This study investigated demographic, intrapersonal, and interpersonal predictors of treatment response in a randomized clinical trial of 134 distressed married couples, which examined traditional (N. S. Jacobson & G. Margolin, 1979) and integrative (N. S. Jacobson & A. Christensen, 1996) behavioral couple therapy. Results based on hierarchical…

Direct observation plays an important role in the assessment practices of school psychologists and in the development of evidence-based practices in general and special education. The defining psychometric features of direct observation are presented, the contributions to assessment practice reviewed, and a specific proposal is offered for…

A review of relevant literatures led to the construction of a self-report instrument designed to measure two subtypes of student engagement with school: cognitive and psychological engagement. The psychometric properties of this measure, the Student Engagement Instrument (SEI), were assessed based on responses of an ethnically and economically…

In this rejoinder, the authors respond to the insightful commentary of Strohmer and Arm, Chwalisz, and Hilton, Harris, and Rice about the meta-analysis on statistical versus clinical prediction techniques for mental health judgments. The authors address issues including the availability of statistical prediction techniques for real-life psychology…

In this article, one of the authors was called to see an 18-year old boy named John, who had done poorly during his first year at college and was depressed. His parents feared that their son may be suicidal, a concern heightened by the recent news that one of their son's friends had committed suicide. Here, he interviews John about his…

To test the widely held belief that fee assessment policy affects the psychotherapeutic process, data were gathered from the records of 434 clients. The three predictor variables were fee, diagnosis, and socioeconomic status. Analysis of variance found only diagnosis to be significantly related to the outcome. (Author)

The MMPI scales were scored for items appearing only on one scale (nonoverlapping) and for items appearing on more than one scale (overlapping). Overlapping scales significantly corresponded with neuroticism, psychoticism and extraversion while nonoverlapping scales insignificantly corresponded with the same theoretical constructs. (Author/SE)

Major reasons for the continuing divergency of opinion as regards the nature and meaning of intelligence are examined. An appraisal of intelligence as a relative concept is proposed which advocates the necessity of specifying the reference systems to which a statement about intelligence refers. (EH)

This study used as source of data the MMPI protocols of 223 psychiatric inpatients randomly divided into two groups for a double cross-validation design, clinical diagnosis of depressive versus nondepressive states as criterion, and multiple regression as the main analytic technique. (Author)

A sample of 126 adult psychiatric outpatients was administered the Psychological Screening Inventory. Discriminant function analysis revealed 18 percent misclassification for clinical scale scoring and 22 percent misclassification for factor scoring. As in similar studies with other instruments, factor analysis did not provide a superior basis for…

Studies the differences in personality functioning between persons who respond responsibly to their bills for psychological testing and those who respond irresponsibly. Results indicate that patients who were not accepting of the goals of personality evaluation and who were confused, appeared less likely to pay the psychologists fee. (Author/PC)

Present psychological assessment stems from a philosophy of science that values objectivity but fails to comprehend the existence of the person being evaluated. A humanistic-existential model shifts the focus from omnipotence to encounter and encourages client responsibility. Some pertinent assessment issues are formulated and specific instruments…

Whether one is working with clients in a clinic or students in school, it is useful to have a psychological framework within which behavioral observations and diagnostic considerations can be integrated and understood. One such approach begins with the assumption that each person has: (1) a self (a sense of personal existence); (2) a self-concept…

While there have been few reports of psychological assessment of eating disordered patients, studies using the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) to assess eating disordered subjects found that female anorexics had remarkably similiar profiles (score elevations of 70 or more) to female schizophrenics on the Depression (D),…

The goal of this study was to examine the complex interplay among family, neuropsychological, psychosocial, psychiatric, and immunological variables with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected homosexual/bisexual men and their families. The subjects were a broad spectrum of 29 outpatient HIV-infected homosexual/bisexual men between the ages…