Avaliação Psicológica de Crianças com Suspeita de TEA: Perfil Interativo dos Avaliadores

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the evaluators’ interactive style profiles during the diagnostic assessment of children with suspected ASD. Two independent judges coded videos of assessment sessions of 22 children (aged from 24 to 74 months), using the Behavioral Evaluation Protocol for Children at Risk for ASD – Revised Version – Non-Verbal (PROTEA-R-NV), interacting with nine different evaluators. The independent judges used the Evaluators’ Interactive Styles Coding Manual to encode the behaviors observed. The unit of analysis was a one-minute interactive episode of each videotape. Each judge registered the presence or absence of the evaluator’s behavior described in the manual, when applicable. The evaluators had a strong tendency to adopt directiveness as an interactive style, followed by responsiveness and intrusiveness. It was concluded that the child’s characteristics and the evaluator’s previous training in the administration of the instrument may have influenced these results.