Research in Behavioral Disorders/Emotional Disturbance: A Survey of Subject Identification Criteria

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Abstract
A survey of 323 research studies in behavioral disorders/emotional disturbance was conducted to determine the nature and prevalence of the behavioral disorders/emotional disturbance identification criteria used to select subjects. Five categories of behavioral disorders emotional disturbance were found. The two most popular methods of subject selection were based on either previous classification (or diagnosis) or psychometric procedures using various assessment instruments. These two methods accounted for 75% of the studies surveyed. Besides general categories, specific identification criteria were analyzed and were found to be either primary or secondary indicators. Finally, identification criteria were analyzed by discipline (i.e., education, psychology, medicine). These findings led to the conclusion that the behavioral disorders/emotional disturbance research literature presents a divergent picture with respect to the nature and prevalence of behavioral disorders/emotional disturbance, and reflects a lack of consensus regarding standard identification criteria. The consequences are found in the absence of narrowly focused behavioral disorders/emotional disturbance subject samples which interferes with the basic scientific processes of generalization and replication.