A study on the usefulness and reliability of the “Scheme of Appraisal of Emotional Development” (SAED) for persons with ID using direct observation in a group-based assessment procedure

• Structured assessments for the evaluation of social–emotional abilities of patients with learning disabilities are reported with short descriptions.
• To transform a routine face-to-face interview of an assessment for the socio-emotional level into a team based evaluation does not forfeit crucial test requirements and yields equivalent results.
• Team evaluation may promote an additional advantage insofar as patient management standards in specialized clinical units seem to improve along with a more transparent conceptualization of patients’ behaviour due to the discussions the teams.

IntroductionWhereas instruments for the assessment of intellectual and social abilities are widely available, instruments for the evaluation of emotional development of persons with intellectual disabilities (ID) are rare. The Scheme of Appraisal of Emotional Development (SAED), an internationally used tool developed by Dosen (2005a. Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, 49, 1, 2005b. Journal of Intellectual Disability Research, 49, 9), is one of the latter and is based on interviews with caregivers. The present study aims to investigate the internal consistency and interrater-reliability by changing the interview procedure into a direct observation and evaluation approach by a whole team instead of by one expert.MethodThe level of emotional development of 175 patients admitted to a psychiatric inpatient unit specialized in the treatment of adults with ID was evaluated with the SAED by the treatment team after an observation period of up to two weeks. The inter- and intra-rater-reliability was assessed by direct observation of the behaviour of an additional 50 patients by two pairs of raters.ResultsThe internal consistency of the SAED dimensions, once rated by team approach, is excellent, and the reliability measures show also good statistical results.Conclusion and implicationsThe evaluation of the level of emotional development using the SAED by a group-led and/or direct observational procedure show to be a reliable and useful approach. The group-based procedure yields equal results compared with the usual interview guidelines and might lead to an additional training effect within the respective teams. The rater-reliability measures align with those reported in other studies.