A critical issue in evaluating the research evidence is consideration of how child care quality is measured

1. How is child care quality measured?
2. Does quality of child care have meaningful effects on children’s developmental outcomes?
3. Does child care quality affect maternal employment?
4. What is the quality of care in the United States? And
5. Is there a persuasive economic argument to justify public intervention to improve the quality of child care?

How Is Child Care Quality Measured?

Researchers have measured quality in various ways: by observing process, by recording structural and caregiver characteristics, by assessing health and safety provisions. Child care processes refer to actual experiences that occur in child care settings, including children’s interactions with caregivers and peers and their participation in different activities. Sometimes process measures are global scores that combine experiences across several areas that include health and safety provisions, interactions with caregivers, and age-appropriate materials. Other process measures target specific activities or experiences, such as language stimulation by caregivers. Structural and caregiver characteristics refer to features such as child:adult ratio, group class size, caregiver formal education, and caregiver specialized training related to children. Structural and caregiver characteristics are conceptualized as more distal indicators of child care quality. Health and safety provisions refer to both health-promoting practices, such as hand-washing, and safety in the classroom and on playgrounds.

Process Quality

One well-known process measure is the Early Care Environment Rating Scale (ECERS, Harms and Clifford, 1980). This measure is composed of 37 items that evaluate seven aspects of center-based care for children ages two and a half to five years. These areas are personal care routines, furnishings, language reasoning experiences, motor activities, creative activities, social development, and staff needs. Detailed descriptors are provided for each item and each item is rated as inadequate (1), minimal (3), good (5), and excellent (7). The ratings, according to the scale developers, are based on a minimum of a two-hour block of observation in the classroom. The Infant/Toddler Environment Rating Scale (ITERS, Harms, Cryer, and Clifford, 1990) is a related measure that assesses process quality in centers for children younger than two and a half years. The 35 items of the ITERS also are organized under seven domains and are rated on 7-point scales.

These same investigators have developed a 32-item observational measure, the Family Day Care Rating Scale (FDCRS), to assess process quality in child care homes (Harms and Clifford, 1989). Some items parallel items on the ITERS and the ECERS, but other items are unique because the instrument “tries to remain realistic for family day care home settings by not requiring that things be done as they navigate to this website are in day care centers” (p. 1).

As can be seen on Tables 1, 2, and 3, these measures are used widely in child care research. The measures have important strengths, including having good psychometric properties and being relatively easy to use reliably. Their widespread use means that cross-study comparisons are possible. These measures also have some limitations. The global composite score combines features of the physical environment, social experiences, and working conditions for staff. Some of these areas may well have greater influences on children’s intellectual functioning or social-emotional well-being than others. The composite score may underestimate effects relative to more targeted scales. A second limitation is that these measures are setting-specific. As a result, they cannot be used as interchangeable measures of quality, meaning that it is not possible to make simple comparisons across types of care or to combine scores in omnibus analyses that look at quality effects across different types of care. A third limitation is that these measures are not appropriate for assessing in-home care given by nannies or grandparents.