Developmental researchers are generally in agreement about the benefits of using a multi-informant approach, such as from parents, teachers, and self-report, to measure child and adolescent adjustment, which can provide better precision than single reports alone (Aebi et al., 2017; Goodman et al., 2000; Verhulst et al., 1997). However, studies consistently report large discrepancies and only low to moderate levels of agreement between informants, resulting in problems of interpretation and leading researchers to question the measurement properties of certain instruments (Bergström & Baviskar, 2021; Olino et al., 2018).
The Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) is a widely used, relatively short, multi-informant measure of child and adolescent adjustment, capturing five domains including emotional symptoms, peer problems, conduct problems, hyperactivity-inattention, and pro-social behaviour, in youth aged 3-17 years (Goodman, 1997). A recent meta-analysis found cross-informant agreement on the SDQ to be in the low to moderate range in general population samples between teacher-child reports (r = .19 - .33), parent-teacher reports (r = .26 - .46), and parent-child reports (r = .30 - .38) (Bergström & Baviskar, 2021). Although concordance rates on the SDQ are generally higher than other multi-informant measures (Goodman, 2001), and tend to exceed levels considered acceptable for cross-informant agreement (Bergström & Baviskar, 2021), large informant discrepancies remain.
Cross-informant agreement on the SDQ tends to be highest for externalising difficulties, such as hyperactivity-inattention, and lowest for internalising difficulties, such as emotional symptoms (Bergström & Baviskar, 2021). This finding is often attributed to the fact that externalising difficulties are more easily observed, compared to internalising difficulties, which may be hidden or unobserved (De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005; Sourander et al., 1999). However, this does not always apply, as a wide array of factors can explain differences in rates of informant discrepancies across domains. For example, conduct problems are considered more observable, yet may be underreported due to social desirability (Imbach et al., 2013), or non-disclosure of certain behaviours to parents, such as antisocial or illicit adolescent behaviour (Cantwell et al., 1997). And, in some cases, internalising problems may be well reported by parents, such as when the parent-child relationship is strong, characterised by more time spent together, including open communication (Treutler & Epkins, 2003).
Studies in clinical samples, of children presenting to services with psychopathology, tend to find higher levels of cross-informant agreement between parents and children, than those found in general population samples (Bergström & Baviskar, 2021). The direction of informant discrepancies also differs between clinical and general population samples, as parents tend to report higher symptoms than children in clinical samples (Cleridou et al., 2017; Goolsby et al., 2022), whereas children tend to report higher symptoms than parents in general population samples (Gaete et al., 2018; Kawabe et al., 2021; Sourander et al., 1999). This suggests that parents of children in clinical settings may be more aware of their children’s difficulties, which could be attributed to the fact that parents usually facilitate access to clinical services (Kazdin, 2003).
Reasons for informant discrepancies are likely to be wide ranging, and have been summarised in theoretical models, such as the Attribution Bias Context (ABC) model (De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005). This model posits that informant discrepancies may arise due to (a) differences in attribution of the cause of children’s behaviour (e.g., situational vs dispositional), (b) individual informants’ own cognitive biases (e.g., depression-distortion hypothesis), and (c) the reporting context of the informant (e.g., at school or at home) (De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005). The latter has often been used to describe parent-teacher discrepancies, as informants report from either the home or the school context, providing valuable information across settings (Genachowski et al., 2022).
Mental health problems, in particular those of mothers, have been identified as a potential source of informant discrepancy. Early research in this area, which found that mothers with depression reported higher symptoms in their children than mothers with no depression, concluded that mothers with depression tended to overreport their children’s symptoms due to their own mental health problems (Breslau et al., 1988; Renouf & Kovacs, 1994). However, these reports were strongly criticised for lack of empirical evidence and misinterpretation of results (Richters, 1992). Firstly, higher mental health difficulties would be expected in households where either a parent or a child is suffering with a mental health disorder, due to bi-directional effects and heightened psychological distress (Madsen et al., 2020). Secondly, parents with a history of mental health difficulties may be more aware of their children’s distress and sensitive to signs of maladjustment, resulting in more accurate reporting of children’s symptoms compared to parents with no history of mental health difficulties (Conrad & Hammen, 1989).
In summary, while parent reports of adolescent mental health and adjustment are widely used, they are not directly comparable to adolescent self-report. Both types of report are prone to error due to subjective bias and differences in reporting context, and neither can be considered as the gold standard (De Los Reyes & Kazdin, 2005). It is important to understand the factors associated with informant discrepancies, in order to inform models of reporter bias and improve the interpretation of adolescent adjustment measures.
The current study
In the current study, parent-adolescent informant discrepancies on the SDQ were investigated using data from the seventh wave of the Millennium Cohort Study (MCS), when cohort members were aged 17, reflecting the only timepoint when both parent and self-report were collected. In line with previous research, it was hypothesised that parents would report lower difficulties and higher pro-social behaviour than adolescents (Gaete et al., 2018; Kawabe et al., 2021). Conditional effects were investigated, and it was hypothesised that discrepancy would be greater in parent-daughter dyads, due to the large increase in self-reported difficulties observed in older adolescent girls (Patalay & Fitzsimons, 2018, 2020; Sadler et al., 2018). In addition, it was expected that informant discrepancies would be lower if parents reported a higher level of psychological distress themselves, due to increased understanding of mental health difficulties (Conrad & Hammen, 1989). Parent’s highest level of education was also explored as a potential conditioning factor, as research tends to find that higher levels of parental education are protective for children’s mental health (Songco et al., 2020; Straatmann et al., 2019), although to our knowledge this has not been explored as a moderator of discrepancy.
Latent Difference Score (LDS) modelling was used, which is considered a flexible and robust way to investigate informant discrepancies (De Haan et al., 2018). LDS models are a specific type of structural equation model, which infer unobserved (latent) constructs from observed (manifest) variables (Kievit et al., 2018). A true difference score (i.e., Δ) can be estimated from the self and parent reported latent factors, which is considered free from measurement error (Gollwitzer et al., 2014). The mean difference score (µΔ), interindividual differences in change (σ²Δ), and the covariance between the self-report and the difference score (σΔ-self) can then be included as model parameters for further investigation (Gollwitzer et al., 2014). In addition, due to the multiple manifest variables observed within a latent model, measurement invariance across reporters can be tested and accounted for, to ensure that any differences observed are the result of a true difference and not variation in how parents and adolescents interpreted and responded to the questionnaire (Gregorich, 2006).