 90% (Baker et al, 1993;Bradley, in press;Caldwell & Bradley, 2003).…”

“…This cultural concern is no less crucial when validating the short form, given that only fewer items can be allowed to capture culturally relevant phenomenon and salient elements of children's home environment. Accordingly, some modification is likely needed such as changes in the content or in specific response choices (Bradley & Corwyn, 2005;Sugland et al, 1995). For a brief home environment measure to potentially have wide usefulness in large-scale studies requires the selection of a core set of indicators that can meaningfully represent the full array of experiences and conditions for each home environmental dimension to be assessed.…”

The Utility of the HOME-SF Scale for Child Development Research in a Large National Longitudinal Survey: The National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 Cohort

“…Indeed, the HOME was originally selected for inclusion in the NLSY79 because of its relatively high reliability and validity (Elardo & Bradley, 1981;Elardo, Bradley & Caldwell, 1975;Yeates et al, 1983). Asignificant body of literature has used the NLSY to document the psychometric value of the NLSY-Short Form (SF) for longitudinal research (Cooley & Unger, 1991;Ferron, Ng'andu, & Garret, 1994;Menaghan & Parcel, 1992;Parcel & Menaghan, 1989;Sugland, Zaslow, Smith, & Brooks-Gunn, 1995). These issues are described further in Baker and Mott (1989).…”