| Training of independent living skills increasingly played a significant role in education and rehabilitation programs for persons with disabilities over the past several years. Review of the literature revealed there was a lack of valid, reliable assessment instrumentation for the evaluation of independent living skills, particularly for adolescent and adult persons. The National Independent Living Skills Screening Instrument was designed to meet that need. The purpose of this study was twofold: (a) to investigate concurrent criteria validity of the National Independent Living Skills (NILS) Screening Instrument, utilizing the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale (VABS)-Survey Form and (b) to determine the predictive reliability of the NILS Screening Instrument.;One hundred eighteen subjects were involved in this study. Subjects represented six programs from three states: Alabama, Colorado, and Minnesota. Subjects were between the ages of 16 and 51 years, had a disgnosed hearing impairment, and may have had secondary handicapping conditions. Three types of information were collected from each subject: (a) performance on the VABS-Survey Form, (b) performance on the NILS Screening Instrument, and (c) demographic data. Individual program personnel administered the assessment instruments utilizing first and third person assessor techniques.;Results of Pearson Product Moment Correlation and canonical correlation analyses supported the conclusion that the NILS Screening Instrument had a high level of concurrent criterion validity based on the VABS-Survey Form. Results of discriminant analysis supported findings that the NILS Screening Instrument significantly discriminated among six levels of supervision found in alternative living environments. The implications of this study were that the National Independent Living Skills Screening Instrument was a valid, reliable tool that could serve as an alternative to existing instrumentation for assessment of independent living skills of persons 16 years of age and older with a diagnosed hearing impairment and possible secondary handicapping conditions. |
