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Psychological Test Report

  • an abstract of a sample of behavior of a patient or a client derived from results of psychological tests
  • very brief sample of one’s behavior
  • reflects a process that starts with a referral source
    • referral is usually made when a specific problem appears in a person’s behavior
  • a psychologist may be called upon to utilize psychodiagnostic expertise to clarify and localize the underlying cause of the problem
  • What seems to bother yo? How do you happen to be here?
  • final report must be written in a manner that is understandable to the person who will be reading it
    • must be written in a way that corresponds to the reader’s level of understanding and training

Criteria

  1. Clarity: written in language that can easily be understood
  2. Meaningfulness of the Report: perceived by the reader as clear and is understood by the reader
  3. Synthesis of the Report: details are formed into broader concepts about the specific person

General Guidelines in Psychological Report Writing

  1. Professional Style
    • the style or flavor of a report will be influence primarily by the training and orientation of the psychologist
    • characterized by short words that are of common usage and that have precise meanings
    • the paragraphs should be short and should focus on a single concept
  2. Deciding What to Include
    • provide information that will be most helpful in meeting the needs of the client
    • strike a balance between providing too much information and providing too little
    • information should only be included if it serves to increase the understanding of the client
  3. Content Overload
    • discuss only those areas that are most relevant to the purpose of the report
  4. Feedback
    • provide the client with clear, direct, and accurate feedback regarding the results of an evaluation

Level of Interpretation: Level 3

  • a coherent and inclusive theory of the individual life of a -- working image of the patient
  • full-scale exploration of the individual’s personality, psychosocial situation, and developmental history

What a Psychological Report Consider or Include

  1. Industrial
    • identifying information
    • test results
    • skills and abilities
    • personality profile
    • summary or recommendations
  2. Clinical
    • personal information
    • referral question
    • test administered
    • behavioral observation (test and interview)
    • test results and interpretation
    • summary formulation
    • diagnostic impression
    • recommendation

Principles of Value

  1. Avoid mentioning general characteristics, which could described almost anyone, unless the particular importance in the given case is made clear.
  2. Describe the particular attributes of the individual fully, using as distinctive terms as possible.
  3. Simple listing of characteristics is not helpful; tell how they are related and organized in the personality.
  4. Information should be organized developmentally with respect to the timeline of the individual life.
  5. Many of the problems of poor reports, such as vague generalizations, clinging to the immediate data, stating the obvious and describing stereotypes are understandable but undesirable reactions to uncertainty.
  6. Validate statements with actual behavioral responses.
  7. Avoid using technical terms. Present them using layman’s language.

Some Sources of Error in Psychological Interpretation

  1. information overload
  2. insufficient internal evidence for interpretation or insufficient external verification of interpretation
  3. overinterpretation
  4. lack of individualization
  5. lack of integration
  6. overpathologizing or overpsychologizing
  7. wrong integration, contradicting ideas