History, Cultural, and Legal Considerations in Psychological Assessment PDF

 Historical Perspective Antiquity to the 19th Century 2200 B.C.E. First came in China to solve various problems of politics and governance; selection of officials more efficient, formal, and meritocratic. ove...

 Historical Perspective Antiquity to the 19th Century 2200 B.C.E. First came in China to solve various problems of politics and governance; selection of officials more efficient, formal, and meritocratic. over time Job applicant must undergo exams for general to 19th knowledge eg. could read, write, proficient in century geography, agriculture, military war, etc. (some cases) Imperial examination – in dynasties with state sponsored examinations for official positions the privileges of making the grade varied.  over time Entitled not only to a government job but also to to 19th wear special garb and w/ special courtesies. century In some dynasties, it could be an exemption from (some taxes; exempt one from government-sponsored cases) interrogation by torture if the individual was suspected of committing a crime. Renaissance Psychological assessment in the modern sense began to emerge. Christian von Wolff (1732, 1734) had anticipated 18th psychology as a science and psychological century measurement as a specialty within that science. 1859 On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection by Charles Darwin was published, where he argued that chance variation in species would be selected or rejected by nature according to adaptivity and survival value. Francis Galton became an extremely influential contributor to the field of measurement. Galton (1869) aspired to classify people according to their natural gifts (p. 1) and to ascertain their deviation from an average (p. 11). Thus, he devised and contributed to the development of many contemporary tools of psychological assessment, including questionnaires, rating scales, and self-report inventories; pioneered coefficient correlation. No specific Wilhelm Max Wundt (1832–1920) in University of date Leipzig in Germany and his students tried to formulate a general description of human abilities with respect to variables such as reaction time, perception, and attention span. Wundt focused on how people were similar, not different. He viewed individual differences as a frustrating source of error in experimentation, and he attempted to control all extraneous variables in an effort to reduce error to a minimum. N/A James McKeen Cattell (Wundt’s student) dealt with individual differences—specifically, individual differences in reaction time. 1890 At Cambridge, Cattell came in contact with Galton, whom he later described as “the greatest man I have known” and coined the term mental test. Over the next 26 years, he not only trained many psychologists but also founded a number of publications (Psychological Review, Science, and American Men of Science). 1892, Psychiatrist Emil Kraepelin was an early experimenter with 1895 the word association technique as a formal test. 1895 Victor Henri who collaborated with Alfred Binet on papers suggesting how mental tests could be used to measure higher mental processes. 1896 Lightner Witmer went on to succeed Cattell as director of the psychology laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania; Cited as the little-known founder of clinical psychology owing at least in part to his being challenged to treat a chronic bad speller. Later that year Witmer founded the first psychological clinic in the United States at the University of Pennsylvania N/A Charles Spearman is credited with originating the concept of test reliability as well as building the mathematical framework for the statistical technique of factor analysis. 1907 Witmer founded the journal Psychological Clinic. The first article in that journal was entitled Clinical Psychology. 1921 Cattell was instrumental in founding the Psychological Corporation, which named 20 of the country’s leading psychologists as its directors. The goal of the corporation was the advancement of psychology and the promotion of the useful applications of psychology.  20th Century Measurement of Intelligence 1905 Binet and collaborator Theodore Simon published a 30-item measuring scale of intelligence designed to help identify Paris schoolchildren with intellectual disability. Binet test is intelligence testing movement and the clinical testing movement. 1939 David Wechsler introduced a test designed to measure adult intelligence. Intelligence is the aggregate or global capacity of the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment. 1939 It was first termed as Wechsler-Bellevue Intelligence Scale, con. and was subsequently revised and renamed the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS). The extend the age range of testtakers from early childhood through senior adulthood was also developed. Group intelligence tests developed by Binet came into being in the United States in response to the military’s need for an efficient method of screening the intellectual ability of World War I recruits in US and prepared for entry into World War II. Army Alpha Test - administered to Army recruits who could read. It contained tasks such as general information questions, analogies, and scrambled sentences to reassemble. Army Beta Test - designed for administration to foreign-born recruits with poor knowledge of English or to illiterate recruits or someone who could not read a newspaper or write a letter home. Measurement of Personality late approximately 4,000 different psychological tests were in 1930s print and clinical psychology was synonymous with mental testing. World War I had brought with it not only the need to screen the intellectual functioning of recruits but also the need to screen for recruits’ general adjustment.  Measurement of Personality late Robert S. Woodworth, a governmental Committee on 1930s Emotional Fitness was assigned in developing a measure of adjustment and emotional stability that could be administered quickly and efficiently to groups of recruits, w/c is Personal Data is Sheet. PDS answerable by yes or no to a series of questions that probed for the existence of various kinds of psychopathology. Ex.: Are you troubled with the idea that people are watching you on the street?  After the war, Woodworth developed a personality test for civilian use that was based on the Personal Data Sheet, w/c is Woodworth Psychoneurotic Inventory. Woodworth Psychoneurotic Inventory - first widely used self-report measure of personality. self-report - refers to a process whereby assessees themselves supply assessment-related information by responding to questions, keeping a diary, or self- monitoring thoughts or behaviors. late Henry A. Murray, Christiana D. Morgan, and their 1930s colleagues at the Harvard Psychological Clinic used projective stimuli for assessment such as the pictures or photos. Projective test - an individual is assumed to “project” onto some ambiguous stimulus of his or her own unique needs, fears, hopes, and motivation. The ambiguous stimulus might be an inkblot, a drawing, a photograph, or something else.  Culture and Assessment Culture - is defined as Goddard raised the socially questions about transmitted behavior how meaningful patterns, beliefs, and tests are when products of work of a used with people particular population, from various community, or group cultural and of people. (Cohen, language 1994, p. 5). backgrounds.  The findings were largely the result of using a translated Binet test that overestimated mental deficiency in native English-speaking populations, let alone immigrant populations. Culture-specific tests - tests designed for use with people from one culture but not from another. Some Issues Regarding Culture and Assessment 1. Verbal communication 2. Nonverbal communication and behavior 3. Standards of evaluation  Legal and Ethical Considerations Laws - are rules that individuals must obey for the good of the society as a whole—or rules thought to be for the good of society as a whole. Ethics - is a body of principles of right, proper, or good conduct. Code of professional ethics - defines the standard of care expected of members of that profession. Standard of care - the level at which the average, reasonable, and prudent professional would provide diagnostic or therapeutic services under the same or similar conditions. The Concerns of the Public Legislation Minimum competency testing programs: students’ education, grade promotions, awarding of diplomas, and identification of areas for remedial instruction. Truth-in-testing legislation: disclosure of answers to postsecondary and professional school admissions tests within 30 days of the publication of test scores; test’s purpose and its subject matter; knowledge and skills the test purports to measure; procedures for ensuring accuracy in scoring; procedures for notifying testtakers of errors in scoring; and procedures for ensuring the testtaker’s confidentiality. Reverse discrimination - the practice of making distinctions in hiring, promotion, or other selection decisions that systematically tend to favor members of a minority group regardless of actual qualifications for positions. Disparate treatment - the consequence of an employer’s hiring or promotion practice that was intentionally devised to yield some discriminatory result or outcome. Disparate impact - the consequence of an employer’s hiring or promotion practice that unintentionally resulted in a discriminatory result or outcome. Some Significant Legislation and Litigation Legislation Significance Americans with Employment testing materials and procedures Disabilities Act of must be essential to the job and not discriminate 1990 against persons with handicaps. Civil Rights Act of It is an unlawful employment practice to adjust 1964 (amended in the scores of, use different cutoff scores for, or 1991), also known otherwise alter the results of employment-related as the Equal tests on the basis of race, religion, sex, or national Opportunity origin. Employment Act  Legislation Significance Family Education Parents and eligible students must be given access Rights and Privacy to school records, and have a right to challenge Act (1974) findings in records by a hearing. Health Insurance New federal privacy standards limit the ways in Portability and which health care providers and others can use Accountability Act patients’ personal information. of 1996 (HIPAA)  Legislation Significance Education for All Screening is mandated for children suspected to Handicapped have mental or physical handicaps. Once Children (PL 94- identified, an individual child must be evaluated 142) (1975 and by a professional team qualified to determine that then amended child’s special educational needs. The child must several times be reevaluated periodically. Amended in 1986 to thereafter, extend disability-related protections downward to including IDEA of infants and toddlers. 1997 and 2004)  Legislation Significance Individuals with Children should not be inappropriately placed in Disabilities special education programs due to cultural Education Act differences. Schools should accommodate existing (IDEA) test instruments and other alternate means of Amendments of assessment for the purpose of gauging the 1997 (PL 105-17) progress of special education students as measured by state-and district-wide assessments.  Legislation Significance Every Student This reauthorization of the Elementary and Succeeds Act Secondary Education Act of 2001, commonly (ESSA) (2015) known as No Child Left Behind (NCLB), was designed to “close the achievement gaps between minority and nonminority students and between disadvantaged children and their more advantaged peers” by, among other things, setting strict standards for school accountability and establishing periodic assessments to gauge the progress of school districts in improving academic achievement.  Legislation Significance Hobson v. Hansen U.S. Supreme Court ruled that ability tests (1967) developed on whites could not lawfully be used to track Black students in the school system. To do so could result in resegregation of desegregated schools.  Legislation Significance Tarasoff v. Therapists (and presumably psychological Regents of the assessors) must reveal privileged information if a University of third party is endangered. In the words of the California Court, “Protective privilege ends where the public (1974) peril begins.”  Legislation Significance Larry P. v. Riles California judge ruled that the use of intelligence (1979 and tests to place Black children in special classes had reaffirmed by the a discriminatory influence because the tests were same judge in “racially and culturally biased.” 1986) Debra P. v. Federal court ruled that minimum competency Turlington (1981) testing in Florida was unconstitutional because it perpetuated the effects of past discrimination.  Legislation Significance Griggs v. Duke Black employees brought suit against a private Power Company company for discriminatory hiring practices. The (1971) U.S. Supreme Court found problems with “broad and general testing devices” and ruled that tests must “fairly measure the knowledge or skills required by a particular job.”  Legislation Significance Albemarle Paper An industrial psychologist at a paper mill found Company v. that scores on a general ability test predicted Moody (1976) measures of job performance. However, as a group, whites scored better than Blacks on the test. The U.S. District Court found the use of the test to be sufficiently job related. An appeals court did not. It ruled that discrimination had occurred, however unintended.  Legislation Significance Regents of the When Alan Bakke, who had been denied University of admission, learned that his test scores were California v. Bakke higher than those of students from a “minority (1978) group” (in this case, Blacks, Chicanos, Asians, and American Indians) who had gained admission to the University of California at Davis medical school, he sued. A highly divided U.S. Supreme Court agreed that Bakke should be admitted, but it did not preclude the use of diversity considerations in admission decisions.  Legislation Significance Allen v. District of Blacks scored lower than whites on a city fire Columbia (1993) department promotion test based on specific aspects of firefighting. The court found in favor of the fire department, ruling that “the promotional examination... was a valid measure of the abilities and probable future success of those individuals taking the test.”  Legislation Significance Adarand A construction firm competing for a federal Constructors, Inc. contract brought suit against the federal v. Pena et al. government after it lost a bid to a competitor (1995) from a diverse background, which the government had retained instead in the interest of affirmative action. The U.S. Supreme Court, in a close (5–4) decision, found in favor of the plaintiff, ruling that the government’s affirmative action policy violated the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment. The Court ruled, “Government may treat people differently because of their race only for the most compelling reasons.”  Legislation Significance Jaffee v. Redmond Communication between a psychotherapist and a (1996) patient (and presumably a psychological assessor and a client) is privileged in federal courts. Grutter v. In a highly divided decision, the U.S. Supreme Bollinger (2003) Court approved the use of race in admissions decisions on a time-limited basis to further the educational benefits that flow from a diverse student body.  Legislation Significance Mitchell v. State, Does a court order for a compulsory psychiatric 192 P.3d 721 examination of the defendant in a criminal trial (Nev. 2008) violate that defendant’s Fifth Amendment right to avoid self-incrimination? Given the particular circumstances of the case (see Leahy et al., 2010), the Nevada Supreme Court ruled that the defendant’s right to avoid self-incrimination was not violated by the trial court’s order to have him undergo a psychiatric evaluation.  Legislation Significance Ricci v. DeStefano The ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in this case (2009) had implications for the ways in which government agencies can and cannot institute race-conscious remedies in hiring and promotional practices. Employers in the public sector were forbidden from e-hiring or promoting personnel using certain practices (such as altering a cutoff score to avoid adverse influence) unless the practice has been demonstrated to have a “strong basis in evidence.” The Concerns of the Profession 1. Test-user qualifications (Three Levels to consider) Level A: Tests or aids that can adequately be administered, scored, and interpreted with the aid of the manual and a general orientation to the kind of institution or organization in which one is working (eg. achievement or proficiency tests). Level B: Tests or aids that require some technical knowledge of test construction and use and of supporting psychological and educational fields such as statistics, individual differences, psychology of adjustment, personnel psychology, and guidance (e.g., aptitude tests and adjustment inventories applicable to normal populations). Level C: Tests and aids that require substantial understanding of testing and supporting psychological fields together with supervised experience in the use of these devices (for instance, projective tests, individual mental tests). 2. Testing people with disabilities (1) transforming the test into a form that can be taken by the testtaker, (2) transforming the responses of the testtaker so that they are scorable, and (3) meaningfully interpreting the test data. 3. Computerized test administration, scoring, and interpretation [Computer-assisted psychological assessment (CAPA)] Some major issues with regard to CAPA are: Access to test administration, scoring, and interpretation software. Comparability of pencil-and-paper and computerized versions of tests. The value of computerized test interpretations. Unprofessional, unregulated “psychological testing” online. 3. Guidelines with respect to certain populations The Rights of Testtakers 1. The right of informed consent 2. The right to be informed of test findings 3. The right to the least stigmatizing label 4. The right to privacy and confidentiality privacy right - the freedom of the individual to pick and choose for himself the time, circumstances, and particularly the extent to which he wishes to share or withhold from others his attitudes, beliefs, behavior, and opinions; privileged information.