Development of the MIND: a Screening Measure Assessing Mental Health Treatment Needs.

Early identification and treatment of mental illness symptoms results in better outcomes, yet few screeners are available that can be efficiently used in community settings. The Mental Illness Needs Detection (MIND) Screener was developed to identify the need for mental health treatment and administered to 820 adults across the USA. Confirmatory factor analysis supported the internal consistency of the MIND. The MIND significantly correlated with the Kessler-10 (K10; a well-validated screener), reported mental illness, mental health treatment, and the need for treatment. The MIND's ability to accurately assess treatment needs was further demonstrated through high sensitivity (84%; 83%), specificity (71%; 62%), and AUC values (0.77; 0.73) when compared to both the K10 and reported need for treatment, respectively. These findings support the validity and reliability of the MIND and indicate its promise as a means of detecting a wide range of mental health needs across a variety of settings.

The Influences of Multiple Informants' Ratings of Inattention on Preschoolers' Emergent Literacy Skills Growth.

There is strong evidence that inattention is a correlate of reading-related skills; however, less research has examined the unique and longitudinal relations between multiple informants' ratings of inattention and the development of early reading skills across the preschool year. This study used latent growth curve analysis to examine whether ratings of inattention, completed by multiple informants, were unique predictors of emergent literacy development in preschoolers. Participants included 284 preschool children. ADHD-rating scales were completed by three different informants (i.e., classroom teachers, project teachers, and examiners) and measures of emergent literacy skills, a measure of working memory, and a measure of non-verbal cognitive ability were completed by the preschoolers. Each informant's rating of inattention uniquely predicted children's initial emergent literacy skills, but only the ratings of inattention made by project teachers were uniquely associated with growth in emergent literacy skills over the course of the preschool year.

Relations between inhibitory control and the development of academic skills in preschool and kindergarten: a meta-analysis.

Although there is evidence that young children's inhibitory control (IC) is related to their academic skills, the nature of this relation and the role of potential moderators of it are not well understood. In this meta-analytic study, we summarized results from 75 peer-reviewed studies of preschool and kindergarten children (14,424 children; 32-80 months old [M = 54.71 months; SD = 9.70]) across a wide range of socioeconomic status. The mean effect size (r) across studies was .27 (95% confidence interval [.24, .29]), indicating a moderate and statistically significant association between self-regulation and academic skills. The association between IC and academic skills was moderated by type of IC behavior task (i.e., hot vs. cool behavior task), by method of assessing IC (i.e., behavior task vs. parent report), and by academic subject (i.e., literacy vs. math), but not by other methods of assessing IC (i.e., behavior task vs. teacher report, parent report vs. teacher report) or by grade (i.e., preschool vs. kindergarten). The results of this meta-analysis suggest that there are preferred methods for assessing IC (i.e., cool behavior tasks, teacher reports) that should be considered when examining the relations between IC and academic skills in young children. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2014 APA, all rights reserved).

Early literacy and early numeracy: the value of including early literacy skills in the prediction of numeracy development.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether early literacy skills uniquely predict early numeracy skills development. During the first year of the study, 69 3- to 5-year-old preschoolers were assessed on the Preschool Early Numeracy Skills (PENS) test and the Test of Preschool Early Literacy Skills (TOPEL). Participants were assessed again a year later on the PENS test and on the Applied Problems and Calculation subtests of the Woodcock-Johnson III Tests of Achievement. Three mixed effect regressions were conducted using Time 2 PENS, Applied Problems, and Calculation as the dependent variables. Print Knowledge and Vocabulary accounted for unique variance in the prediction of Time 2 numeracy scores. Phonological Awareness did not uniquely predict any of the mathematics domains. The findings of this study identify an important link between early literacy and early numeracy development.

An individual differences analysis of the self-teaching hypothesis.

The self-teaching hypothesis suggests that children learn orthographic structure of words through the experience of phonologically recoding them. The current study is an individual differences analysis of the self-teaching hypothesis. A total of 40 children in Grades 2 and 3 (7-9 years of age) completed tests of phonological recoding, word identification, and orthographic knowledge. The relation of phonological recoding and word identification was significantly mediated by orthographic knowledge. Furthermore, two aspects of orthographic knowledge (perhaps word-specific and general orthographic knowledge) mediated different variance shared between phonological recoding and word identification. Results support an individual differences version of the self-teaching hypothesis and emphasize the importance of phonological recoding in the primary curriculum.