Author Description

"This authoritative clinical reference and text provides a complete guide to conducting empirically based assessments to support accurate diagnoses and better clinical care. The book builds crucial skills for gathering and interpreting data for specific assessment purposes. It also presents more advanced ways to integrate information from tests, interviews, observations, and other sources, within a biopsychosocial framework that fully addresses the needs of each client. Particular attention is given to accounting for potential biases that affect every stage of the decision-making process. User-friendly features include case examples, advice on writing reports and giving feedback to clients, and a detailed sample report"-- "The goal of the present text is to present an empirically-informed approach to the entire process of psychological assessment. The overall assessment approach advocated in this text is that the assessor should consider him/herself to be a "scientific detective." In several chapters, the scientific literature pertaining to other critical aspects of the assessment process are discussed. Because good assessment requires integration and decision-making processes at every step of the assessment, Chapter 2 will present the decision-making biases that can affect every stage of the assessment process. In addition, research-informed guidelines for obtaining and using important assessment data from sources beyond formal tests are presented in Chapter 8. Furthermore, while little evidence currently bears on the last stage of assessment, Chapter 13 will focus on this vital aspect of the assessment process. Overall, the goal of this text is to demonstrate that inductive and deductive decision-making by a scientifically-minded assessor can lead to more accurate decisions and better care"--