Assessment of Addictions in Clinical and Research Settings

In both research and therapeutic intervention, accurate assessment is essential for the development of effective case formulations, planning treatments, and evaluating outcomes. To these ends, important areas to assess include problem severity, relapse risk, substance use expectancies, motivations to engage in addictive behavior, and treatment readiness. When one is selecting appropriate assessment instruments, it is important to consider factors such as acceptability of the instrument to clients, the availability of population norms, the time required to administer the measure, clinician training required for administration, and the psychometric properties of the measure. Instruments have been developed for such purposes as to screen for possible addiction, diagnose addictive disorders, measure the quantity and frequency of addictive behaviors, assess symptom severity, and plan treatment. Instruments should be selected in accordance with the purpose for which they have been developed. This chapter reviews the purposes and psychometric properties of a number of addiction measures.