Using Rasch analysis to examine the item-level psychometrics of the Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scales

Abstract

The Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scales (IT-MAIS; Zimmerman-Phillips, S., Osberger, M.J., Robbins, A.M. 2001. Infant-toddler meaningful auditory integration scale. Sylmar, CA: Advanced Bionics Corporation) is a popular assessment designed to measure listening skills in children with hearing loss aged 0–3 years. For this study we analyzed the item-level psychometric properties of the IT-MAIS via Rasch analysis to gain further understanding about its validity and reliability. We chose to analyze the psychometric properties of the IT-MAIS because very little information exists regarding its development and validation, although it is widely used to assess listening skills in children with sensorineural hearing loss ages 0–3 years pre- and post-cochlear implant (CI). Our results indicated that the IT-MAIS items demonstrated less than ideal psychometric properties and the IT-MAIS item order did not reflect the order in which children are expected to develop functional listening skills. Our findings suggest that there is a pressing need for further discussion among researchers and clinicians about (1) how the IT-MAIS is used, and (2) what other valid and reliable outcome measures could be used alongside, or in place of, the IT-MAIS to determine CI candidacy, establish treatment goals, or track progress in listening development in very young children with hearing loss.

Keywords:

• Validity
• Reliability
• Rasch analysis
• Children
• Cochlear implants
• Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scale
• Infants
• Toddlers
• Hearing loss

Acknowledgements

The authors extend a big thank you to our colleagues on the University of Iowa's Cochlear Implant Program and all the families who volunteered their time for this study. Portions of this work were presented under the title, ‘An examination of the validity and reliability of the Infant-Toddler Meaningful Auditory Integration Scales’ at The Hearing Across the Lifespan (HEAL) Conference, Cernobbio, Lake Como, Italy in June 2014; at the American Auditory Society Annual Meeting held in Scottsdale, AZ in March 2013; and at the American Cochlear Implant Alliance's 2013 Symposium held in Washington, D.C. in October 2013.

ORCID

Brittan A. Barker http://orcid.org/0000-0001-9327-7057

Neila J. Donovan http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7235-8357

Notes

1 We simplified the statistical explanation for the current readership. For a thorough discussion on the topic please see the tutorial written for those in the field of Communication Sciences and Disorders by Baylor et al. (2011).

2 Rasch analysis is considered ideal for analysis for small samples (N = 50–100). We anchored the initial 23 scores according to Rasch methods and by so doing; the other 33 ratings are considered individual ratings during the probabilistic iterations used to estimate the model (Mallinson, 2011). Our results are thus based on 56 person-level entries.

3 The logit is the interval unit of measurement used in Rasch analysis. It represents the relative differences between person ability and item difficulty that results during the log-odds transformation of the data based of the natural logarithm. The logit is calculated at ∼2.718 (Wright and Stone, 1999).

4 Overall pre-CI IT-MAIS scores for our sample were as follows: 0 (n = 5), 1 (n = 2), 2 (n = 1), and 3 (n = 3), out of a possible overall score of 40.