SITUATIONAL VARIABILITY OF ATTENTION PROBLEMS - PSYCHOMETRIC PROPERTIES OF THE REVISED HOME AND SCHOOL SITUATIONS QUESTIONNAIRES

Investigated the psychometric properties of the Home Situations Questionnaire-Revised (HSQ-R) and School Situations Questionnaire-Revised (SSQ-R) completed by parents and teachers, respectively, for a large sample of urban elementary school children. These instruments were developed to assess the severity and cross-situational pervasiveness of attention problems. HSQ-R and SSQ-R scores were found to possess adequate levels of internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct validity; and to share considerable variance with criterion measures such as parent and teacher behavior ratings, direct observations of classroom on-task behavior, and productivity on academic tasks. Boys displayed more severe attention problems across a wider number of settings than did girls, regardless of grade level. The HSQ-R and SSQ-R appear to have utility in the assessment of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and related behavior disorders in which attention problems are an important focus of evaluation.