Identifying Autism with a Brief and Low-Cost Screening Instrument-OERA: Construct Validity, Invariance Testing, and Agreement Between Judges

Simple and low-cost observational-tools to detect symptoms of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are still necessary. The OERA is a new assessment tool to screen children eliciting observable behaviors with no substantial knowledge on ASD required. The sample was 99 children aged 3-10: 76 with ASD and 23 without ASD (11/23 had intellectual disability). The 13 remained items exhibited high interrater agreement and high reliability loaded onto a single latent trait. Such model showed excellent fit indices evaluated via confirmatory factor analysis and no item showed differential function in terms of age/sex/IQ. A cutoff of five points or higher resulted in the highest sensitivity (92.75) and specificity (90.91) percentages. OERA is a brief, stable, low-cost standardized observational-screening to identify ASD children.State of Sao Paulo Funding Agency-FAPESP under Maria Cecilia Souto Vidigal FoundationNational Research Council-CNPqUniv Prebiteriana Mackenzie, Dev Disorders Program, Rua Consolacao 930,Edificio 28, BR-01302907 Sao Paulo, SP, BrazilFed Univ Sao Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Psychiat, Sao Paulo, SP, BrazilFed Univ Sao Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Genet, Sao Paulo, SP, BrazilUniv Fed Rio Grande do Sul, Dept Psychol, Porto Alegre, RS, BrazilFed Univ Sao Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Psychiat, Sao Paulo, SP, BrazilFed Univ Sao Paulo UNIFESP, Dept Genet, Sao Paulo, SP, BrazilFAPESP: 2012/51584-0CNPq: 401468/2010-0Web of Scienc