Validation of the parent version of the World Health Organization Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale for adolescents

Abstract

Objective: To investigate the validity of a parent version of the World Health Organization Adult Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) Self-Report Scale for adolescents (ASRS-AP) and the 6-question screening version (ASRS-AP-S). Methods: Adolescent psychiatric outpatients (N = 112, mean age 15 years, 40% boys) and their parents were interviewed with the Kiddie Schedule of Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia (K-SADS), and the parents reported on the ASRS-AP/ASRS-AP-S. Results: Internal consistency (Cronbach’s alpha) was 0.93 for ASRS-AP and 0.85 for ASRS-AP-S, 0.91 and 0.87 for the inattention subscale, and 0.91 and 0.72 for the hyperactivity subscale, respectively. The concurrent validity (Spearman’s correlation coefficient) between the total K-SADS ADHD symptom severity score and the sum of the score on the ASRS-AP/ASRS-AP-S was 0.75 and 0.66, respectively. Diagnostic accuracy measures for the ASRS-AP and ASRS-AP-S were 78% and 80% sensitivity, 75% and 74% specificity, 73% and 71% positive predictive value (PPV), and 81% and 82% negative predictive value (NPV), respectively. Conclusions: The ASRS-AP and ASRS-AP-S showed high internal consistency and concurrent validity in relation to total K-SADS ADHD symptom severity score. Both scales showed favourable diagnostic accuracy measures.

Keywords:

• ADHD
• adolescents
• parent
• rating scale
• validation study.

Acknowledgements

Statistical analyses were performed by K.S. We also acknowledge Mattias Rehn for excellent data management.

Disclosure of interest

Grants to K.S. from the County Council of Västmanland and the Örebro Regional Research Council are acknowledged. The funding sources had no further role in the study design, the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data, the writing of the report or the decision to submit the paper for publication. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Figure 1. Receiver operating characteristic analysis (ROC) for the ASRS-AP with dichotomized answers (0–18 points) among boys and girls of the clinical adolescent sample (N = 112; boys n = 45).

Figure 2. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis for the ASRS-AP-S with dichotomized answers (0–6 points) among boys and girls of the clinical adolescent sample (N = 112; boys n = 45).