Chapter 5 Assessment: Overview INTRODUCTION TO CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY 2E HUNSLEY & LEE PREPARED BY DR. CATHY CHOVAZ, KING’S COLLEGE, UWO
Jan 08, 2018
Chapter 5Assessment: Overview
INTRODUCTION TO CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY 2EHUNSLEY & LEE
PREPARED BY DR. CATHY CHOVAZ, KING’S COLLEGE, UWO
Psychological Assessment Competencies in Psychological Assessment Assessment Focused Intervention Focused Additional Assessment Types Psychological Testing
Assessment – Topics
An iterative process Systematic Information about the person’s physical,
social, and cultural environments Refining the question at hand before
responding to a question or a goal of the assessment
Psychological Assessment
Generating and refining hypotheses Importance of being informed about human
diversity Age Gender Sexual orientation Culture Religious beliefs
Psychological Assessment
Knowledge of: psychometric theory the scientific, theoretical, empirical, and
contextual bases of assessment
Knowledge, skills, and techniques to assess: cognitive affective behavioral personality
Competencies inPsychological Assessment
Ability to: assess intervention outcomes evaluate multiple roles that clients and psychologists
function
Understanding of the relation between assessment and intervention and intervention planning
Technical assessment skills, including problem/goal identification and case conceptualization
Competencies inPsychological Assessment
Assessment-focused services: Information provided that addresses a person’s current or anticipated psychosocial deficits
For example, child custody evaluations
Assessment Focused
Intervention-focused services: The first step in gathering information about appropriate treatment
For example, intake evaluation at a clinic
Intervention Focused
Screening: A tool often developed to identify a disorder, condition or characteristic, depending on the site For example, a measure that identifies mental
health problems in adolescents
Diagnosis/Case Formulation: The development of an understanding of the basis/etiology of the problem that informs treatment For example, early stages of therapy
Additional Assessment Types
Prognosis/Prediction: An assessment used to see whether a problem will worsen without treatment Whether one needs therapy for a given problem
Prediction errors – unfortunately common in clinical psychology
Base rate – frequency of a problem in the general population
Additional Assessment Types
Prognosis/Prediction (cont):Sensitivity – the number of times an event is predicted compared to the actual number of eventsSpecificity – the number of times a non-event is predicted compared to the actual number of non-events
Prediction True Event True Non-EventEvent True Positives (A) False Positives (B)Non-Event False Negatives (C) True Negatives (D)Sensitivity: A / (A + C)Specificity: D / (D + B)
Additional Assessment Types
A Psychologist who conducts assessments to determine who is at risk for future suicide attempts
Sensitivity – provides information on how well the assessment procedures are able to detect future suicide attemptsSpecificity – provides information on how well the assessment procedures were able to identify individuals who would not attempt suicideIdeal - ↑specificity and ↑sensitivity
Example
1. PlanningGreat deal of assessment is designed to inform
treatment-related decisions
Useful treatment plan:1. Problem Identification2. Treatment Goals3. Treatment Strategies
Treatment
2. Monitoring Psychologist must closely monitor the impact
of Tx Enables treatment plans to change to better
meet the patient’s needs (i.e., shortened, lengthened, intensified)
How is it monitored? Interviews Brief psychological tests Specific tests designed for goals
Treatment (cont.)
1. Evaluation Outcome data is typically collected to
document the extent to which psychological treatment has been effective in achieving stated goals
May also be used to evaluate an entire service or individual clinicians
Also yields much more data on the effects on clients, strengths and weaknesses of the strategy, etc.
Treatment (cont.)
Psychological testing:
A sample of a person’s behavior scored in a standardized process Not the same as psychological assessment (which is
often more multi-faceted and may not use tests per se)
Psychological Testing
Standardization: Consistency across clinicians in the procedure
used to administer and score a test
Reliability: A measure of the consistency of the test
Internal consistency: whether all aspects of the test contribute meaningfully
Test-retest reliability: whether similar results would be obtained at 2 time points
Inter-rater reliability: whether similar results would be found by several raters
Psychological Testing: Important Concepts
Validity: Whether a test measures what it is supposed to
measure
Content validity: whether the test measures all aspects of the construct
Concurrent and predictive validity: whether the test data are consistent with other related constructs
Discriminant validity: whether the test is not measuring unrelated constructs
Incremental validity: whether the measure adds to other sources of data
Psychological Testing: Important Concepts
Norms: Using a large sample to determine cut off
scores on a test Representative sample: importance of using a
sample that matches the population Percentile rank: percentage of those in the
normative group that fell below a given test score
Evidence-based assessment: using theory and research to guide the process of assessment
Psychological Testing: Important Concepts
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