The Chinese 10-Item Empathy Quotient and Systemising Quotient-Revised: Internal Consistency, Test-Retest Reliability, Known-Groups Validity, and Sex Differences in Autistic and Non-Autistic Adults.
The 10-item Chinese EQ and SQ-R are quick, stable tools that separate autistic from non-autistic adults.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Researchers translated the 10-item Empathy Quotient and Systemising Quotient into Chinese.
They gave the short forms to autistic and non-autistic adults twice, two weeks apart.
The team checked if scores stayed stable and if the two groups scored differently.
What they found
Both scales held together well and gave nearly the same scores two weeks later.
Autistic adults scored lower on empathy and higher on systemising, just as expected.
The brief tools kept the same pattern seen in longer English versions.
How this fits with other research
Tureck et al. (2013) also tightened an autism tool, but they reworked the ADI-R for toddlers.
Their work came first; Kung (2024) shows the same polish can work for quick adult self-report scales.
Tarasova et al. (2024) validated another short scale in German adults with ID.
Both studies prove you can keep validity while cutting items and translating.
Why it matters
You now have two 10-question screens you can trust in Chinese-speaking adults.
Use them in intake packets or telehealth to flag social-cognitive style in minutes.
No need to wait for the 40-item forms; the short ones do the job.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
PURPOSE: The 10-item version of the Empathy Quotient (EQ-10) and the Systemising Quotient-Revised (SQ-R-10) were originally developed in the English-speaking population. However, little is known about the reliability of these measures. There is also extremely limited research translating or evaluating any translated version of these 10-item measures. The present study translated the measures into Chinese and evaluated the Chinese 10-item EQ (C-EQ-10) and SQ-R (C-SQ-R-10). METHODS: An online survey consisting of the C-EQ-10 and the C-SQ-R-10 was completed by 698 non-autistic adults and 43 autistic adults in Hong Kong. RESULTS: Internal consistency of the measures was satisfactory in the autistic group (α = 0.60-0.63) and good in the non-autistic group (α = 0.76-0.82). Test-retest reliability was high in both the autistic group (r = .76-0.81) and the non-autistic group (r = .80-0.84). On average, the autistic group had significantly lower empathising than did the non-autistic group (Cohen's d = -1.21), and there was a trend of higher systemising in the autistic group than in the non-autistic group (Cohen's d = 0.20). On average, within the non-autistic group, males had significantly lower empathising (Cohen's d = -0.57) and significantly higher systemising (Cohen's d = 0.33) than did females. These average sex differences were attenuated and non-significant in the autistic group. Distribution patterns of "brain types" based on empathising-systemising difference scores seem to suggest that "brain types" are shifted towards systemising types in autistic or male participants. CONCLUSION: The C-EQ-10 and the C-SQ-R-10 are valid and reliable measures.
Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 2024 · doi:10.1002/pchj.598