The document outlines the 6 key steps in the psychological assessment process: 1) deciding what is being assessed, 2) determining all assessment goals, 3) selecting standards for decision making, 4) collecting assessment data through various methods, 5) making diagnostic and treatment decisions based on the data, and 6) communicating assessment results to relevant parties like clients and other professionals. The overall purpose of clinical assessment is to comprehensively evaluate a client's psychological functioning to inform diagnosis, treatment planning, and prediction of future behavior.

1. STEPS OF ASSESSMENT
By
Psych. Musawar Ali
MPHIL, ICAP
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2. DEFINITIONS
 Scoring: The procedure of assigning a numerical value
to assessment task.
 Assessment: The process of measuring something with
the purpose of assigning a numerical value.
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3. DEFINITION OF ASSESSMENT
Assessment is a process in which
collecting, analyzing, organizing
information about a client to
make and inform decision.
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4.  According to APA (1999)
“A psychological assessment is a comprehensive
examination undertaken to answer specific question
about a client’s psychological functioning during a
particular time interval or to predict a client’s
psychological functioning in the future.”
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5. CLINICAL ASSESSMENT
 Clinical assessment is a way of diagnosing and planning
treatment
 Evaluation of a patient's physical condition
and prognosis based on information gathered
 It involves the patient's medical history
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6. HISTORY OF ASSESSMENT
 Chinese used testing some 4000 years ago for job
selection purposes and appeared to be a test-
dominated society
Civil service examinations.
Candidates were also assessed for their ability to
memorize and understand the objects.
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7. Formal procedures were established.
By the seventeenth century post-renaissance
philosophers began to look at ideas, events and
phenomena in more scientific ways, leading to a
new way of thinking called ‘empiricism’.
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8. Experimental psychologists such as Wilhelm
Wundt and Hermann discovered that psychological
phenomena could be described in rational and
quantitative ways.
Galton was the first to emphasize the importance
of individual differences, created the first tests of
mental ability and was the first to use
questionnaires, he founded psychometrics
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9. constructed a series of tests.(cognitive process
and daily life problem).
Child ability in different ages
Performance test.
Stanford–Binet Intelligence Test .
designed techniques for measurement scales,
for the assessment of attitudes and developed
test theory
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10. ASSESSMENT TYPES
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 Formative - for
performance
enhancement
 Formal - quizzes, tests,
essays, lab reports, etc.
 Summative - for performance
assessment
 Informal - active questioning
during and at end of class

11. GOALS OF ASSESSMENT
 Initial screening and diagnosis.
 Differential diagnosis.
 Evaluating current performance and intervention.
 Monitoring intervention effectiveness.
 Making decision for termination of intervention.
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12. Diagnostic Classification
Description
Treatment Planning
Prediction
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13. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN
ASSESSMENT AND EVALUATION
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 Assessment is done to
determine the current level.
 Assessment is exploratory
In nature.
 Collecting and analysis of
data.
 Ongoing process.
 Diagnostic .
 Flexible.
 cooperative
 Current level compared
with previous level.
 Evaluation is confirmatory
in nature.
 Application of value of
judgment.
 Summative process.
 Judgmental.
 Fixed.
 Competitive.

14. DIFFERENCES BETWEEN ASSESSMENT
AND TESTING
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 Assessment is a broad
process.
 Provides qualitative and
quantitative data.
 Structured and flexible.
 Testing is a part of
assessment.
 Provide only quantitative
data.
 Structured and un
flexible.

15. EVALUATION TYPES
 Criterion-referenced evaluation -- student performance is
assessed against a set of predetermined standards
 Norm-referenced evaluation -- student performance is
assessed relative to the other students.
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16. THE PURPOSE OF CLINICAL
ASSESSMENT
 Gather information from different sources
 Case history of the client
 Past and present life situations are also considered.
 comprehensive picture of the client's life, which
helps in determining the diagnosis and course of
treatment.
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17. STEPS
IN THE ASSESSMENT PROCESS
STEP 1: Deciding What Is Being Assessed
 The assessment process begins with a series of questions.
 Is there a significant psychological problem?
 What is the nature of this person's problem?
 Is the problem primarily one of the emotion, thought, or
behavior?
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18. STEP 2: DETERMINING ALL
THE GOALS OF ASSESMENT
The second step in the process of clinical assessment is
the formulation of the psychologist's goal in a
particular case. Goals may include diagnostic classification,
determination of the severity of a
problem, risk screening for future problems
and evaluation of the effects of treatment, and prediction
about the likelihood of certain types of future behavior.
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19. STEP 3: SELECTING STANDARDS FOR
MAKING DECISIONS
 Making decisions about the information and decisions
and judgments require points of
reference for comparison.
Standards are used to determine if
a problem exists, how severe a problem is,
and whether the individual has evidenced improvement
over a specified period of time.
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20. STEP 4: COLLECTING ASSESSMENT DATA
 Psychologist they must decide which of many methods will be used
to assess the targets that have been selected.
 These choices include the use of structured or unstructured clinical
interviews, reviews of the individual's history from school or
medical records, measurements of physiological functioning.
 Interviews can be relatively open ended.
 preferences or style of the individual
psychologist, or highly structured in which a series of
questions asked.
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21. STEP 5: MAKING DECISIONS
 The information obtained in
the psychological assessment process is
valuable only to the extent that it can be used
in making important decisions about the
person or persons who are the focus
of assessment. 21

22. CONT…
 The goals of assessment--diagnosis,
screening, prediction, and evaluation of intervention—determine the
types of decisions that are made. The decisions that are made on
the basis of psychological assessments can have profound effects
on people's lives. The process of making decisions is complex and
the stakes are high. Therefore, it is important to understand the
factors that influence the decisions
and judgments made by clinical psychologists and ways
to optimize the quality of these decisions 22

23. STEP 6: COMMUNICATING THE
INFORMATION
 After collecting information that is relevant to
the evaluation of an individual and the environments in
which she or he functions, scoring the measures that were
used , and interpreting the scores, the psychologist is faced
with the final task of clinical assessment:
communicating this information and interpretations to the
interested parties.
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24. CONT…
 This communication typically takes the form of a written psychological
report that is shared with the client, and
professionals (physicians, teachers, and other mental health professionals), a
court of law, or family members who are responsible for the client.
 The challenges for psychologists in conveying assessment information are
many, including the need to be accurate, to provide an explanation of
the basis for their judgments, and to communicate free of technical jargon.
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26. RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY
 Reliability: the extent to which an assessment
tool is consistent or free from error in
measurement
 Validity: the extent to which an assessment tool
measures what it is intended to measure
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