5-15-R (FTF-R)

About the FTF-R questionnaire

The Five to Fifteen-R (FTF-R) questionnaire is a parent and teacher interview created in the 1990’s by researchers and clinicians in the Nordic countries. The questionnaire was originally called Five to Fifteen (FTF) (Kadesjö et al., 2004) and designed for children ages 5-15. It has since been developed, revised and ultimately renamed Five to Fifteen-R (FTF-R); after a new norming study (Lambek & Trillingsgaard, 2015), it now covers ages 5-17. FTF-R is used for examination of developmental disorders and behavioural problems, and sheds light on various important areas of child development. The questionnaire may be used by a number of different professions, but psychologists and doctors should be consulted when interpreting results.

Parents and teachers can respond to the questionnaire by filling out a paper form acquired by the examiner via the GNC website or via www.5-15.org. The parent and teacher responses can be filled out by authorised professionals online (www.5-15.org). This gives the examiner a breakdown of the results, as well as a graphical overview of how parents or teachers responded to the questionnaire. Parents and teachers can also respond to the questionnaire online by using temporary codes provided by the examiner.

How is the FTF-R scored?

The Five to Fifteen-R (FTF-R) questionnaire consists of 181 items, each being a statement which the respondent assesses as either 0 (“Does not apply”), 1 (“Applies sometimes/to some extent”) or 2 (“Applies”).

The items are divided into 8 different domains (areas): motor skills, executive function (including attention), perception, memory, language, learning, social competence and mental problems. Most domains are further divided into two or more subdomains.

There are also so-called “influence questions” after each domain, in which parents are asked to summarise whether the child’s behaviour creates difficulties in everyday life.
Finally, parents are asked to freely describe their child’s greatest strengths as well as whatever problems they are most worried about. This assessment should be based on the child’s behaviour over the last three months.

How is the FTF validated?

The Five to Fifteen-R (FTF-R) questionnaire is normed (Kadesjö et al., 2004) and a number of studies (Kadesjö et al., 2004; Korkman et al., 2004; Bohlin & Janols, 2004) have found it to have high validity and reliability. The current norms for the parent version of FTF-R were based on responses from approximately 4,000 randomly selected Danish parents between 2011 and 2013 (Lambek & Trillingsgaard, 2015). The norms for the teacher version were based on around 1,500 questionnaires filled out by Danish teachers. Parent responses were also available for these children, which made it possible to compare results from parent and teacher questionnaires.

What about cut-off values?

The results obtained via www.5-15.org show the responses for each item; the median, average and standard deviation; as well as the 90th and 98th percentiles for each domain and subdomain. A graph is also included, showing how the domain/subdomain results compare to the norm. Results in the green field of the graph are in the 90th percentile of the “norm group”, results in the yellow area are in the 90th to 98th percentile (moderate problems) and results in the grey section are over the 97th percentile (major problems).

Requirements for users of the 5-15R

In order to be approved as a user of the 5-15R, one must outline one’s professional qualifications/skills, in which context one intends to use the questionnaire, and also accept the ethical terms and conditions associated with the questionnaire. Users are expected to have basic education at the university level in education, medicine or psychology. Moreover, they are also expected to be working in teams assigned to investigating difficulties in children. Users should have good knowledge of normal child development and what constitutes abnormalities in this area. One must also possess basic knowledge of statistics in order to interpret results and be aware of the instrument’s possibilities and limitations. The most important factor within any investigation team is that the people involved have the competence required to interpret the results of the 5-15R. Other people can submit data but results and calculations/scoring must be interpreted and evaluated by people qualified to do so.

Once you have been approved as a user of the 5-15R, you are granted a personal username and password. Any individual choosing to share a password with a colleague to enable shared insight in different matters/projects is personally responsible for how it is used. The password should be changed at regular intervals.
Whatever information emerges is confidential, and both Swedish secrecy law and workplace rules for handling of confidential information apply.

When applying for a user account at www.5-15.org, you are to provide your professional e-mail address, not a private one (like @hotmail.com- or @gmail.com-addresses).

Parents' questionnaire (5-17 years)

* Russian version is not yet updated to 5-15-R standard

Teachers' questionnaires (5-17 years)

NEW in 2017: The database now includes norm data based on teachers' responses as well as parents'. Questionnaires can be scored accordingly.