Reliability and validity of autism diagnostic interview-revised, Japanese version.
The Japanese ADI-R works well for kids 5+, but misses almost half of autism cases in younger children.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers checked if the Japanese version of the ADI-R works well. They tested the kids . Half had autism, half had other issues. Two raters scored each interview to see if they agreed.
They wanted to know: does the Japanese ADI-R give the same results when different people use it? And can it tell autism from other problems?
What they found
The Japanese ADI-R is reliable. Two raters agreed a large share of the time. It correctly spotted a large share of kids with autism overall.
But there's a catch. For kids under 5, it only caught a large share of autism cases. It worked much better for older kids.
How this fits with other research
Noterdaeme et al. (2002) showed the ADI-R plus ADOS together catch almost every case. This new study proves the Japanese ADI-R alone is good, but not perfect.
Zander et al. (2015) found similar age problems in Swedish toddlers. Their ADI-R also missed many young kids. This confirms the age issue isn't just Japanese culture - it's the tool itself.
Foley-Nicpon et al. (2017) showed we need both ADI-R and ADOS for smart kids with mild symptoms. The Japanese study didn't test this group, but warns us the ADI-R alone isn't enough for any young child.
Why it matters
If you work with Japanese families, you can trust the Japanese ADI-R for kids 5 and up. For younger kids, always add the ADOS. This combo will catch cases the ADI-R alone misses.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
To examine the inter-rater reliability of Autism Diagnostic Interview-Revised, Japanese Version (ADI-R-JV), the authors recruited 51 individuals aged 3-19 years, interviewed by two independent raters. Subsequently, to assess the discriminant and diagnostic validity of ADI-R-JV, the authors investigated 317 individuals aged 2-19 years, who were divided into three diagnostic groups as follows: autistic disorder (AD), pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified, and other psychiatric diagnosis or no diagnosis, according to the consensus clinical diagnosis. As regards inter-rater reliability, intraclass correlation coefficients of greater than 0.80 were obtained for all three domains of ADI-R-JV. As regards discriminant validity, the mean scores of the three domains was significantly higher in individuals with AD than in those of other diagnostic groups. As regards diagnostic validity, sensitivity and specificity for correctly diagnosing AD were 0.92 and 0.89, respectively, but sensitivity was 0.55 for individuals younger than 5 years. Specificity was consistently high regardless of age and intelligence. ADI-R-JV was shown to be a reliable tool, and has sufficient discriminant validity and satisfactory diagnostic validity for correctly diagnosing AD, although the diagnostic validity appeared to be compromised with respect to the diagnosis of younger individuals.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2013 · doi:10.1007/s10803-012-1606-9