Overview
The Student Risk Screening Scale is a brief, no-cost, user-friendly screening tool designed to identify school-aged students with externalizing problems. The SRSS includes the following seven items: (a) steal; (b) lie, cheat, sneak; (c) behavior problem; (d) peer rejection; (e) low academic achievement; (f) negative attitude; and (g) aggressive behavior. These items are rated on a four-point Likert-type scale (never = 0, occasionally = 1, sometimes = 2, frequently = 3). Total scores are summed (range = 0–21, with higher scores indicating higher risk) and used to classify students into one of three risk categories established by publishers: low (0–3), moderate (4–8), or high (9–21). The SSRS can be completed by teachers 6-8 weeks after the onset of the academic years and requires approximately 10 to 15 minutes to rate all students within a classroom.
Key Details
Grade Level
Assessment Type
Domains Assessed
Respondent
Method
Cost
No Cost
Time per Student
1-2 min
Items
7.0
Item Format
Frequency
Approach
Risk
Populations
Evidence is based on a sample of 937 middle school students in the Southeastern United States (Lane et al., 2013).
Scoring
Overall Scores
Externalizing
Internalizing
Subscale Scores
None
Scoring Procedures
Self-Scored
Interpretive Information
Degree of Risk/Cut Scores
Psychometric Properties
Reliability
The internal consistency of the full scale (SRSS-IE14) yielded an alpha coefficient of .81 (Lane at al., 2013).
Validity
Pearson’s product-moment correlation coefficients were computed between the SDQ scores (total and subscales) and the following SRSS scores: SRSS-E7 (the original 7 items), the SRSS-I5 (the new five items retained to assess internalizing behaviors), and SRSS-IE12 (all items from the SRSS-E7 and SRSS-I5) to establish convergent validity. Total scores ranged from 0 to 21 for the SRSS-E7, 0 to 15 for the SRSS-I5, and 0 to 36 for the SRSS-IE12. SRSS-I5 scores were significantly correlated with all SDQ scores. Correlation coefficients were moderately to highly positively and statistically significant for the Total Difficulties score (r = .39, p < .0001), the Emotional Symptoms (r = .53, p < .0001), and Peer Problems (r = .49, p < .0001) subscale (Lane et al., 2013).
References
Primary Citation
Drummond, T. (1994). The Student Risk Screening Scale (SRSS). Grants Pass, OR: Josephine County Mental Health Program.
Additional Citations
Lane, K. L., Oakes, W. P., Swogger, E. D., Schatschneider, C., Menzies, H., M., & Sanchez, J. (2015). Student risk screening scale for internalizing and externalizing behaviors: Preliminary cut scores to support data-informed decision making. Behavioral Disorders, 40, 159-170.
Lane, K. L., Oakes, W. P., Carter, E. W., Lambert, W. E., & Jenkins, A. B. (2013). Initial evidence for the reliability and validity of the Student Risk Screening Scale for internalizing and externalizing behaviors at the middle school level. Assessment for Effective Intervention, 39(1), 24–38. https://doi.org/10.1177/1534508413489336