Minnesota Child Development Inventory

The Child Development Inventory- Minnesota has been used since the early 1980s to document the development of children who are deaf or hard of hearing in the state of Colorado.  The questionnaire was chosen for this purpose because it can be used from birth through 7 years of age.  This inventory is a parent-questionnaire that can be updated every six months.

There are over 300 items and the response format is “yes” or “no”.

This developmental inventory has been important for:

1. Documenting progress over time
2. Comparing the child’s performance to typical development
3. Raising “red flags” in specific areas of development that may lead to a referral for additional assessment.
4. Providing system data for monitoring the quality of the system at meeting family/childrens’ needs.

The Child Development Inventory (MINN) has the following subtests:

————— LINKS  ————–

1. Expressive Language (CDI EL)  LINK 1 Subtest
2. Comprehension Conceptual (CDI CC) Link 2 Subtest
3. Personal-Social (CDI PS) Link 3 Subtest
4. Fine Motor (CDI FM) Link 4 Subtest
5. Gross Motor (CDI GM) Link 5 subtest
6. Self Help (CDI SH) LInk6 subtest
7. Situation Comprehension (CDI SC) Link 7 subtest
8. General Development (CDI GD) Link 8 subtest

Norms can also be accessed for the following groups:

• Early-identified children – by 6 months
• Late-identified children – after 6 months
• Children with mild and moderate hearing loss
• Children with moderate-severe and severe hearing loss
• Children with profound hearing loss
• Total Group – all children with permanent bilateral hearing loss

VALIDITY AND RELIABILITY OF THE CHILD DEVELOPMENT INVENTORY:

• The Expressive Language scale of the MINN has a split-half reliability of .54 to .92 depending on the age of the children tested (Ireton & Thwing, 1974).
• The MINN Expressive Language scale’s concurrent and predictive validity has been examined when using the scale with both special needs and typically developing children.
• Among a sample of children referred to a communication disorders clinic, the MINN Expressive Language Scale showed a significant association with the Reynell Developmental Expressive Language Scale, r = .50, (Chaffee, Cunningham, Secord-Gilbert, Elbard, & Richards, 1990).
• In spontaneous speech samples taken from typically developing 23- to 28-month-old children, MINN Expressive Language was highly and significantly associated with both Sequenced Inventory of Communication Development and Mean Length of Utterance (MLU) (coefficients were .67 and .68: Tomblin, Shonrock, & Hardy, 1989).
• In both a random population sample (Gottfried, Guerin, Spencer, & Meyer, 1984) and an at-risk sample (Eisert, Spector, Shankaran, Faigenbaum, & Szego, 1980), significant correlation coefficients of .51 to .79 were obtained between MINN Expressive Language and Verbal scores of the McCarthy Scales of Children’s Abilities. This instrument is used with all groups of children.
• The MINN has demonstrated reliability and validity in a sample of D/HH children. A coefficient of .94 was obtained when MINN Expressive Language reliability was calculated in a sample of 150 D/HH participants using Cronbach’s Alpha, (Yoshinaga-Itano, et al., 1998). The study found MINN expressive language was significantly and highly correlated (r = .76) with MLU calculated from a spontaneous speech samples taken from 109 different D/HH participants.
  • Additionally, in a sample of 136 D/HH participants MINN Expressive language was found to be significantly correlated (r = .74) with the MacArthur Communicative Development Inventories (Fenson et al., 1993
• Ireton & Thwing, 2008 Child Development Inventory, Pearson Education, Inc. Upper Saddle River, NJ
• Minnesota Child Development Inventory