Empirical analysis of the selective attention and associated behavior checklists of the aggregate neurobehavioral student health and educational review

For 111 referred children, the Behavior Observation (BO) and the Selective Attention (SA) components of the Aggregate Neurobehavioral Student Health a nd Educational Review (ANSER) were completed by mothers and teachers and th e Pediatric Examination of Educational Readiness at Middle Childhood was co mpleted by the pediatrician. Smaller samples were used to study concurrent validity. The questionnaires presented high internal reliability Factor ana lyses of the BO questionnaires resulted in a common primary factor of "Aggr essiveness" for ratings by mothers and teachers. For the SA, "Hyperactivity " (mothers) and "Inattention" (teachers) accounted for the majority of vari ance. There were modest correlations between teachers and mothers. The corr elation between the pediatrician and teachers reached the highest value. Th e BO-Teachers form was significantly related to the Teacher Report Form and the Conners Teacher Rating Scale. The authors concluded that the ANSER pre sents concurrent validity for teacher ratings, items predictive of atypical behavior, and a unique pool for defining a subgroup of children with atten tional disorders. The limited relationship between mothers and teachers may be ascribed to different interpretations of the same items.