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Wednesday, September 10, 2008

Creating Something

I have begun year three of doctoral studies in Family Social Science. This year has begun better than the others. More relaxed. More peaceful. More confident. Closer to my graduation date.

I am taking an assessment course. This course deals with measuring things, generally people and relationships. One of our assignments is to create a new measure of something.

I am challenging myself to create a theoretically-based, clinically useful, reliable, valid measure which (drumroll please) does not require the respondent to be literate or be quantitatively oriented.

Theoretically-based means there is a theory backing up this development of this measure.

Clinically useful means that a therapist could use it with a client every session, it tells something clinically relevant about the client's situation, shows progress from session to session, is easy to interpret, and takes up very little time.

Reliable means that it measures the same time after time.

Valid means that it measures what it clams to measure - it's accurate.

Does not require literacy means that the repsondent does not need to know how to read or write in order to complete the assessment.

Does not require quantitative orientation means that the person does not need to understand scales from 1 to 5 or 1 to 7 or whatever.

Think I can do it?

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Chris

Use pictures, anyone child or adult can pick out how they are feeling!!!

Tammy E.

Carolyn Brooks said...

What are you measuring? Anyway, if it is an oral test they would not have to be literate. It just takes more of your time to administer. Good luck. I know you can do it!

Lonely Dissertator-No-More said...

I have one. It's called "How much I love my father today." Thumbs up for "very much," thumbs horizontal for "so so," and thumbs down for "phhzzt!" My daughter uses it to rate my parental performance! And it's very reliable--a lollipop will ALWAYS yield a thumbs up! :-)

Fajita said...

Great ideas. Especially the thumb rating. i ahve also used it with my kids. I used two thumbs to measure for an interaction and moderation effect.

Lonely Dissertator-No-More said...

Hey! With elastic bands, we might even be able to model pathways. Coolzers.

Fajita said...

Great ideas. Especially the thumb rating. i ahve also used it with my kids. I used two thumbs to measure for an interaction and moderation effect.