title: The German Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS-G): Reliability and Validity of a Novel Assessment of Communicative Participation.
abstract: Our purpose was to explore the validity and reliability of the German Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (FOCUS-G; Thomas-Stonell, Oddson, Robertson, & Rosenbaum, 2010, 2012), which is an authorized adaptation of the Focus on the Outcomes of Communication Under Six (Thomas-Stonell et al., 2010) tool, which measures communicative participation in preschool children.
  
  
  
  Parents of typically developing children (TDC) and of children with speech impairment (CSI) completed the FOCUS-G and the Questionnaire for Measuring Health-Related Quality of Life in Children (KiddyKINDL; Ravens-Sieberer & Bullinger, 2000). To determine test-retest reliability, the FOCUS-G was readministered to a subsample of parents 1 week later.
  
  
  
  The FOCUS-G had high values for internal consistency (α = .959, Ω = .941), test-retest reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient = .974), and split-half reliability (r = .832). Total scores on the FOCUS-G and KiddyKINDL demonstrated significant associations. FOCUS-G total scores and subdomain scores for both samples showed significant correlations, indicating good construct validity. The discriminatory ability of the FOCUS-G was indicated by significantly higher mean scores for TDC (M = 6.03, SD = 0.65) than CSI (M = 5.47, SD = 1.02).
  
  
  
  The overall good psychometric properties of this novel assessment of communicative participation support its use by speech-language pathologists for clinical and research purposes with German-speaking children.
authors.affiliation: Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Human Sciences, University of Cologne, Germany.
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Neumann
authors.affiliation: Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Human Sciences, University of Cologne, Germany.
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Salm
authors.affiliation: Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Human Sciences, University of Cologne, Germany.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Rietz
authors.affiliation: Department of Special Education and Rehabilitation, Faculty of Human Sciences, University of Cologne, Germany.
authors.forename: Prisca
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Stenneken
mesh_terms: D002652:Child Behavior / Q000523:psychology; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003142:Communication; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007805:Language Development Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis*; D008297:Male; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results