Adaptation and standartization of Pragmatic Language Skills Inventory into Turkish

In Turkey, children with pragmatic problems become apparent at preschool and elementary school with accompanying diffuculties in their social relations which increase gradually. However experts, parents and teachers usually remain unsatisfactory in determining the problem and forming the corresponding intervention plan. One of the reasons for this issue is the lack of an objective instrument which can evaluate pragmatic skills.Purpose of this research is adaptation and standardization of Pragmatic Language Skills Inventory (PLSI) into Turkish. PLSI is designed to evaluate pragmatic skills of 5-12 years old children.Turkish version of Pragmatic Language Skill Inventory (PDBE-TV) has 45 articles, standard reference and it is dependant on teacher evaluation. Evaluation category is pragmatic language development of the children between 5 and 12 years old. The evaluation can be applied in such a short time such as 5-10 minutes and it features a 9 points Likert scale.PDBE is preferred because of its easy application and interpretation. In addition, there is yet no standardized instrument in Turkish which can evaluate pragmatic language skill. Therefore this inventory aims to be an introductory study about the topic.This research is descriptive. In this research data is gathered from 705 males and 678 females, in total 1383 children who are between 5-12 years old among 18 schools in İstanbul.Analysis yielded a high alpha coefficient which points out that PDBE-TV is indeed a reliable inventory. In addition re-testing results showed that PDBE-TV is time-independent. Although not standardized, another thesis research Pragmatic Language Skills Control List Scale is used to evaluate the criteria dependent reliability. According to data gathered, it can be stated that PDBE-TV and Pragmatic Language Skills Control List Scale have criteria interdependent reliability. Furthermore it is observed that PDBE-TV can differentiate between persons with autistic defect, mental incapacity and persons who show normal development.Therefore this inventory can be used as a means to scan in schools and upon determining below average students, those students can be directed to proper child neurologs, guidance and research centers in order to be evaluated in detail. This inventory?s articles can also be used in setting objectives to improve pragmatic language skills.