The study evaluated the psychometric properties of Finnish versions of the Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory for Children
(SPAI-C) and the Social Anxiety Scale for Children-Revised (SASC-R). 352 students (M = 12.2 years) participated in the study
and completed the SPAI-C and SASC-R. In addition, 68 participants (M = 12.2 years) and their parents were interviewed with
the Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School Aged Children (K-SADS-PL). The SPAI-C was more sensitive
for identifying youth meeting criteria for social phobia (SP), whereas the SASC-R demonstrated greater specificity. The youth
in this sample had lower mean total scores on the self-report questionnaires than did those in the original validitation studies
of the SPAI-C and SASC-R conducted in America. These findings question whether cross-cultural differences in the expression
of SP influence the clinical cut-off scores used in translated versions of social anxiety questionnaires.
Keywords social anxiety - social phobia - SPAI-C - SASC-R
An erratum to this article can be found online at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00787-010-0100-1