CLP 4143 Abnormal Psychology Study Questions Dr M Licht Learning Objectives forTopic III How are Abnormal Behaviors Assessed Know all KEY TERMS on the assigned pages Key Terms are the boldfaced terms in the text and listed at end of chapter Definitions for most of these terms also can be found in the Glossary in the back of the textbook 1 What is meant by assessment and what purposes does it serve in research and treatment of psychopathology Ch 4 pgs 86 87 Assessment is the process of gathering of information to help solve a problem The purpose of assessment is to gather more information to know when the problems began how often they happened what made them better or worse and if there are other problems that may explain or interfere with their treatment It helps in research and treatment because it can help explain a principle problem and then go from there to help with treatment All the samples and information gathered can be used for research and help decide which treatment best helps the problems 2 Why must we be concerned about the consistency of behavior across time and situations when we attempt to assess it Ch 4 pg 87 We must see that the behaviors are not isolated events or just things happening during observation We need to know if behavior can be generalized to draw inferences from a person s behavior in a natural environment on the basis of the samples of behavior that are obtained The behavior needs to be persistent and to figure this out psychologists tend to find more than one source of information in an assessment 3 Why do psychologists often obtain assessment information from more than one source Ch 4 pg 87 Assessment information needs to come from more than one source because they want to be able to paint a broad integrated picture of the person s adjustment and then integrate all the data together to paint the picture 4 What criteria and methods are used to evaluate assessment procedures How about to evaluate classification and diagnostic systems pgs 83 85 Note This includes the Research Methods box on page 84 The same criteria that are used to evaluate diagnosis categories are used to evaluate the usefulness reliability and validity of the assessment Reliability refers to the consistency of measurements For an assessment to be reliable it must have test retest reliability or be able to have the same results after being taken twice Also it has to have inter rater reliability that two doctors would score the same patient the same The validity comes from the meaning or usefulness Etiological validity is concerned with factors that contribute to the onset of the disorder things in the past Concurrent validity is concerned with present time and with correlations between the disorder and other symptoms what is it associated with Predictive validity is concerned with the future and the stability of the problem over time Kappa the measuring the simple proportion of agreements between clinicians A score of 0 means no agreement and a score of 1 0 means perfect agreement A score of 0 7 indicates relatively good agreement and below 0 4 means poor agreement Reliability for Diagnosis of Mental Disorders between clinicians schizophrenia is 82 anxiety disorder is 74 mood disorders is 77 personality disorders is 47 substance abuse disorder is 84 5 What types of procedures are used to assess psychological factors When would you want to use each type What are the advantages and limitations of each type Ch 4 pgs 88 96 Interviews the most commonly used procedure that provides an opportunity to ask people for their own descriptions of their own problems Unstructured interviews are not directed and are just led by the clinician Structured interviews are directed and have a list of specific questions to ask It is better to be controls easier to observe a patient s nonverbal behavior and can provide a lot of information in a short amount of time Limits can come from unwilling patients who are reluctant to admit experiences Observational Procedures can be informal and formal Informal observational procedures are more likely to be qualitative no numerical data In formal observational procedures they can use a rating scale to place the client along a dimension can be made on the basis of info collected during an interview Behavioral coding systems are used instead of making judgments focuses on the frequency of specific behavioral events and requires much less inferences Observational procedures are useful to supply information typically collected in interview format but can be time consuming expensive have errors and have patient reactivity reacting to situation Self Report and Personality Tests consist of a series of straightforward statements where the person is required to answer true or false Some questions focus on normal population and some focus for psychological problems The MMPI has more than 500 statements letting people say true or false Lets clinicians stay away from bias and just interpret the data actuarial interpretation Projective Personality Tests the person is presented with a series of ambiguous stimuli and they say what they see aka Rorschach inkblot test Lets people say their hidden desires and conflicts they are unconsciously aware of 6 What types of procedures are used to assess social factors This is not described in the text but think about how you would assess the social factors described in Chapter 2 and we will discuss it in class 7 What types of procedures are used to assess biological factors When would you want to use each type What are the advantages and limitations of each type Ch 4 pgs 96 99 Brain Imaging Techniques MRI provides static view of brain structures and a fMRI shows a series of images PET scans can only measure activity CT scans can show specific brain structures but not as well as fMRIs fMRIs are best for studying the neurological underpinning Advantages can help rule out some neurological conditions and can help see the relationship between brain function and disorders Limitations no established norms very expensive not all processes are linked to activities in the brain Psychophysiological Assessment recording changes in the physiological response systems like the PNS Sympathetic and Autonomic NS and the CNS Recording these changes indicates the person s internal state but typically can disagree with a person s subjective self report These are good for research but not typically used in a clinical setting are less likely to be bias and
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