DIAGNOSIS, ASSESSMENT, AND COMORBIDITY IN PSYCHOSOCIAL TREATMENT RESEARCH

This paper identifies problems in prevailing terminology and conceptua l models that may hinder research on treatment. To avoid the multiple meanings of diagnosis, the term assessment is used in reference to ide ntifying the distinguishing features of individual cases, while taxono my is used to designate the grouping of cases according to their disti nguishing features. Treatment research requires clear specification of the behavioral/emotional problems and competencies targeted for inter vention. Artifactual comorbidity can be avoided by specifying treatmen t targets at several levels, including competencies, specific problems , syndromes, profiles of syndrome scores, and global problem scores. T o select subjects for treatment research and to evaluate outcomes, mul tisource data can be coordinated by using a cross-informant computer p rogram, taxonomic decision tree, and averaging of multisource standard scores.