Screening Instruments for Mental Illness in Juvenile Offenders: The MAYSI and the BSI

• NCJ Number: 183504
• Author(s): N. Dickson Reppucci Ph.D.; Richard E. Redding Ph.D.
• Date Published: 2000
• Length: 4 pages
• Grant Number(s): 97-JE-FX-0051
• Sponsoring Agency: Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP); Virginia Dept of Criminal Justice Services
• Sale Source: NCJRS Photocopy Services; Juvenile Justice Clearinghouse/NCJRS
• Publication Format: Document
• Publication Type: Measurement/Evaluation Device
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

After briefly describing the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) and the Massachusetts Youth Screening Instrument (MAYSI), which are used as screening instruments for mental illness in juveniles, this study reviews the research on the effectiveness of these instruments.

Abstract

The BSI is designed to measure current psychological symptom status and is oriented toward psychiatric diagnoses. The BSI yields scores on nine syndrome constructs and provides three total scores that indicate psychological distress. It has been used in a variety of published research studies, and reliability and validity have been established and are acceptable. The BSI typically requires only 7-10 minutes to complete, and it is easily scored. Among its weaknesses are that it has not been used with juveniles in the justice system, and recommended cut-off scores many not be valid for a detention center population; it does not have a specific suicide subscale and does not assess aggression or drug and alcohol use. It is also relatively expensive to purchase. The MAYSI is specifically designed to assess psychological distress experienced by youth in the juvenile justice system for the purpose of referral to mental health services. It focuses on symptoms and signs of distress, rather than psychiatric diagnoses. It measures both situational and characterological distress. There is no total MAYSI score, but rather scores on nine subscales, each assessing a different type of distress. Its reliability and validity have been established on a large sample of youth in the juvenile justice system. To date, only one study has investigated both the BSI and the MAYSI simultaneously. Land (1998) individually administered either the BSI or the MAYSI or both to 149 male adjudicated adolescents at a Diagnostic and Reception Center in Virginia. The MAYSI and BSI correlated well with each other but not as well with clinicians' ratings. Both instruments failed to identify some youth who should be referred for a full mental health assessment according to the clinicians and misidentified some youth who did not need to be referred. Neither instrument alone would be sufficient to identify accurately all youth in need of mental health services. 8 references