Social-Emotional Screening

Children's ability to regulate their emotions and skillfully manage social interactions is critical to their healthy development and future success. If social-emotional problems are identified and addressed early, children are less likely to be placed in special education programs-and later in life, they're also less likely to experience school failure, unemployment, and incarceration.

Preventing social-emotional challenges in the critical early years is a matter of national concern. The first step is timely, accurate, and cost-effective screening-with a screener like Ages & Stages Questionnaires®: Social-Emotional (ASQ:SE)-that pinpoints problem areas before they do damage to a child's development. The earlier a social-emotional problem is recognized and intervention is begun, the better the child's chance of substantial improvement.

What is Social-Emotional Screening?

Social-emotional screening is the practice of systematically looking for and monitoring signs that a young child may be delayed in one or more areas of social-emotional development, such as communication, autonomy, affect, and interaction with people.

		Where Can ASQ:SE Be Conducted? Anyone who works with infants and young children can play a key role in the early identification of social-emotional concerns. ASQ:SE can be completed in:
			Homes
			Primary health care clinics
			Immunization clinics
			Mental health clinics
			Child care centers
			Preschool
			Baby groups
			Health fairs
			School screenings
			Community child-find activities

Screening is not meant to establish a diagnosis for the child but rather to help professionals determine whether more in-depth social-emotional assessment is called for. In most cases, screening rules out the likelihood that further assessment is needed.

Using a high quality screening tool like ASQ:SE, professionals can screen children for social-emotional concerns accurately and cost-effectively.

How Do Screening Tools Work?

Screening tools usually take the form of a series of questions or checklists used to track children's development relative to milestones achieved by a larger group of children of the same age. A home-grown checklist won't accurately evaluate this development; screening tools must be carefully validated by research.

With ASQ:SE, parents or other caregivers answer a series of simple questions regarding their child's social-emotional development (e.g., "Is your baby able to calm himself down (for example, by sucking on his hand or pacifier?)"; "Does your child like to be picked up and held?"). Children whose social-emotional development appears to fall significantly below that of their peers are flagged for further attention.

Learn how ASQ:SE screens children for social-emotional concerns accurately and cost-effectively >>