Identification of social-emotional problems in young children using a parent-completed screening measure

The early identification of social and emotional problems in infants, toddlers, and young children is critical for improving developmental outcomes. The Ages and Stages Questionnaires: Social-Emotional, a newly-developed screening tool, is described in this article. Questionnaires span the 3- to 63-month period with 8 separate assessment intervals. Research findings, including data on 3014 questionnaires, are reported. Internal consistency was generally high, with an overall alpha of 0.82. Test-retest reliability between parents’ classifications was 0.94. Sensitivity ranged from 0.75 to 0.89 with 0.82 overall sensitivity; specificity ranged from 0.82 to 0.96 with 0.92 overall specificity. Parents reported easy understanding and high satisfaction with the questionnaires.