EMPIRICALLY BASED ASSESSMENT AND TAXONOMY OF PSYCHOPATHOLOGY - CROSS-CULTURAL APPLICATIONS - A REVIEW

This paper provides an overview of empirically based assessment and ta xonomy, as illustrated by cross-cultural research on psychopathology. The empirically based approach uses standardized assessment procedures to score behavioral and emotional problems from which syndromes are d erived by multivariate analyses. Items and syndromes are scored quanti tatively to reflect the degree to which individuals manifest them, as reported by particular informants. Although the approach to assessing problems and to constructing taxonomic groupings differs from the ICD/ DSM approach, there are no inherent contradictions between either thei r models for disorders nor the criterial features used to define disor ders. Cross-cultural comparisons have yielded relatively small differe nces in problem rates and syndrome structure, plus considerable simila rity in associations of problems with sex and SES, as well as similar correlations between reports by different types of informants. Researc h on variations in problems in relation to culture, sex, age, SES, and type of informant can contribute to improving both the ICD/DSM and em pirically based approaches and to a more effective synthesis between t hem.