Evaluate the reliability of diagnosing disorders

Question 1

What does reliability refer to?

Answer 1

Reliability refers to how consistent a study or measuring device is.

Question 2

When is a measurement said to be reliable?

Answer 2

A measurement is said to be reliable or consistent if the measurement can produce similar results if used again in similar circumstances.

Question 3

Why is there a big debate as to whether abnormal behaviour can be diagnosed reliably?

Answer 3

There are a number of reasons, for example, will one person’s set of symptoms lead to a common diagnosis by different physicians.

Question 4

What early studies of the DSM found it to be reliable?

Answer 4

Beck et al. (1961) gave two psychiatrists the same 153 patients to diagnose and they agreed only 54% of the time. This suggests that diagnosis at that time is not reliable.

Question 5

What later studies have found DSM IV (one of the most recent) to be reliable?

Answer 5

Brown et al. (2001) tested the inter rater reliability of two different psychiatrists diagnosis of 362 patients in the US and found that there was very good inter rater reliability in their diagnoses.

Question 6

However, what disagreements were there on the Brown et al (2001) study

Answer 6

For example, on the number of symptoms needed to diagnose the disorder and whether the symptoms were sever enough to be classified as symptoms.