Initial Development of the Child Responsiveness Scale for Early Childhood Settings

This article presents initial psychometric data for scores on the Child Responsiveness Scale (CRS), an observational measure to assess child responsiveness to teacher delivery of practices designed to promote social-emotional competencies. In Study 1, 633 live observations conducted with 54 teachers and 91 children at risk for emotional and behavioral disorders in early childhood classrooms were rated independently by two coders. Interrater reliability, ICC(2,2), for the CRS item scores, averaged .67 ( SD = .06; range .55 to .72). The CRS scale scores demonstrated sensitivity to variation across teachers, children, and coders. In Study 2, 634 recorded observations with 52 teachers and 52 children in early childhood classrooms were rated independently by two coders. Interrater reliability, ICC(2,2), for the item scores, averaged .62 ( SD = .08; range .53 to .74). An exploratory factor analysis and a confirmatory factor analysis conducted on separate samples indicated that the items were best represented as two correlated factors, one for positive and one for negative items. Analyses provided preliminary evidence for CRS scale score validity. Future research directions are discussed regarding using the CRS to evaluate child responsiveness’s role in promoting child outcomes in early childhood classrooms.