Measurement Invariance of Oppositional Defiant Disorder Dimensions in 3-Year-Old Preschoolers
Abstract
Measurement invariance (metric/scalar) of oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) dimensions (negative affect, oppositional behavior, and antagonistic behavior) across sex and informants is tested. Parents and teachers of 622 preschool children from the general population answered a dimensional measure of ODD. ODD dimensions function similarly in boys and girls. Some differences were found by informant, indicating that the equivalence of the ratings of parents and teachers is not complete and that given the same underlying level of the latent trait, some parents’ item scores were higher than those of teachers. Metric invariance was complete but scalar invariance was not attained. The results contribute evidence on the conceptualization of ODD as a source-specific disorder. The simultaneous use of ODD dimensions reported by parents and teachers must be considered in the context of a lack of complete measurement invariance, which implies that comparisons of observed means from parents and teachers are not readily interpretable.
References
2011). Commentary: Definitely more than measurement error: But how should we understand and deal with informant discrepancies? Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 80–86.
(2000). DSM-IV Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th text revised ed.). Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press.
. (2012). Principles and practice of scaled difference ? 2 testing. Structural Equation Modeling, 19, 372–398.
(2011). Parent-reported mental health in preschoolers: Findings using a diagnostic interview. Comprehensive Psychiatry, 52, 359–369.
(2010). Oppositional defiant disorder and the explanation of the comorbidity between behavioral disorders and depression. Clinical Psychology: Science and Practice, 17, 319–326.
(2010). Dimensions of oppositional defiant disorder as predictors of depression and conduct disorder in preadolescent girls. Journal of the American Academy of Child Adolescent Psychiatry, 49, 484–492.
(2008). Invariance and convergent and discriminant validity between mothers’ and fathers’ ratings of oppositional defiant disorder toward adults, ADHD-HI, ADHD-IN, and academic competence factors within Brazilian, Thai, and American children. Psychological Assessment, 20, 121–130.
(2009). A multitrait (ADHD-IN, ADHD-HI, ODD toward adults, academic and social competence) by multisource (mothers and fathers) evaluation of the invariance and convergent/discriminant validity of the Child and Adolescent Disruptive Behavior Inventory with Thai adolescents. Psychological Assessment, 21, 635–641.
(2006). Measurement and structural invariance of parent ratings of ADHD and ODD symptoms across gender for American and Malaysian children. Psychological Assessment, 18, 452–457.
(2012). Structural equation modeling with Mplus: Basic concepts, applications, and programming. New York, NY: Taylor and Francis Group.
(2011). More than measurement error: Discovering meaning behind informant discrepancies in clinical assessments of children and adolescents. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 1–9.
(2005). Informant discrepancies in the assessment of childhood psychopathology: A critical review, theoretical framework, and recommendations for further study. Psychological Bulletin, 131, 483–509.
(2006). The cross-cultural equivalence of parental rearing measure: EMBU-C. European Journal of Psychological Assessment, 22, 85–91.
(2010). Testing for factorial invariance in the context of construct validation. Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, 43, 121–149.
(2012). Embracing not erasing contextual variability in children’s behavior – Theory and utility in the selection and use of methods and informants in developmental psychopathology. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53, 558–574.
(2011). Source-specific Oppositional defiant disorder among inner-city children: Prospective prediction and moderation. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 40, 23–35.
(2007). Source-specific oppositional defiant disorder: Comorbidity and risk factors in referred elementary schoolboys. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 46, 92–101.
(2012). Dimensions of oppositional defiant disorder in 3-year-old preschoolers. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 53, 1128–1138.
(2011). The diagnostic interview for children and adolescents for parents of preschool children. Psychiatry Research, 190, 137–144.
(2007). Parent-teacher disagreement regarding behavioral and emotional problems in referred children is not a risk factor for poor outcome. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 16, 121–127.
(2000). Testing the equivalence among different item response formats in personality measurement: A structural equation modeling approach. Structural Equation Modeling, 7, 271–286.
(2012). Anger and irritability symptoms among youth with ODD: Cross-informant versus source-exclusive syndromes. Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 40, 1073–1085.
(2013). DSM-IV ADHD symptoms self-ratings by adolescents: Test of invariance across gender. Journal of Attention Disorders, 17, 3–10.
(1997). The strengths and difficulties questionnaire: A research note. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 38, 581–586.
(1997). Control of Type I errors with multiple tests of constraints in structural equation modeling. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 32, 39–51.
(2007). Evidence-based assessment. Annual Review of Clinical Psychology, 3, 29–51.
(2009). Reporting practices in confirmatory factor analysis: An overview and some recommendations. Psychological Methods, 14, 6–23.
(2011). Testing measurement invariance: A comparison of multiple-group categorical CFA and IRT. Structural Equation Modeling, 18, 212–228.
(2012). Testing factorial invariance in multilevel data: A Monte Carlo study. Structural Equation Modeling, 19, 250–267.
(2001). Oppositional defiant disorder with onset in preschool years: Longitudinal stability and pathways to other disorders. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 40, 1393–1400.
(2009). The prevalence of ADHD, ODD, depression, and anxiety in a community sample of 4-year-olds. Journal of Clinical Child and Adolescent Psychology, 38, 315–328.
(2013). Measurement invariance of Big-Five factors over the life span: ESEM tests of gender, age, plasticity, maturity, and La Dolce Vita effects. Developmental Psychology, 49, 1194–1218.
(1999). Test theory: A unified treatment. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
(1993). Measurement invariance, factor analysis and factorial invariance. Psychometrika, 58, 525–543.
(2004). Assessing factorial invariance in ordered-categorical measures. Multivariate Behavioral Research, 39, 479–511.
(1998–2012). Mplus User’s Guide (7th ed.). Los Angeles, CA: Muthén & Muthén.
(2009). Should there be separate parent and teacher-based categories of ODD? Evidence from a general population. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 50, 1264–1272.
(2010). Developmental pathways in oppositional defiant disorder and conduct disorder. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 119, 726–738.
(2010). Longitudinal dimensionality of adolescent psychopathology: Testing the differentiation hypothesis. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 51, 871–884.
(2012). Mother-teacher agreement on preschoolers’ symptoms of ODD and CD: Does context matter? Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology, 40, 933–943.
(2009). Three dimensions of oppositionality in youth. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 50, 216–223.
(2005). Informant, gender and age differences in ratings of adolescent problem behaviour. European Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 14, 117–126.
(2000). A review and synthesis of the measurement invariance literature: Suggestions, practices, and recommendations for organizational research. Organizational Research Methods, 3, 4–69.
(