A PRELIMINARY-STUDY OF THE USEFULNESS OF THE BEHAVIOR ASSESSMENT SYSTEMS FOR CHILDREN IN THE EVALUATION OF MENTAL-HEALTH NEEDS IN A HEAD-START POPULATION

122 parents and 18 teachers rated Head Start children on the pre-schoo l version of the Behavioral Assessment System for Children. Parents te nded to rate their children as having greater problem scores than did their teacher, but both ratings, when compared to general norms, were within normal limits. Low to moderate correlations were found for the same scales on Parent and Teacher forms. Teachers rated children in th e center program as having fewer problems than their home-based peers, while parents evaluated center children as having better adaptive beh avior than children in the home-based program. Boys had more clinical problems than girls, while girls were rated as showing more adaptive b ehavior than boys. The usefulness and need for further research on thi s assessment are mentioned.