Validation of the Preschool and Early Childhood Functional Assessment Scale (PECFAS)

Abstract

Efforts to determine the prevalence of serious emotional disturbance in preschool-aged children have been hampered by the lack of a validated measure. The Preschool and Early Childhood Functional Assessment Scale (PECFAS) is a multi-dimensional measure that assesses the psychosocial functioning of children aged 3-7 years. The concurrent validity and reliability of the PECFAS were assessed in a sample of 30 preschool-aged children in a large Head Start program in Ventura, California. PECFAS ratings based on in-depth interviews were significantly related to parental ratings that the children had mental health problems, psychiatric diagnoses, teacher ratings of the child's need for mental health evaluations, teacher ratings of behavior problems on a standardized screening inventory (DIAL-R), and actual referrals for mental health evaluations. Interrater reliability for the total PECFAS score was high (r = .90) as was internal consistency of the five subscales (alpha = .86). Using the PECFAS scores as a standard, the weighted prevalence of serious emotional disturbance in this West Coast Head Start program was 17%, at the lower end of the current estimated rate of SED for older children in low income samples (18-26%).

Overview of Ten Child Mental Health Clinical Outcome Measures: Testing of Psychometric Properties with Diverse Client Populations in the U.S.

“…Murphy et al ( 1999 ) recruited a predominately Hispanic community sample of English and Spanish speaking low-income pre-school children enrolled in a Head Start program. 7 Hodges and Wong ( 1996 ) recruited predominately White children of army personnel who had been referred for mental health services; they also compared ratings for fictional written patient vignettes.…”

“…Inter-rater reliability was moderate to high for written vignettes for the school-age CAFAS (Hodges & Wong, 1996 ) and for parental reports for the preschool PECFAS (Murphy et al, 1999 ). There is strong correlation with reported problematic behaviors, poor academic performance, and teacher rating of psychosocial problems (Hodges & Wong, 1996 ; Murphy et al, 1999 ). The only construct validity tests were based on graduate student ratings of individual items (Bates et al, 2006 ).…”

“…Hill & Hughes, 2007 ; Hodges & Wong, 1996 ) or school disciplinary referrals (e.g. Hill & Hughes, 2007 ; Hodges & Wong, 1996 ; Hogez & McKay, 1986 ; Murphy et al, 1999 ; Nelson et al, 2002 ; Reed & Edelbrock, 1983 ). Children of low SES families and minority children are at disproportionate risk of both of these, particularly African American boys (Heath, 1982 ; Skiba et al, 2002 ).…”

How an Electronic Medical Record System Facilitates and Demonstrates Effective Psychosocial Screening in Pediatric Primary Care

“…8-11 Due to its established validity in high-risk populations, including low-income groups, the PSC has been widely implemented in clinical settings serving patients insured by Medicaid. 12-14 The PSC has also been endorsed by the National Quality Forum, the National Committee for Quality Assurance, and other standard-setting organizations. It is one of the only National Quality Forum endorsed measures to focus entirely on child MH.…”