EFFECTS OF SETTING AND NUMBER OF OBSERVATIONS ON GENERALIZABILITY OF PARENT-CHILD INTERACTIONS IN CHILDHOOD OBESITY TREATMENT

The generalizability of behaviors across observational conditions is a critical issue in behavioral assessment. Generalizability theory was used to examine two aspects of audio recorded parent-child interaction s recorded over 6 days of home measurement and 1 day of laboratory mea surement in a behavioral treatment program for childhood obesity. Fami lies audiotaped parent-child home meetings during which they reviewed self-monitored diet and exercise records that were coded for the follo wing types of interactions: praise statements, negative statements, pr ompts for new behaviors, and statements promoting problem solving. A s imilar meeting was audiotaped in our laboratory. The first question ex plored was the number of measurements needed to generalize to the univ erse of the six home measures. Results showed an increase in generaliz ability over measurements for each behavioral category. Using generali zability coefficients of .60 or more, praise, negative comments and pr ompts, respectively, could be reliably observed based on 1, 4, or 4 da ys of measurement Second, the effects of setting (laboratory versus ho me) were assessed for 1 day of measurement in each environment. Again using generalizability coefficients of .60, generalizability analysis showed that the lab setting could not be generalized to the home setti ng based on 1 day of measurement, with generalizability coefficients r anging from .27 for negative comments to.57 for praise. Results sugges t that 4 days of behavioral assessment in the home can be used to esta blish generalizable data for all the dependent measures studied. Howev er, generalizability coefficients suggested that 1 day of laboratory m easurement was not adequate to generalize to typical home behavior.