Preliminary findings on the psychometric properties of the Chinese version verbal and nonverbal interaction scale (C-VNVIS)

Abstract

Communication between caregivers and care recipients is crucial in providing quality nursing care. However, older persons with cognitive impairment have major difficulties in verbal communication due to deterioration in their ability to express themselves verbally. The Chinese version Verbal and Non-verbal Interaction Scale (C-VNVIS-CR) was developed to assess behavioural responses in an all-round approach that captures both the sociable (such as calm, relaxed) and unsociable (such as argumentative, shouting) versus the verbal and non-verbal behavioural responses that may be observed in cognitively impaired people. The preliminary results show that it has satisfactory levels of inter-rater and test-retest reliability as well as internal consistency, but only modest levels of correlation with another observational scale for assessing cognitively impaired people emotional changes. Thus, further validation studies of the C-VNVIS-CR are necessary. However, the most important point of this study is that it sheds new light on how cognitively impaired residents’ responses can be assessed in a reliable and systematic manner. This is an important first step to evaluate and monitor the quality of care provided to them based on their behavioural responses via the consistent use of C-VNVIS-CR – an observation-based instrument. 照顧者和被照顧者之間的溝通是提供優質護理服務的關鍵。但是，由於患有認知障礙的長者的言語表達能力已衰退，因此他們未必能夠進行言語溝通互動。發展C-VNVIS-CR就是用以全方位評估認知障礙者的行為反應，捕捉有可能在他們身上觀察到的社交(例如鎮靜和輕鬆)和非社交(例如爭吵和呼喝)及言語和非言語的行為反應。 初步結果顯示雖然C-VNVIS-CR的觀察者評分信度、再測信度和內部一致性信度都處於滿意水平，但與另一份用以量度認知障礙人士情緒轉變的觀察量表的相關係數只有中度水平。 因此， 這需要進一步的驗證研究以收集更多證據支持C-VNVIS-CR的效度。然而，這項研究最重要的一點是能夠進一步了解如何對有認知障礙的長者的反應進行可靠和有系統的評估。另外，這亦為使用觀測量表(即 C-VNVIS-CR) 量度認知障礙長者的行為表現，並持續地評估和監測給予他們的護理的品質踏出重要的一步。