Validation francophone du Toddler Attention Questionnaire, un questionnaire d'attention des jeunes enfants

Objectives: There is a lack of tools for non-parental caregivers and in the French language to assess the quality of the attachment relationship with toddlers. The Toddler Attention Questionnaire (TAQ) is an Italian scale created for caregivers in day care centers. By its focus on the exploration system, the TAQ offers the opportunity to study the relation between attention characteristics and attachment behavior in toddlers. In the attachment theory, a link is often assumed between these two concepts. Mary Main has described the different attachment patterns (secure, insecure avoidant, insecure ambivalent-resistant, disorganized) by using cognitive psychology dimensions relying on attentional processes. However, this relation is hardly proven scientifically and study results in this field are not always congruent. The validation of the TAQ in French, main purpose of this study, is likely to add new contributions to this field. Materials and methods: The Toddler Attention Questionnaire is composed of 29 self-reported items and four dimensions which describe 4 attentional processes: lability, flexibility, detachment, disorientation. The items present different behaviors and measure, on a five-point Likert scale, the quality of children's attention during exploration. The French translation was made by two native bilingual persons following the back translation procedure and was administered to the primary caregiver, who was in charge of each child in 13 French daycare centers. The questionnaires were completed for 148 children aged from 20 to 36 months who attended to the daycare center at least 20 hours per week. Results: The analyses show a robust structure into three dimensions: the disorientation subscale was deleted because of its reduced contribution to the total variance. Some items were also shifted (9 items) or deleted (6 items) compared to their contribution to the different dimensions. Moreover, a qualitative analysis of the remarks from the participants allowed to adapt some items' formulation (4 items). The final French version of the TAQ, composed of 23 items, explained 46.94 % of the variance. The Cronbach's Alphas ranged from 0.64 (Flexibility) to 0.83 (Lability). The TAQ is a dimensional tool: the sum of the scores gives a position of the child behavior in a continuum of attachment security in each dimension. Conclusions: Two main differences between the present validation and the original study may limit generalization and comparability. First, we adopted large selection criteria, including children who attended to a daycare center at least 20 hours per week, instead of 36 hours per week of the original study. This choice allowed to collect more questionnaires and to be closer to the total rate of hours attended by French children in daycare center. Second, our sample of professional participants was more heterogeneous than the Italian sample regarding the professional experiences and the seniority in the daycare center. With few items, well-defined questions and easy administration, the TAQ seems to be a cost-effective alternative to the traditional methods used to assess attachment behaviors such as the Strange Situation or the Attachment Q-Sort. Hence, the major advantage of our validation is to allow French researchers to carry out studies with large samples in the attachment field, particularly with toddlers and professional caregivers. Studying the secondary attachment relationship is essential to highlight how a child copes with the absence of his primary attachment figure in the daycare center. Moreover, the focus on attention processes is important to prevent attention deficits and learning difficulties and to reduce its potential effect on the child's development. Nevertheless, further research would be needed to extend its psychometric proprieties (convergent, discriminant and test-retest validity) and to examine its clinical usefulness.