Translation and Cultural Adaptation of the Cognitive Assessment System 2: Rating Scale

In Puerto Rico there are no scales in Spanish for teachers to assess the neurocognitive processes underlying the academic and social functioning of students, as established in the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). This paper documents the process of translation and cultural adaptation of the Cognitive Assessment System 2: Rating Scale, which allows teachers to assess the neurocognitive processes of the PASS theory (Planning, Attention, Simultaneous and Successive Processing) in children and adolescents. A concurrent triangulation was used with a sample that included 2 translators, 8 experts in neurocognitive processes and 15 teachers. Chávez and Canino’s (2005) methodology was used to obtain semantic and content equivalence. The procedure included: translation into Spanish, review by bilingual experts and teachers, back-translation and final review by experts. According to the results, the reviewers understood the translation of all items, but suggested semantic (e.g. grammatical) and content (e.g. examples of cultural concepts) changes to maintain equivalence with the original version. This work shows the importance of avoiding literal translations, while using comprehensive models of translation and adaptation. In addition, it provides a tool for the identification and early intervention of Specific Learning Disorders (SLD) in Spanish-speaking students, in compliance with IDEA.