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Original Articles

The Single-Case Reporting Guideline In BEhavioural Interventions (SCRIBE) 2016 Statement

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Pages 862-876 | Received 21 Aug 2015, Accepted 16 Nov 2015, Published online: 29 Apr 2016
 

Abstract

We developed a reporting guideline to provide authors with guidance about what should be reported when writing a paper for publication in a scientific journal using a particular type of research design: the single-case experimental design. This report describes the methods used to develop the Single-Case Reporting guideline In BEhavioural interventions (SCRIBE) 2016. As a result of 2 online surveys and a 2-day meeting of experts, the SCRIBE 2016 checklist was developed, which is a set of 26 items that authors need to address when writing about single-case research. This article complements the more detailed SCRIBE 2016 Explanation and Elaboration article (Tate et al., 2016) that provides a rationale for each of the items and examples of adequate reporting from the literature. Both these resources will assist authors to prepare reports of single-case research with clarity, completeness, accuracy, and transparency. They will also provide journal reviewers and editors with a practical checklist against which such reports may be critically evaluated. We recommend that the SCRIBE 2016 is used by authors preparing manuscripts describing single-case research for publication, as well as journal reviewers and editors who are evaluating such manuscripts.

Scientific Abstract

Reporting guidelines, such as the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) Statement, improve the reporting of research in the medical literature (Turner et al., 2012). Many such guidelines exist and the CONSORT Extension to Nonpharmacological Trials (Boutron et al., 2008) provides suitable guidance for reporting between-groups intervention studies in the behavioral sciences. The CONSORT Extension for N-of-1 Trials (CENT 2015) was developed for multiple crossover trials with single individuals in the medical sciences (Shamseer et al., 2015; Vohra et al., 2015), but there is no reporting guideline in the CONSORT tradition for single-case research used in the behavioral sciences. We developed the Single-Case Reporting guideline In BEhavioural interventions (SCRIBE) 2016 to meet this need. This Statement article describes the methodology of the development of the SCRIBE 2016, along with the outcome of 2 Delphi surveys and a consensus meeting of experts. We present the resulting 26-item SCRIBE 2016 checklist. The article complements the more detailed SCRIBE 2016 Explanation and Elaboration article (Tate et al., 2016) that provides a rationale for each of the items and examples of adequate reporting from the literature. Both these resources will assist authors to prepare reports of single-case research with clarity, completeness, accuracy, and transparency. They will also provide journal reviewers and editors with a practical checklist against which such reports may be critically evaluated.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Single-case methodology is defined as the intensive and prospective study of the individual in which (a) the intervention/s is manipulated in an experimentally controlled manner across a series of discrete phases, and (b) measurement of the behavior targeted by the intervention is made repeatedly (and, ideally, frequently) throughout all phases. Professional guidelines call for the experimental effect to be demonstrated on at least three occasions by systematically manipulating the independent variable (Horner et al., Citation2005; Kratochwill et al., Citation2010, Citation2013). This criterion helps control for the confounding effect of extraneous variables that may adversely affect internal validity (e.g., history, maturation) and allows a functional cause and effect relationship to be established between the independent and dependent variables.