Psychometric assessment of the French European Developmental Coordination Disorder Questionnaire (DCDQ-FE)

Background The Developmental Coordination Disorder Questionnaire'07 (DCDQ'07) is a parent-report measure to identify children at risk for Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). We developed a French version of the DCDQ'07 (DCDQ-FE) that has shown excellent inter-language reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) = 0.91) and is culturally relevant for use in European countries. The aims of this study were to examine the internal consistency, test-retest reliability, construct validity of the Developmental Coordination Disorder Questionnaire-French European (DCDQ-FE), as well as establish a cut-off score. Methods The psychometric properties of the DCDQ-FE were examined with a clinical group of 30 children (mean age: 9.4 years, SD = 2.6) and a control group of 43 children (mean age: 9.1 years, SD = 2.4). Their parents (n = 73) filled out the DCDQ-FE at a first sitting and 70 of them filled it out 38 days later in average for test-retest reliability. The children were assessed using the Movement Assessment Battery for Children-2 (MABC-2) so as to measure the convergent validity of the DCDQ-FE. The cut-off score was determined with an additional sample of 42 children according to scores on the MABC-2 (>= 16th percentile) (n = 115). Results and implications Internal consistency of the DCDQ-FE was excellent (Cronbach's alpha = 0.96) and test-retest reliability was good (ICC = 0.956) with no differences between scores obtained at the two sittings (p > 0.05). Differences in scores between children in the clinical and control groups (Z = -6.58, p < 0.001) provide evidence of construct validity. The correlation obtained between DCDQ-FE and MABC-2 scores (Spearman's rho correlation coefficient = 0.802, p < 0.001) supports convergent validity. Using a cut-off of 56, overall sensitivity and specificity were 85.0% and 81.6% respectively (area under the curve = 0.896). The DCDQ-FE is a reliable and valid questionnaire for detecting children who are at risk for DCD in a European-French population of children aged 5 to 15 years old.