The scales of psychological capacities: adaptation to an adolescent population.

ABSTRACT

Given the dearth of pediatric outcome measures, Wallerstein's "scales of psychological capacities" (SPC), measuring psychotherapy changes with adults and reflecting shifts in character without specific adherence to a school of personality, was adapted to adolescents (Ad-SPC) and examined psychometrically. Twelve child psychoanalysts were consulted for content validity. Two investigators determined it to have high face validity after administering it to 40 adolescents. High inter-rater reliability was achieved for individual scale items. Construct validity was determined using Pearson correlations between multiple Ad-SPC items and co-administered validated measures of psychopathology. Preliminary psychometric properties support the Ad-SPC's potential for applicability in adolescent psychotherapy.