Assessing social desirability in family self-report.
This study focused on social desirability in family members' self-reports. 32 clinical families (93 family members) were given self-report measures from the McMaster and Circumplex family-assessment models and a measure of social desirability. Clinicians assessed these families on clinical rating scales from the same models. Regression analyses were used to examine the relationship between self-reports, social desirability scores, and clinicians' ratings. It was expected that social desirability would be a suppressor variable (i.e., when accounted for, the similarity between clinicians' and family members' ratings would be enhanced). This did not occur; instead, social desirability was significantly but negatively correlated with ratings of pathology. Results provide evidence that correcting for social desirability on clinical pencil-and-paper tests is not supported.
Fristad
M A
MA
Department of Psychiatry, Ohio State University, Columbus 43210-1228.
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D002648:Child; D005190:Family; D005196:Family Therapy; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011581:Psychological Tests; D011594:Psychometrics; D012928:Social Desirability