RESUMO
INTRODUCTION: The Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL/6-18) is the most commonly used parent-completed instrument that assesses child and adolescent psychopathology. It has been used in epidemiology and clinical studies. The last version contains DSM-oriented subscales. OBJECTIVE: Investigate the psychometric properties of the CBCL/6-18 and develops a valid and reliable Mexican version. METHOD: Psychologists and child psychiatrists adapted the Spanish version of CBCL/6-18, and a back translation was done by a native English speaker. Discrepancies in the adaptation were solved by consensus. The checklist was applied to children in the community and to outpatients from a psychiatric children hospital. Reliability was evaluated by estimating internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) on all scales: retest at one week was evaluated with intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC). A ROC curve was performed to estimate a cut-off which correctly identified children from the clinically referred patients and children recruited in the community (non-referred). Mean differences for the groups were calculated with the Student's t test. RESULTS: The Mexican version of the CBCL/6-18 showed that the Cronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.90 for internalizing problems, 0.94 for externalizing problems and 0.97 for the total problem scale. The ICC was 0.97 for the total problem scale. Significant differences were found between the mean score in broad band, narrow and the new DSM/oriented scales. CONCLUSIONS: The Mexican version of CBCL/6-18 is a reliable and valid screening instrument for clinical and epidemiologic use.