Jorien Vugteveen

The Struggles of a Field Study: Studying the Effectiveness of a Flipped Classroom

Flipping the classroom is an increasingly popular method to support student learning in higher education. One of the aims of this educational approach is to engage students from the start and throughout the course by facilitating active processing of study content and discouraging procrastination. We conducted field research to gain insight into students’ study behaviour throughout such a course. Bi-weekly online surveys were used to gather data among 200 students. Additionally, we kept track of lecture attendance and gathered information on students’ perceptions about the course. This case study is an account of the struggles we encountered during our field study: decreasing diary response rates and students’ negative feelings about the course, which potentially biased our findings. From this project we take away some valuable lessons, which we would like to share with other (novice) researchers.

Using the Dutch multi‑informant Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) to predict adolescent psychiatric diagnoses

Knowledge on the validity of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) among adolescents is limited but essential for the interpretation of SDQ scores preceding the diagnostic process. This study assessed the predictive and discriminative value of adolescent- and parent-rated SDQ scores for psychiatric disorders, diagnosed by professionals in outpatient community clinics, in a sample of 2753 Dutch adolescents aged 12–17. Per disorder, the predictive accuracy of the SDQ scale that is contentwise related to that particular disorder and the SDQ impact scale was assessed. That is, 24 logistic regression analyses were performed, for each combination of DSM-IV diagnosis [4: Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Conduct/Oppositional Defiant Disorder (CD/ODD), Anxiety/Mood disorder, Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)], informant (3: adolescent, parent, both), and SDQ scale(s) (2; related scale only, related scale and impact scale). Additional logistic regression analyses were performed to assess the discriminative strength of the SDQ scales. The results show both fair predictive strength and fair discriminative strength for the adolescent- and parent-reported hyperactivity scales, the parent-reported conduct scale, and the parent-reported social and prosocial scales, indicating that these scales provide useful information about the presence of ADHD, CD/ODD, and ASD, respectively. The SDQ emotional scale showed to be insufficiently predictive. The findings suggest that parent-rated SDQ scores can be used to provide clinicians with a preliminary impression of the type of problems for ADHD, CD/ODD, and ASD, and adolescent for ADHD.

Psychometric Properties of the Dutch Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) in Adolescent Community and Clinical Populations

This study assessed the factor structures of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) adolescent and parent versions and their measurement invariance across settings in clinical (n = 4,053) and community (n = 962) samples of Dutch adolescents aged 12 to 17 years. Per SDQ version, confirmatory factor analyses were performed to assess its factor structure in clinical and community settings and to test for measurement invariance across these settings. The results suggest measurement invariance of the presumed five-factor structure for the parent version and a six-factor structure for the adolescent version. Furthermore, evaluation of the SDQ scale sum scores as used in practice, indicated that working with sum scores yields a fairly reasonable approximation of working with the favorable but less easily computed factor scores. These findings suggest that adolescent- and parent-reported SDQ scores can be interpreted using community-based norm scores, regardless of whether the adolescent has been referred for mental health problems.