Da. Cole et al., Structural differences in parent and child reports of children's symptoms of depression and anxiety, PSYC ASSESS, 12(2), 2000, pp. 174-185
Two cohorts of public elementary school children and their parents (assesse
d 3 years apart) completed child and parent forms of the Children's Depress
ion Inventory (CDI) and the Revised Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale (RCMA
S). Assessments were conducted twice, once during the fall (N = 562) and ag
ain during the spring (N = 630) of the 6th grade. Factor analyses revealed
3 factors for each measure. Two of the 3 parent CDI factors manifested some
degree of congruence with their counterparts from the child CDI. Similarly
, 2 of the 3 RCMAS factors were somewhat congruent across informant types.
Differences between parent and child factor structures suggest that parents
' and children's reports focus on somewhat different aspects of child psych
opathology, and they can make qualitatively different contributions to the
multiaxial assessment of children.