Abstract
Abstract We developed a reporting guideline to provide authors with guidance about what should be reported when writing a paper for publication in a scientific journal using a particular type of research design: the single-case experimental design. This report describes the methods used to develop the Single-Case Reporting guideline In BEhavioural interventions (SCRIBE) 2016. As a result of 2 online surveys and a 2-day meeting of experts, the SCRIBE 2016 checklist was developed, which is a set of 26 items that authors need to address when writing about single-case research. This article complements the more detailed SCRIBE 2016 Explanation and Elaboration article (Tate et al., 2016) that provides a rationale for each of the items and examples of adequate reporting from the literature. Both these resources will assist authors to prepare reports of single-case research with clarity, completeness, accuracy, and transparency. They will also provide journal reviewers and editors with a practical checklist against which such reports may be critically evaluated. We recommend that the SCRIBE 2016 is used by authors preparing manuscripts describing single-case research for publication, as well as journal reviewers and editors who are evaluating such manuscripts.
Scientific Abstract Reporting guidelines, such as the Consolidated Standards of Reporting Trials (CONSORT) Statement, improve the reporting of research in the medical literature (Turner et al., 2012). Many such guidelines exist and the CONSORT Extension to Nonpharmacological Trials (Boutron et al., 2008) provides suitable guidance for reporting between-groups intervention studies in the behavioral sciences. The CONSORT Extension for N-of-1 Trials (CENT 2015) was developed for multiple crossover trials with single individuals in the medical sciences (Shamseer et al., 2015; Vohra et al., 2015), but there is no reporting guideline in the CONSORT tradition for single-case research used in the behavioral sciences. We developed the Single-Case Reporting guideline In BEhavioural interventions (SCRIBE) 2016 to meet this need. This Statement article describes the methodology of the development of the SCRIBE 2016, along with the outcome of 2 Delphi surveys and a consensus meeting of experts. We present the resulting 26-item SCRIBE 2016 checklist. The article complements the more detailed SCRIBE 2016 Explanation and Elaboration article (Tate et al., 2016) that provides a rationale for each of the items and examples of adequate reporting from the literature. Both these resources will assist authors to prepare reports of single-case research with clarity, completeness, accuracy, and transparency. They will also provide journal reviewers and editors with a practical checklist against which such reports may be critically evaluated.
Keywords: single-case design, methodology, reporting guidelines, publication standards
Supplemental materials: http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/arc0000026.supp
Footnotes
The SCRIBE Group wishes to pay special tribute to our esteemed colleague Professor William Shadish (1949–2016) who passed away on the eve of publication of this article. His contribution at all stages of the SCRIBE project was seminal.
Funding for the SCRIBE project was provided by the Lifetime Care and Support Authority of New South Wales, Australia. The funding body was not involved in the conduct, interpretation or writing of this work. We acknowledge the contribution of the responders to the Delphi surveys, as well as administrative assistance provided by Kali Godbee and Donna Wakim at the SCRIBE consensus meeting. Lyndsey Nickels was funded by an Australian Research Council Future Fellowship (FT120100102) and Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Cognition and Its Disorders (CE110001021). For further discussion on this topic, please visit the Archives of Scientific Psychology online public forum at http://arcblog.apa.org.
In order to encourage dissemination of the SCRIBE Statement, this article is freely accessible through Archives of Scientific Psychology and will also be published in the American Journal of Occupational Therapy, Aphasiology, Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy, Evidence-Based Communication Assessment and Intervention, Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, Journal of School Psychology, Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, Physical Therapy, and Remedial and Special Education. The authors jointly hold the copyright for this article.
- Received August 21, 2015.
- Accepted November 16, 2015.
- © 2016 The Author(s). Reprinted from: Tate RL, Perdices M, Rosenkoetter U, et al. The Single-Case Reporting Guideline In BEhavioural Interventions (SCRIBE) 2016 Statement. Arch Sci Psychol. 2016;4:1–9.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/),which allows anyone to download, reuse, reprint, modify, distribute, and/or copy this content, so long as the original authors and source are cited and the article's integrity is maintained. Copyright for this article is retained by the author(s). Author(s) grant(s) the American Psychological Association a license to publish the article and identify itself as the original publisher. No permission is required from the authors or the publisher.
Issue highlights
