Mental health needs assessment of children and adolescents

Needs assessment is essential input for program planning. Little data are, however, available about the various approaches and whether strategies for needs assessment are viable. It was found by an inexpensive methodology that opinions about the importance of various services, opinions about the potential acceptance of services, services provided, and the total need for services are interrelated. A hybrid approach that utilized data from teachers and the people that provide mental health services was also a practical means to obtain information about the unmet needs of children and adolescents in the country. Data supported the value of this technique for the assessment of the unmet needs of children and adolescents. Thus, an inexpensive methodology can provide useful information from multiple perspectives.     

Making a case for an interface between quasi-experimental designs and social impact analyses

This paper describes the community impact assessment conducted after Concorde operations were initiated at Dulles International Airport. Problems in the design and conduct of this study that make causal interpretations implausible are discussed. The present authors report an improved design to eliminate these problems as well as increase the external validity of the results. A discussion of how the careful implementation of quasiexperimental designs allows for treatment-related causal interpretations to be made is also included. Finally, it is emphasized that practical application of these data make it possible to improve the implementation of the treatment in communities receiving it at a later date.     

Pitfalls in planning: Contrasting perspectives on mental health and corporate planning

Planning is a management activity that has been linked to high quality services, organizational growth, and in austere times, to organizational survival. The present study was undertaken to identify the critical barriers that inhibit or derail effective planning. It was predicted that human service and corporate managers would generally agree about the most and least important planning pitfalls in their systems. Discrepancies would be related to differences in the structural characteristics of organizations in the two sectors. Rankings made by 57 senior mental health administrators of the most and least important pitfalls in planning were contrasted with those of 159 corporate executives. Substantial agreement between the two groups of executives was found.     

A response to the BPA evaluation plan: Some modest but utilitarian considerations

In response to the complex and expensive Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) evaluation plan, this article attempts to identify some pragmatic issues and alternative approaches to conservation program evaluation. In particular, the need for simpler, lower-cost evaluation options and the importance of process evaluation to program management are emphasised. This is followed by the delineation of several key principles to be observed in conducting a more modest, but still methodologically sound and managerially useful, evaluation of energy conservation programs.     

“Paradigms lost”: Some thoughts on choosing methods in evaluation research

Patton agrees with us concerning the need for a catholic approach to method choices in evaluation. However, Patton criticizes us for setting up a straw man when we argued that quantitative and qualitative methods are not inevitably linked to different “paradigms” and that allegiance to a particular paradigm does not force the evaluator into a choice between mutually exclusive qualitative and quantitative methods. The first part of this article shows how some of the past literature creates the impression both of an inevitable method-paradigm linkage and of a forcedchoice between qualitative and quantitative paradigms. It is argued that such impressions could have pernicious consequences for evaluation practice by artificially restricting method choices. In the final section, we consider some of the difficulties of making method choices and suggest that the purposefully developed strengths of different methods should not be completely ignored.     

On considering the unintended impact of evaluation: reactive distortions in program goals and activities

The relationship between program planning and evaluation can be viewed as bidirectional; that is, evaluation methods, procedures, instruments, and criteria not only are determined by, but also influence, program goals and activities. Within the human services context, several factors or sources of reactivity between evaluation and program planning can be identified. These involve (a) quantification of goals and activities, (b) preferences by different audiences for various kinds of evaluation data, (c) values and evaluation criteria, and (d) evaluation requirements and resource availability. Effects of these reactive features are discussed and illustrated with examples drawn from mental health evaluation and accountability practices. It is argued that for evaluation to be a credible and useful practice, evaluators should plan their efforts and assess their own effectiveness within the larger context of human service systems.     

Models and procedures for evaluating government provided leisure services

This paper briefly describes an experimental project in which government attempted to set up a viable management information and feedback system for evaluating accountability in services delivery. Conceptual models for agency goals and services delivery were designed and measures of program performance were developed in the provision of leisure and recreational services. Two citizen surveys are described which contributed data for service provider feedback. A discussion of perspectives on the definition of equity is presented.     

Legal standards for evaluation research: A reply to Smith

Smith (1981), asserting that not all evaluative studies require the same degree of evidence for decision-making, suggests a legal paradigm for determining how much certainty is necessary for informed decision-making. Specifically, he argues for the use of three levels of certainty, i.e., suggestive, preponderant, or conclusive evidence, modeled after the legal standards of proof. Unfortunately, such an approach is untenable for several reasons. Smith's suggestion that decision-makers adopt legal terminology, for example, is really a recommendation of form rather than substance and, furthermore, his analogy from the law to the evaluation context is based upon a misunderstanding of the trial process. These and other problems with Smith's suggestions are discussed.     

The evaluation and selection of adequate causal models: a compensatory education example

Procedures for ascertaining relative model adequacy in latent variable structural relations models are discussed. Under diverse methods of estimation, this determination may be assessed using the chi square goodness of fit statistic, incremental fit indices for covariance structure models, and latent variable coefficients of determination. An example from evaluation research is taken (cf. Magidson, 1977; Bentler & Woodward, 1978). Numerical sensitivity of parameter estimates under alternative model specifications is demonstrated. Interpretive implications based on these procedures are discussed in terms of parameter sensitivity to alternative model specifications.     

The evaluator as program consultant

This paper presents a model for the role of the evaluator in which the evaluator acts as a Program Consultant who operates in three domains: Program Development, Planned Change, and Evaluation Technology. This permits the performance of evaluations that have greater validity and utility. The model is presented both from the theoretical perspective of linkage and from the context of the evaluation of a Case Management program operated by a Community Action Agency. Each of the domains is discussed with examples from the Case Management Evaluation. The paper concludes with a discussion of the contexts in which the model is best applied.     

Institutional child abuse

Although various forms of child abuse have been extensively investigated, other forms of psychological and institutional abuse continue to exist. This paper will focus on a variety of experiences occurring in institutions and residential centers that, in effect, cause a variety of detrimental effects and harm to those in those agencies who are supposedly “in treatment.” The various forms of institutional abuse will be examined and ramifications and repercussions explored.     

Case management: lessons from earlier efforts

Case management is a major, new initiative in the provision of community support services to implement public policy of maintaining mental patients in the community. A review of the case management function as used in the anti-poverty program in the 1960s, shows that a case manager works in a task environment consisting of a multitude of independent service agencies, works within the culture of a core service agency, and relates to chronic clients. The case manager's position is shaped by each of these relationships. Each provides dimensions for a formative evaluation of the program. Case management evaluation can identify issues, and document problems to contribute to the rational redesign of our service system.     

Institutions and juvenile delinquency in historical perspective

This paper is an empirical historical study of institutionalization of juvenile delinquents. Estimates of institutionalization rates from 1820 to 1970 are presented. Rates have increased throughout this period, most rapidly in the second half of the 19th century and again during recent decades of the 20th century. Theories that have attempted to explain institutionalization are reviewed. However, the commonly accepted theories do not seem to comprehensively account for the observed pattern of institutional growth. A different perspective is offered, one that seems to fit the totality of data better than previous theories. The evidence suggests that institutionalization for juvenile delinquency has increased as a function of a changing vouth labor market—first the separation of work from family life, followed by a long-term decline in demand for young workers. As a dilemma in social planning related to juvenile delinquency, the findings suggest a need for providing con- structive social and economic alternatives to the declining youth labor market.     

Thomas Szasz' “critical reflections on child psychiatry”: An alternative view through a systemic lens

In “Critical Reflections on Child Psychiatry,” Thomas Szasz (1979) argues that children are without the rights afforded adults, that children are often coerced into therapy, and that most children do not appear to benefit from psychotherapy. Szasz raises many pertinent questions for mental health professionals working with children. However, his arguments appear to be based on literature limited to traditional psychodynamic approaches. His position also neglects to consider literature in the developmental psychology and legal fields. This paper, written from the cognitive developmental and the family systems perspective, provides another examination of the important issues raised by Thomas Szasz.     

Analyzing mental health evaluation: moral and ethical dimensions

Now that evaluators have been sensitized to the importance of moral and ethical issues in their work, it is time to move beyond generalities and examine the moral and ethical implications of specific evaluation models in specific settings. This paper proposes a framework that can be used to examine moral and ethical dimensions of evaluation and illustrates it by analyzing a selected model of mental health evaluation. Such a systematic identification of moral issues can improve evaluation practice both proactively, by shaping the training of evaluators, and retrospectively, by contributing to meta-evaluation.     

Quality of life indicators and program evaluation

Social indicators and program evaluation research have much in common. Quality of life work specifically raises the question of objective versus subjective variables, aggregate data versus distributional and individual issues, and the reference standards used in judgment and evaluation decisions. This article presents perspectives on these issues from the orientation of quality of life research and proposes that these approaches have relevance for program evaluation work.