Standardizing the assessment of emotional development in adults with intellectual and developmental disability
Tanja Sappok, Anton Došen, Sabine Zepperitz, Brian Fergus Barrett, Jolanda Vonk, Christian Schanze, Marie Ilic, Thomas Bergmann, Leen De Neve, Joana Birkner, Sandra Zaal, Marco O. Bertelli, Mark Hudson, Filip Morisse, P.S. Sterkenburg
Abstract
OBJECTIVE: The Scale of Emotional Development-Short (SED-S) is an instrument to assess the level of emotional development (ED) in people with intellectual and developmental disability. Index cases are developed as a didactic tool to standardize the application of the scale. METHOD: In a stepwise process, a European working group from six countries developed five index cases, one for each level of ED. All cases were first scored by 20 raters using the SED-S and then rephrased to reduce inter-rater variations (SD > 0.5). RESULTS: All five index cases yielded overall ratings that matched the intended level of ED. Across the range of ED, Regulating Affect needed rephrasing most to ensure a distinct description within each level of ED. CONCLUSIONS: The tri-lingual, cross-cultural evolution of five index cases contributes to a standardized application of the SED-S and can serve as training material to improve the inter-rater reliability of the SED-S across different cultures and languages.