FURTHER COMPARISONS OF TEACHER AND PARENT RATINGS OF BEHAVIOR AND EMOTIONAL-PROBLEMS IN JAMAICAN CHILDREN

As a sequel to comparisons between parent and teacher reports on behav ioral/emotional problems in clinic-referred Jamaican youngsters, paren t and teacher reports for 359 nonreferred Jamaican 6-11 year-old young sters were compared. Similar to clinic-referred findings, low to moder ate correlations emerged for parent and teacher reports on nonreferred children. Correlations were also significantly higher for ratings of undercontrolled (e.g., disobedience, stealing, fighting) than ratings of overcontrolled (e.g., shyness, depression, fearfulness) behavior, s uggesting that some findings may be robust across cultures and referra l status. However, correlation coefficients varied across referral sta tus for ratings of overcontrolled problems in girls and undercontrolle d problems in boys. Overall, the findings suggest that the study of ch ild behavior requires attention to the reporter of the behavior and th e context in which such behavior occurs.