ACER Psychology

Rassoul Sadeghi (PhD)
Australian Council for Educational Research

Abstract

The Child and Adolescent PsychProfiler (CAPP) is an easily administered, psychometrically approved screening instrument to identify children and adolescents with psychological disorders. It is a criterion-referenced screener oriented to the DSM-IV-TR. (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Disorders, fourth edition, text revision, 2000) The psychometric properties of the CAPP (e.g., inter-rater reliabilities, Cronbach alphas) have been supported using classical test theory (Langsford, Houghton & Douglas, 2007). To date, however, this test has not been subjected to Rasch analysis. The main purpose of this study was to use the Rasch measurement model to investigate the psychometric properties of the CAPP. The CAPP self-report form was administered to 156 participants aged 10 to 17. The Rasch Simple Logistic model was applied to analyse the data using the RUMM2020 software. Rasch analysis was carried out at two levels: 1) analysis on each of the eight main categories, and 2) analysis based on all the items. The main categories showed adequate internal consistency, reliability and construct validity except for the tic disorder category. The result of the analysis for this category was inconclusive because it had only two items. Analysis of all CAPP items combined also supports its use as a measure of General Mental Distress (GMD). A scale combining all 104 items showed good fit to the Rasch measurement model. The results of this study provide support for the measurement properties, internal consistency, reliability, and unidimensionality of the CAPP as a General Mental Distress Index and its seven sub-scales.

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