Investigating the utility of the Ages and Stages Questionnaire as a research tool: Health visiting contacts and early child development in Bradford

Parents of young children should receive a mandated, routine visit from a health visitor when their child is aged 2-2 ½ years old, with the administration of the Ages and Stages Questionnaire (ASQ-3) (and practitioners may also choose to use the ASQ:SE, social and emotional questionnaire). The ASQs are generalised measures of child development and may serve as useful measures in future research studies, however, there is little known about how these questionnaires are implemented in the UK, and their average scores.

The Born in Bradford’s Better Start (BiBBS) cohort relies on routine measures including the ASQ as outcomes for intervention evaluations. This study will improve our understanding of the administration of the ASQ in real-world practice and our understanding of the early life factors which may impact upon child development, potentially enabling us to identify children who may need more support.

This study will use data from the Born in Bradford’s Better Start (BiBBS) cohort to investigate the utility of the ASQ as a research measure. It will also investigate the early life factors associated with childhood development (with the ASQ as the outcome).