title: The Strengths of Youth in a Public Behavioral Health System: Measurement Choices, Prevalence Rates, and Group Differences.
abstract: Youth with severe emotional and behavioral problems receiving services in public behavioral health systems have strengths that are understudied in research and underutilized in practice. This study explores four alternative strategies (individual item scores, the number of "actionable" strengths, subscales, and a total composite) for summarizing the strengths of youth assessed with the Child and Adolescent Needs and Strengths (CANS) in a large, urban, public behavioral health system. The paper examines whether these summarization strategies produce divergent understandings of the prevalence of strengths across gender, age, and racial groups. Analyses suggest that youth enter this system with high levels of strengths. There are few group differences in strengths across the diverse summarization strategies. Though the practice-preferred method of using individual strengths items provides the most interpretable information about strengths, the aggregation strategies may be useful for programs and systems. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.
authors.affiliation: School of Social Welfare, University of California, 120 Haviland Hall #7400, Berkeley, CA, 94720, USA. sarahacco@berkeley.edu.
authors.forename: Sarah
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Accomazzo
authors.affiliation: School of Social Welfare, University of California, 120 Haviland Hall #7400, Berkeley, CA, 94720, USA.
authors.forename: Valerie B
authors.initials: VB
authors.lastname: Shapiro
authors.affiliation: Chapin Hall Research Center, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA.
authors.forename: Nathaniel
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Israel
authors.affiliation: School of Social Welfare, University of California, 120 Haviland Hall #7400, Berkeley, CA, 94720, USA.
authors.forename: B K Elizabeth
authors.initials: BK
authors.lastname: Kim
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000628:therapy*; D008605:Mental Health Services; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D011634:Public Health; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: CANS; Children and adolescents; Strengths; Strengths-based assessment; Systems of care