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Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Child Behavior Checklist 1.5–5 in a Sample of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders

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Abstract

Validity studies of measures for emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) for use with preschool children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are lacking. The Child Behavior Checklist 1.5–5 (CBCL; Achenbach and Rescorla, Manual for the ASEBA Preschool Forms & Profiles. VT: University of Vermont, Research Center for Children, Youth, and Families, Burlington, 2000), a widely used measure for EBD, contains several norm-referenced scales derived through factor analysis of data from the general pediatric population. In this study, confirmatory factor analysis of archival data evaluated the adequacy of the CBCL factor model in a well characterized sample of preschoolers with ASD (N = 128). Psychometric results supported the model and suggested that practitioners can use the CBCL to assess for EBD in young children with ASD in conjunction with other clinical data. This will increase the likelihood of accurate identification and EBD-specific intervention.

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Notes

  1. Thirty-three items do not contribute to the seven syndrome scales and are labeled “Other Problems” on the CBCL protocol. These items contribute to the Total Problems score.

  2. The specific zero frequency cells are available upon request from the first author.

  3. An exploratory Full Information Maximum Likelihood analysis (Jöreskog and Moustaki 2006) with promax rotation identified two factors that were labeled Dyssomnia and Parasomnia. All factor loadings were of a relatively large magnitude. Except for wakes up often at night, each item exhibited a strong relationship with only one factor. Complete information about this analysis is available upon request from the first author.

  4. Tests of invariance were conducted (tau and parallel models) but resulted in improper solutions, most likely due to misspecification. Thus, congeneric solutions were accepted.

  5. Tables of these factor loadings are available upon request from the first author.

  6. As was the case for the syndrome scales, tests of invariance were problematic.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported in part by NIH grant U54MH066397 (STAART Center) and General Clinical Research Center grant 5 MO1RR0044, NIH, National Center for Research Resources. The authors thank Courtney McGuire for her assistance in developing the database for this study. The authors also thank Dr. Gerhard Mels for his technical support for some of the statistical analyses, and Dr. Thomas Achenbach for allowing us to reproduce data from the Manual for the ASEBA Preschool Forms & Profiles.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School Psychology Department, Rochester Institute of Technology, 18 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY, 14623, USA

    Vincent Pandolfi

  2. Department of Pediatrics, Division of Neurodevelopmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, Rochester, NY, USA

    Caroline I. Magyar

  3. Psychology Department, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, USA

    Charles A. Dill

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  1. Vincent Pandolfi
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  2. Caroline I. Magyar
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  3. Charles A. Dill
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Correspondence to Vincent Pandolfi.

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Pandolfi, V., Magyar, C.I. & Dill, C.A. Confirmatory Factor Analysis of the Child Behavior Checklist 1.5–5 in a Sample of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders. J Autism Dev Disord 39, 986–995 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0716-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0716-5

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