Diagnostic and Symptom Interviews for Adults

Document Type

Book Section

Publication Date

3-1-2019

Publication Title

Handbook of Psychological Assessment

Publisher

Acadmic Press, Elsevier.

Edition

4th

First page number:

355

Last page number:

393

Abstract

There are now available numerous diagnostic and symptom interviews. These procedures have the advantage of improving accuracy of diagnosis and symptom assessment by standardizing the information that is covered in the clinical interview and specifying the way in which the information is obtained and recorded. Development of standardized diagnostic interviews increased after the DSM-III became widely accepted in order to increase reliability of diagnosis. Contemporaneously, researchers began to develop symptom rating scales to increase reliability of symptom severity ratings in clinical trials. In this chapter we review the most commonly used structured and semistructured diagnostic interviews. We also review symptom ratings scales, including multidimensional scales that allow for assessment of a range of psychopathology, as well as more specialized scales for the assessment of affective and psychotic symptoms. Many of these procedures are primarily used for research applications but ongoing efforts should continue to make them more relevant in clinical settings because they hold great promise for improving assessment in clinical practice.

Keywords

Clinical Interview; Diagnostic Interviews; Rating Scales; Psychometrics; Psychosis; Depression; Mania

Disciplines

Psychology | Social and Behavioral Sciences

Language

English

UNLV article access

Search your library

Share

COinS