Interviewing

Structured Diagnostic Interviews

Structured diagnostic interviews were developed for interviewing parents and children about symptoms and criteria for psychiatric diagnoses. Two examples are the Diagnostic Interview for Children and Adolescents, Version Four (DICA-IV) (Reich, 2000) and the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children, Version Four (DISC-IV) (Shaffer and colleagues, 2000). To conduct a structured diagnostic interview, the interviewer must follow a set of standard questions and probes geared toward specific response categories. The choice of the next question depends on the interviewee's answer to the previous question. Computer scoring of responses assesses whether the child meets criteria for specific psychiatric diagnoses, such as those in the American Psychiatric Association's (1994) Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV). Administering the DISC-IV or DICA-IV generally takes at least an hour and, at times, up to three or more hours.

Research shows that structured diagnostic interviews are more reliable when administered to parents than to children. That is, on two different occasions, parents more often report symptoms for the same diagnoses, whereas children change their answers from one time to the next. The length and rigid format of structured diagnostic interviews can be tedious and, therefore, inappropriate for younger children.

Semistructured Interviews

Semistructured interviews have a less rigid format than the structured diagnostic interviews. Questions are usually organized by content areas, such as children's school functioning, friends and social relations, and family relations. Some semistructured interviews are designed to produce psychiatric diagnoses. However, as with the DICA-IV and DISC-IV, reliability of semistructured diagnostic interviews tends to be higher for parents than for children.

The Semistructured Clinical Interview for Children and Adolescents, Second Edition (SCICA) (McConaughy & Achenbach, 2001) is a clinical assessment interview designed for children ages 6 to 18 years. The SCICA protocol lists a series of openended questions that allow a variety of responses rather than “yes” or “no” answers. Table 1 lists samples of SCICA questions in seven topic areas. Interviewers can alter the sequence of questions and topics to follow the child's lead in conversation. This allows more flexibility and a more conversational style than is possible in the structured diagnostic interviews. The SCICA also includes a family drawing for children ages 6 to 11 years.

...