Validity of the SDDS: A 40-item vocabulary screening tool for 18- to 42-month olds in Czech.

Background: Children with early language delays are at increased risk of persistent language impairment. Early identification and intervention are desirable. Parent-report inventories are useful screening tools, but the screening context places limits at their length. Validity of parent-report screening tools in languages other than English has been rarely reported in detail.

Aims: The aim was to establish the concurrent validity of an existing 40-item parent-report vocabulary screening tool in Czech, using a picture-based examiner-administered comprehension and production task as a concurrent measure of vocabulary.

Methods & Procedures: Parents of 200 children aged 1;3 to 3;6 were given the screening inventory, in which they were asked if their child says or comprehends each of 40 words. At the same time, children were administered a picture-based comprehension and production task. Concurrent validity of the inventory was examined using correlations, partial correlations, and regression analyses controlling for age.

Outcomes & Results: The partial Spearman correlation (controlling for age) between production scores from parent-report and production scores from the examiner-administered task was 0.53; for comprehension, the correlation between parent report and test scores was 0.36. These values are similar to those reported for short and full versions of MacArthur-Bates CDI for 2-year-olds.

Conclusion & Implications: A 40-item tool shows clear concurrent relations with an examiner-administered picture comprehension and production task. The study demonstrates that short parent-report tools may be useful in early identification of language impairments, and they may be a good option particularly in languages that have limited repertoire of assessment instruments.