Advances in Psychological Assessment VOLUMES

Transcription

1 Advances in Psychological Assessment VOLUMES

2 A Continuation Order Plan is available for this series. A continuation order will bring delivery of each new volume immediately upon publication. Volumes are billed only upon actual shipment. For further information please contact the publisher.

3 Advances in Psychological Assessment VOLUMES Edited by James C. Rosen University of Vermont Burlington, Vermont and Paul McReynolds University of Nevada-Reno Reno, Nevada SPRINGER SCIENCE+BUSINESS MEDIA, LLC

4 ISBN ISBN (ebook) DOI / Springer Science+Business Media New York Originally pub1ished by Plenum Press, New York in 1992 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1 st edition 1992 AII rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher

5 Contributors THOMAS M. ACHENBACH, Professor, Department of Psychiatry, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont. LEW BANK, Oregon Social Learning Center, Eugene, Oregon. JAMFS N. BUTCHER, Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota. AlAN E. FRUZZETTI, Doctoral Candidate, Department of Psychology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington. HARRISON G. GOUGH, Professor of Psychology, Emeritus, University of California, Berkeley, California. ROBERT D. HARE, Professor, Department of Psychology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. TIMOTHY J. HARPUR, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois. STEPHEN D. HART, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada. RONAlD R. HOlDEN, Department of Psychology, Queen's University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada. DOUGLAS N. JACKSON, Senior Professor, Department of Psychology, The University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario, Canada. NEILS. JACOBSON, Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington. v

6 vi CONTRIBUTORS PAUL McREYNOlDS, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, University of Nevada-Reno, Reno, Nevada. GERAlD R. PAITERSON, Oregon Social Learning Center, Eugene, Oregon. JAMES C. ROSEN, Professor and Director of the Clinical Psychology Program, Department of Psychology, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont. ROBERT J. SfERNBERG, Professor, Department of Psychology, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. NATHAN C. WEED, Instructor, Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota.

7 Preface The present volume, like the earlier ones in this series, is designed to help keep the assessment psychologist abreast of significant new developments in the field. The series is addressed both to the practitioner and the researcher, and has also proved helpful to graduate students in psychology, and this volume can usefully serve as a supplementary text for graduate classes in assessment. The chapters in the present volume, as in the preceding ones, are most directly relevant to workers in the areas of measurement, clinical psychology, and personality psychology, but some chapters will also be of use to specialists in other areas. It has been the policy, in determining chapter topics and in soliciting authors for volumes in this series, to first survey the field of psychological assessment as a whole, and then to focus on those trends and techniques that are particularly innovative and are at the forefront of current development. Our basic aim is to highlight and articulate advances in the field. It is, of course, not sufficient, In order for a theme to merit inclusion in this series, that it be essentially new; equally important, the contribution to the field of assessment must be substantial. This criterion means that topics selected for inclusion in this series are rarely completely novel; rather, they represent relatively new developments-which, however, have been sufficiently tested and utilized to make it evident that they truly are advances. We feel that the eight chapters comprising the present volume-the eighth in the ongoing series-meet these criteria particularly well, and it Is with considerable pleasure that we present them to the professional assessment community. WetakethisopportunitytothankEliotWerneratPlenumPressforhis assistance and support in producing this book. Most of all, we express our gratitude to the 14 authors whose scholarly contributions have resulted in the excellence of this volume. James C. Rosen Paul McReynolds vii

8 Contents Introduction xi Paul McReynolds and James C. Rosen CHAPTER 1 Metaphors of Mind Underlying the Testing of Intelligence Robert J. Sternberg CHAPTER2 The Use of Structural Equation Modeling In Combining Data from Different Types of Assessment Lew Bank and Gerald R. Patterson CHAPTER3 New Developments in Multiaxlal Empirically Based Assessment of Chlld and Adolescent Psychopathology Thomas M. Achenbach CHAPTER4 The Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R): An Overview for Researchers and Clinicians Stephen D. Hart, Robert D. Hare, and Timothy J. Harpur CHAPTERS The MMPI-2: Development and Research Issues Nathan C. Weed and James N. Butcher CHAPTER6 Assessing Psychopathology Using the Basic Personality Inventory: Rationale and Applications Ronald R. Holden and Douglas N. Jackson CHAPTER 7 Assessment of Couples Alan E. Fruzzetti and NeilS. Jacobson ix

9 CONTENTS CHAPTERS Assessment of Creative Potential In Psychology and the Development of a Creative Temperament Scale for the CPI Harrison G. Gough Index

10 Introduction Paul McReynolds and James C. Rosen Our purpose in this Introduction is to offer some brief background comments on the substantive chapters to follow. The general object of these remarks is to place each chapter in its proper context within the overall assessment scene, and in so doing to enhance the meaningfulness of the chapters, both individually and as a group. In addition we will provide a brief overview of the entire volume, focusing on the order of the chapters, their relations to each other, and their import as a whole. Though each chapter stands alone, and focuses on a particular area of advance in assessment, when taken as a group they constitute, we believe, a representative-albeit incomplete-picture of contemporary psychological assessment. And though the contributions can of course be read in any order, the order in which we have arranged them is not random, but rather reflects an underlying plan. The first two chapters concern the conceptual bases of assessment. Of these, the opening chapter addresses the conceptual foundations of intelligence testing-historically the first area of assessment to gain prominence-and the second reviews and delineates a new mathematical approach in data analysis. The following four chapters-numbers 3 through &-are all concerned with methods of assessment. The first of these four focuses on the evaluation of children and adolescents, and the PAUL McREYNOLDS, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, University of Nevada Reno, Reno, Nevada. JAMFS C. ROSEN, Professor and Director of the Clinical Psychology Program, Department of Psychology, University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont.

11 xu PAUL McREYNOLDS AND JAMES C. ROSEN remaining three are directed toward adult assessment. Also, the first two of the four-chapters 3 and 4-represent techniques in which the assessor systematically evaluates the individual being assessed, whereas the latter two chapters of this group-i.e., chapters 5 and 6-deal with selfreport inventories. Chapter 7, the penultimate contribution, approaches assessment from a different perspective; rather than examining a specific method of assessment it focuses on a particular object of assessment, in this case couples. The final chapter, number 8, has a still different rationale, in that it is concerned with the assessment of an important human potential, the capacity for creativity. This, then, is the overall plan of the volume. We turn now to a more detailed introduction to each chapter, beginning with Chapter 1, on the assessment of intelligence. Intelligence testing continues as one of the most basic areas of assessment. Among the relatively recent technological developments in this area are revisions of the W AIS, WPPSI, and Stanford-Binet, publication of the Kaufman Assessment Battery for children (K-ABC), and the third edition of the WISC. Chapter 1, however, is not concerned with particular intelligence tests, but rather takes a broader, more conceptual approach to the assessment of intelligence. Its author, RobertJ. Sternberg, is an internationally renowned authority on the nature of intelligence, and a sharp critic of traditional intelligence assessment. In his contribution here he first provides a brief historical introduction to the measurement of intelligence, with an emphasis on Binet's work, and then offers a broad, overall schematization-built around the guiding concept of metaphorof seven different approaches to conceptualizing and assessing intelligence. This scholarly and thought-providing chapter not only effectively broadens the scope in terms of which intelligence is typically conceived, but also provides an informed glimpse of what the intelligence tests of the future-and perhaps not too distant future-may well be like. High quality assessment, particularly when utilized in research, is dependent not only on the availability of sound data-gathering instruments and procedures, but also on adequate methods of data analysis. This truism takes one within the realm of the statistical bases of assessment. Though perhaps less known to the majority of assessment psychologists than the development of new instruments, there have indeed been major recent advances in data analysis. One of the most striking of these is the systematic procedure known as structural equation modeling. This modern, highly sophisticated method for dealing meaningfully with the combined effects of an assortment of variables is the topic of Chapter 2. The authors, Lew Bank and G. R. Patterson, are expert not only in the logic and mathematics of structural equation modeling, but in addition have meaningfully utilized the technique in

12 INTRODUCTION xlii their own influential studies on children and parents at the Oregon Social Learning Center. Their contribution here includes illustrative examples from those researches. These examples demonstrate that structural equation modeling, by its very nature, is closely tied to substantive psychological theory, and can assist in deciding which of several theoretical formulations is to be preferred. Chapter 3, as noted earlier, is on the assessment of children and adolescents. The author, Thomas M. Achenbach, is one of the most highly respected and cited authorities in this area. He is responsible for the development of several widely employed instruments, including the Child Behavior Checklist (for parents) and the Teacher's Report Form, for reporting specific child behaviors based on direct observation. In addition, he has contributed in a major way to the theoretical understanding of child psychopathology, especially with respect to taxonomical issues. In his contribution to this volume, Achenbach, rather than concentrating solely on particular instruments, draws a broader picture. He proposes an orientation that he terms "multiaxial empirically based assessment". This approach involves integrating data from a variety of sources, including behavior ratings, interviews, ability tests, and physical evaluations. Further, a computer program is available for the integration of certain data on individual children. Both in terms of the individual measures discussed and the overall assessment model described, this chapter offers a wealth of insights to the child assessor. With Chapter 4 we turn to assessment in a major area of psychopathology-psychopathy. For many years the understanding of this disorder, sometimes also referred to as sociopathy or antisocial personality disorder-has constituted a major research problem. This situation was long exacerbated by the lack of an adequate instrument for identifying and describing the psychopath. In recent years, however, this lack has been largely alleviated by Robert D. Hare and his associates in their development of the Psychopathy Checklist. This instrument, now in a revised and updated form, is without question a major advance, both for researchers and clinicians. In their contributions to this volume Stephen D. Hart, Hare, and Timothy J. Harpur provide an up-to-date overview of the Checklist, beginning with an analysis of the concept of psychopathy and then reviewing the psychometric properties, factor structure and range of application of the instrument. Their chapter is properly viewed as both a basic contribution to the understanding of psychopathy, and as an examiner's guide for psychologists wishing to employ the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised. The MMPI has been with us for a half century; it was developed in the early 1940s, and first published in In the decades to follow it gained an international reputation as the foremost broad-based psychological

13 xlv PAUL McREYNOlDS AND JAMFS C. ROSEN instrument for psychopathological assessment. Then in the latter 1980s the inventory, which in some respects was showing certain signs of age, was revised and restandardized, under the leadership of a committee composed of James N. Butcher, W. Grant Dahlstrom, John R. Graham, Auke Tellegen, and Beverly Kaemmer. In 1989 the new version was published-as most readers of this Introduction already are aware-as MMPI-2. Clearly, this was an event of the utmost importance in the field of assessment. In the present volume Chapter 5, by Nathan C. Weed and Butcher, is devoted to the new MMPI-2. The chapter summarizes the rationale and development of the revised inventory, and reviews major research trends. As such, the chapter will prove useful both to those readers who systematically utilize the MMPI and those who merely wish to keep themselves informed on a major advance in assessment. Whereas Chapter 5 concerned a classic instrument in the assessment of psychopathology, Chapter 6 describes a highly promising newer instrument designed for the same general role. This is the Basic Personality Inventory (BPI), by Douglas N. Jackson. Readers not otherwise familiar with Jackson's work will recognize him as the author of the well-known Personality Research Form and the Jackson Personality Inventory, both widely employed in the evaluation of normal functioning. In contrast, the Basic Personalty Inventory, as already indicated, is explicitly addressed to the explanation of psychopathology. Shorter than the MMPI, and assessing somewhat different dimensions of psychopathology, it clearly has a number of attractive features. Though the test was constructed some time ago the manual was published only in 1989, after considerable research had accumulated. The present chapter is by Ronald R. Holden, who has done extensive research on the inventory, and Jackson. It provides an excellent description of the BPI, sets forth the rationale underlying the test's construction and development, and reviews recent research on the test. All psychologists working in the area of psychopathologywill find this chapter a useful resource in bringing them up-to-date on a valuable new addition to their wares. In Chapter 7 the focus turns from concentration on a single instrument to concern with a particular object of assessment, specifically, the assessment of couples. Treatment of distressed couples is a major clinical area, both for the practitioner and the researcher, and sound assessment plays a crucial role in successful treatment. In this chapter Alan E. Fruzzetti and NeilS. Jacobson, who are well-known authorities in this field, bring the reader up-to-date on recent developments in couples assessment. They succeed in incorporating a wealth of information in their wide-ranging chapter, including a conceptual analysis of the purposes and levels of couples assessment, and a survey of the major available assessment techniques that have direct clinical relevance. The

14 INTRODUCTION authors strongly recommend a multi-level, multi-method approach to assessment when dealing with couples, rather than focussing on only one data source. They make this point very concretely by providing a model protocol-which contains a variety of evaluative procedures-for couples assessment. In closing, Fruzzetti and Jacobson draw from their own wide experience to offer a number of helpful suggestions for further research in couples assessment. The eighth and final chapter differs notably from the preceding seven in one major respect: whereas the first seven provide detailed perspectives and reviews of given procedures or of particular areas of assessment, Chapter 8 presents extensive new empirical data. The topic addressed is the assessment of an important human dimension-creativity. Several decades ago research on the nature and assessment of creativity was one of the most active areas in personology; though recently the area has received less attention it is no less Important. The author of Chapter 8, Harrison G. Gough, is the creator of the now classic California Psychological Inventory. His chapter here consists of two highly significant research contributions. The first of these reports on a monumental ongoing study beginning in 1950, and involving over a thousand subjects and an extensive test battery, and aimed at the identification of creative potential in psychology graduate students. The second part of Gough's chapter describes the development of a Creative Temperament (C1) scale for the CPI, and presents extensive normative and validity data. Both studies add greatly to the understanding of creativity, and the new CT scale provides an important new tool for investigators on this topic. It Is evident from these introductory remarks that the eight chapters to follow cover a wide range of recent advances In psychological assessment. Because of their diversity, quality and topicality the various contributions provide, we believe, important resources for the advanced student, the researcher, and the practitioner.