The Rate of Cyber Dating Abuse Among Teens and How It Relates to Other Forms of Teen Dating Violence

This study presents evaluative data on the Childhood Experiences of Violence Questionnaire (CEVQ), a brief, self-report measure of youth victimization. Literature reviews, expert consultations and qualitative interviews informed the development of the CEVQ. Test-retest reliability of the preliminary and final versions of the CEVQ was examined. Child welfare workers (n=11) assessed content validity. Construct validity was assessed by comparing levels of emotional and behavioral problems of youth with self-reports (n=177) of victimization. Criterion validity was tested by comparing clinicians' judgment of child physical abuse (PA) and child sexual abuse (SA) with youths' self-reports (n=93). In general, test-retest intra-class correlations (ICCs) for the preliminary version of the questionnaire were good to excellent. Reliability estimates for the stem questions in the final version of the CEVQ were excellent, except for peer violence items which showed fair to good agreement. ICCs for PA, severe PA, SA, and severe SA of the CEVQ were .85, .77, .92, and .87, respectively. Youth with self-reported victimization had significantly higher scores for most categories of emotional and behavioral disorders. Experts classified victimization items as relevant. Kappa coefficients comparing clinician's judgments and youth's self-reports for PA, severe PA, SA, and severe SA were .67, .64, .70, and .50, respectively. The present findings provide preliminary evidence that the CEVQ is a brief, reliable, valid and informative instrument for assessing exposure to victimization and maltreatment among youth. Although this instrument is not appropriate for clinical use at this time, its psychometric properties will make it useful in conducting further epidemiological research and studies evaluating interventions aimed at reducing victimization.

The Youth Self Report (YSR) is a widely used measure of youth emotional and behavioral problems. Although the YSR was designed for youths ages 11 to 18, no studies have systematically evaluated whether youths younger than age 11 can make valid reports on this measure. This study thus examined the reliability and validity of the YSR scales scores for younger (ages 7-10; n = 184) and older (ages 11-14; n = 147) youths. Results demonstrated that younger youths were able to provide reliable reports on the YSR broad band (Internalizing, Externalizing) scales, though less so on the narrow band scales. Across all scales, the externalizing scales performed more favorably than the internalizing scales among both younger and older youth. Younger youths' DSM-oriented scales corresponded significantly with DSM diagnoses.