Language: ASPPB offers a French form of the EPPP (the FEPPP) where a licensing authority legally requires one. ASPPB has not yet published the competency statements in French, so our questions and cards are in English until it does.

2.C.3

Integrating findings across methods and informants

ASPPB's competency statement 2.C.3: Interpret and synthesize results from various sources (e.g., multiple methods of assessment, written documentation, collateral sources of information) using relevant guidelines and research

Conclusions rest on the pattern across test scores, interviews, observations, records and collateral reports, not on any single number. Sources often disagree, because each has different access, error and incentives. Integration checks the validity of each source, weighs each by what it can know about the question, treats discrepancies as information to explain, and asks whether each added source contributes something new.

Key ideas

Expect modest agreement: In a meta-analysis of adult assessment, self and informant reports correlated about .43 for internalizing and .44 for externalizing problems on parallel instruments, and about .30 on different instruments, so neither source can stand in for the other.
Discrepancy as information: Informants observe the person in different contexts, so a disagreement may mean the problem appears in one setting and not another, or is internal and hard to see, rather than that one informant is wrong.
Validity first: Validity indicators and performance validity results are reviewed before content is interpreted; when a protocol is invalid, its content scales are not interpreted and conclusions rest on other sources.
Convergence and incremental validity: Confidence grows when independent methods converge on the same conclusion. A new source is most useful when it adds information not already captured, which is the question incremental validity research asks.

Worked example

Ilse, 10, reports on a self-report scale that she worries 'all the time' about her parents dying and has stomachaches before school. Her father's anxiety ratings are average, and her teacher describes her as quiet but not anxious. During a classroom observation she checks the clock often and twice asks whether school will end on time.

The disagreement is expected: child and adult reports of internalizing problems agree only modestly, and worry is largely invisible to others.
Each source is weighed by its access: only Ilse can report her worries directly, while her father and teacher describe what is visible at home and at school.
The observation adds independent evidence: clock checking and questions about dismissal fit separation-related worry and converge with her own report.
The formulation states that her anxiety is mostly internal and shows in subtle behaviors, and the feedback helps her father and teacher recognize those signs.

Treat disagreement between sources as data to explain, and look for convergence across independent methods.

Check yourself

A client's personality inventory shows extreme inconsistency on its validity scales. The interview, medical records and his wife's account agree well with one another. How should the inventory be used?

Practise 2.C.3

Sources

Achenbach, Krukowski, Dumenci and Ivanova (2005), Assessment of adult psychopathology: Meta-analyses and implications of cross-informant correlations, Psychological Bulletin (PMID 15869333), Psychological Bulletin 131, 361-382 (mean r .428 internalizing, .438 externalizing, .304 across different instruments)
De Los Reyes, Augenstein, Wang, Thomas, Drabick, Burgers and Rabinowitz (2015), The validity of the multi-informant approach to assessing child and adolescent mental health, Psychological Bulletin (PMID 25915035), Psychological Bulletin 141, 858-900 (mean internalizing correspondence r = .25; contexts)
Sweet, Heilbronner, Morgan, Larrabee, Rohling, Boone, Kirkwood, Schroeder and Suhr (2021), American Academy of Clinical Neuropsychology (AACN) 2021 consensus statement on validity assessment, The Clinical Neuropsychologist (PMID 33823750), The Clinical Neuropsychologist 35, 1053-1106
Hunsley and Meyer (2003), The incremental validity of psychological testing and assessment: Conceptual, methodological, and statistical issues, Psychological Assessment (PMID 14692841), Psychological Assessment 15, 446-455
Campbell and Fiske (1959), Convergent and discriminant validation by the multitrait-multimethod matrix, Psychological Bulletin (PMID 13634291), Psychological Bulletin 56, 81-105