The influence of culture and language on the original and revised Tasks of Emotional Development (TED) test in Latino adolescent males

In this study 15 adolescent Latino males were asked to tell stories to the Original and Revised Tasks of Emotional Development (TED) test. The children provided TED narratives in either English or Spanish, which was either their primary or secondary language. These stories were scored using the TED test's objective scoring system and these results were compared to demographic data and their acculturation to the United States. Statistically significant differences were found between some of the scores given to Revised TED card narratives when compared to the stories given to the equivalent Original TED card. These scores indicated more socially-appropriate or mature for the Affect, Outcome and Spontaneity scores. There was no statistically significant difference in any Perception scoring pairs for any TED card in the total sample. Several hypotheses are provided for these scoring differences including the possible influences of culture, acculturation and language.