Silia Vitoratou1, Alexandra Garcia-Rosales2,3, Tobias Banaschewski4, Edmund Sonuga-Barke2, Jan Buitelaar5, Robert D Oades6, Aribert Rothenberger7, Hans-Christoph Steinhausen8,9,10,11, Eric Taylor2, Stephen V Faraone12, Wai Chen2,13,14. 1. Psychometrics and Measurement Lab, Department of Biostatistics and Health Informatics, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Neurosciences, King's College London, London, UK. 2. MRC Social Genetic Developmental and Psychiatry Centre, Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Neurosciences, King's College London, London, UK. 3. Psychiatry Department, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain. 4. Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Central Institute of Mental Health, Medical Faculty Mannheim/Heidelberg University, Mannheim, Germany. 5. Department of Cognitive Neuroscience, Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Radboud University Medical Center, Nijmegen, The Netherlands. 6. Clinic for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany. 7. Clinic for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, University Medical Center, Göttingen, Germany. 8. Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland. 9. Clinical Psychology and Epidemiology, Department of Psychology, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland. 10. Child and Adolescent Mental Health Center, Capital Region Psychiatry, Copenhagen, Denmark. 11. Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Southern Denmark University, Odense, Denmark. 12. Departments of Psychiatry and of Neuroscience and Physiology, SUNY Upstate Medical University, Syracuse, New York, USA. 13. Complex Attention and Hyperactivity Disorders Service (CAHDS), Specialised Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS), WA Department of Health, Perth, Western Australia, Australia. 14. Centre and Discipline of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychosomatics and Psychotherapy, School of Medicine, Division of Paediatrics and Child Health and Division of Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences, The University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
Abstract
OBJECTIVES: This study aims to ascertain whether the differences of prevalence and severity of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are true or whether children are perceived and rated differently by parent and teacher informant assessments (INFAs) according to gender, age, and co-occurring disorders, even at equal levels of latent ADHD traits. METHODS: Use of latent trait models (for binary responses) to evaluate measurement invariance in children with ADHD and their siblings from the International Multicenter ADHD Gene data. RESULTS: Substantial measurement noninvariance between parent and teacher INFAs was detected for seven out of nine inattention (IA) and six out of nine hyperactivity/impulsivity (HI) items; the correlations between parent and teacher INFAs for six IA and four HI items were not significantly different from zero, which suggests that parent and teacher INFAs are essentially rating different kinds of behaviours expressed in different settings, instead of measurement bias. However, age and gender did not affect substantially the endorsement probability of either IA or HI symptom criteria, regardless of INFA. For co-occurring disorders, teacher INFA ratings were largely unaffected by co-morbidity; conversely, parental endorsement of HI symptoms is substantially influenced by co-occurring oppositional defiant disorder. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest general robustness of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ADHD diagnostic items in relation to age and gender. Further research on classroom presentations is needed.
OBJECTIVES: This study aims to ascertain whether the differences of prevalence and severity of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are true or whether children are perceived and rated differently by parent and teacher informant assessments (INFAs) according to gender, age, and co-occurring disorders, even at equal levels of latent ADHD traits. METHODS: Use of latent trait models (for binary responses) to evaluate measurement invariance in children with ADHD and their siblings from the International Multicenter ADHD Gene data. RESULTS: Substantial measurement noninvariance between parent and teacher INFAs was detected for seven out of nine inattention (IA) and six out of nine hyperactivity/impulsivity (HI) items; the correlations between parent and teacher INFAs for six IA and four HI items were not significantly different from zero, which suggests that parent and teacher INFAs are essentially rating different kinds of behaviours expressed in different settings, instead of measurement bias. However, age and gender did not affect substantially the endorsement probability of either IA or HI symptom criteria, regardless of INFA. For co-occurring disorders, teacher INFA ratings were largely unaffected by co-morbidity; conversely, parental endorsement of HI symptoms is substantially influenced by co-occurring oppositional defiant disorder. CONCLUSIONS: Our findings suggest general robustness of Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders ADHD diagnostic items in relation to age and gender. Further research on classroom presentations is needed.
Authors: Alexandra Garcia-Rosales; Silia Vitoratou; Stephen V Faraone; Daniel Rudaizky; Tobias Banaschewski; Philip Asherson; Edmund Sonuga-Barke; Jan Buitelaar; Robert D Oades; Aribert Rothenberger; Hans-Christoph Steinhausen; Eric Taylor; Wai Chen Journal: Eur Child Adolesc Psychiatry Date: 2020-04-03 Impact factor: 4.785