Abstract: Behavioral problems in childhood have been associated with conduct problems later in life. Thus, it is essen-tial that youths with or at risk for conduct problems receive the help they need on time. Therefore, youth with or at risk for conduct problem must receive effective risk-need assessments and intervention plans regardless the person who conducts the assessment. ESTER-assessment is a structured, computer-aided, risk-need instrument developed for assessing youth (0-18) with or at risk for conduct problems. It uses a five-step response scale to assess 19 research-based risk and protective factors and the present study tests the inter-rater reliability of these 19 factors. This was done by comparing the assessments conducted by two independent raters who assessed the file information of 30 girls (mean age = 16.9) who had been incarcerated due to psychosocial problems, criminality and/or drug abuse. Results showed fair to good agreement for the majority of the factors via intra-class correlations and percentage agreement varied on the 19 factors from 24.1 to 80.8 % for exact agreement and from 72.2 to 96.7 % for exact agreement or difference by one step on the response scale. We conclude that it is possible to gain acceptable to excellent inter-rater reliability in assessing risk and protective factors via ESTER-assessment.Abstract: Behavioral problems in childhood have been associated with conduct problems later in life. Thus, it is essen-tial that youths with or at risk for conduct problems receive the help they need on time. Therefore, youth with or at risk for conduct problem must receive effective risk-need assessments and intervention plans regardless the person who cond...Show More
