Distributional Properties and Criterion Validity of a Shortened Version of the Social Responsiveness Scale: Results from the ECHO Program and Implications for Social Communication Research

Kristen Lyall; Mina Hosseini; Christine Ladd-Acosta; Xuejuan Ning; Diane Catellier; John N Constantino; Lisa A Croen; Aaron J Kaat; Kelly Botteron; Nicole R Bush; Stephen R Dager; Cristiane S Duarte; M Daniele Fallin; Heather Hazlett; Irva Hertz-Picciotto; Robert M Joseph; Margaret R Karagas; Susan Korrick; Rebecca Landa; Daniel Messinger; Emily Oken; Sally Ozonoff; Joseph Piven; Juhi Pandey; Sheela Sathyanarayana; Robert T Schultz; Tanya St John; Rebecca Schmidt; Heather Volk; Craig J Newschaffer; program collaborators for Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes

doi:10.1007/s10803-020-04667-1

Distributional Properties and Criterion Validity of a Shortened Version of the Social Responsiveness Scale: Results from the ECHO Program and Implications for Social Communication Research

J Autism Dev Disord. 2021 Jul;51(7):2241-2253. doi: 10.1007/s10803-020-04667-1.

Authors

Kristen Lyall¹, Mina Hosseini², Christine Ladd-Acosta^{2

3}, Xuejuan Ning², Diane Catellier⁴, John N Constantino⁵, Lisa A Croen⁶, Aaron J Kaat⁷, Kelly Botteron⁸, Nicole R Bush⁹, Stephen R Dager¹⁰, Cristiane S Duarte¹¹, M Daniele Fallin¹², Heather Hazlett¹³, Irva Hertz-Picciotto^{14

15}, Robert M Joseph¹⁶, Margaret R Karagas¹⁷, Susan Korrick¹⁸, Rebecca Landa¹⁹, Daniel Messinger²⁰, Emily Oken²¹, Sally Ozonoff²², Joseph Piven¹³, Juhi Pandey²³, Sheela Sathyanarayana²⁴, Robert T Schultz²³, Tanya St John²⁵, Rebecca Schmidt^{14

15}, Heather Volk¹², Craig J Newschaffer^{26

27}; program collaborators for Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes

Collaborators

program collaborators for Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes:
D K Benjamin, P B Smith, K L Newby, L P Jacobson, C B Parker, R Gershon, D Cella, S Teitelbaum, R O Wright, K M Aldous, T Fennell, S S Hecht, L Peterson, B O'Brien, J Y Lee, J Snowden, C Duarte, I Hertz-Picciotto, M Karagas, K Karr, L Trasande, C Newschaffer, E Oken, M O'Shea

Affiliations

¹ A.J. Drexel Autism Institute, Drexel University, 3020 Market St, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA. kld98@drexel.edu.
² Department of Epidemiology, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA.
³ Wendy Klag Center for Autism and Developmental Disabilities, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA.
⁴ RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC, USA.
⁵ Department of Psychiatry, Washington University, St. Louis, MO, USA.
⁶ Division of Research, Kaiser Permanente, Oakland, CA, USA.
⁷ Department of Medical Social Sciences, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA.
⁸ Departments of Psychiatry and Radiology, Washington University, St Louis, MO, USA.
⁹ Departments of Psychiatry and Pediatrics, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, USA.
¹⁰ Department of Radiology, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
¹¹ Division of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Columbia University, New York State Psychiatric Institute, New York, NY, USA.
¹² Department of Mental Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore, MD, USA.
¹³ Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC, USA.
¹⁴ Department of Public Health Sciences, UC Davis, Davis, CA, USA.
¹⁵ MIND Institute, UC Davis, Sacramento, CA, USA.
¹⁶ Department of Anatomy and Neurobiology, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA, USA.
¹⁷ Department of Epidemiology, Geisel School of Medicine, Dartmouth College, Hanover, USA.
¹⁸ Channing Division of Network Medicine, Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
¹⁹ Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Kennedy Krieger Institute, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, USA.
²⁰ Departments of Psychology and Pediatrics, University of Miami, Coral Gables, USA.
²¹ Division of Chronic Disease Research Across the Lifecourse, Department of Population Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Institute, Boston, USA.
²² Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, MIND Institute, University of California Davis, Sacramento, CA, USA.
²³ Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA, USA.
²⁴ Department of Pediatrics, University of Washington and Seattle Children's Research Institute, Seattle, USA.
²⁵ Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA.
²⁶ A.J. Drexel Autism Institute, Drexel University, 3020 Market St, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, USA.
²⁷ College of Health and Human Development, Pennsylvania State University, State College, USA.

Abstract

Prior work proposed a shortened version of the Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS), a commonly used quantitative measure of social communication traits. We used data from 3031 participants (including 190 ASD cases) from the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Program to compare distributional properties and criterion validity of 16-item "short" to 65-item "full" SRS scores. Results demonstrated highly overlapping distributions of short and full scores. Both scores separated case from non-case individuals by approximately two standard deviations. ASD prediction was nearly identical for short and full scores (area under the curve values of 0.87, 0.86 respectively). Findings support comparability of shortened and full scores, suggesting opportunities to increase efficiency. Future work should confirm additional psychometric properties of short scores.

Keywords: Autism spectrum disorder; Quantitative traits; Social Responsiveness Scale; Social communication.

Publication types

Validation Study

MeSH terms

Adolescent
Area Under Curve
Autism Spectrum Disorder / diagnosis*
Child
Child, Preschool
Communication*
Female
Humans
Male
Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / standards*
Psychometrics
Reproducibility of Results
Social Behavior*

Abstract

Publication types

MeSH terms

Grants and funding