Citation

Slep AMS, Heyman R. J. Fam. Violence 2004; 19(2): 95-106.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, New York

Copyright

(Copyright © 2004, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1023/B:JOFV.0000019840.36496.a1

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This paper describes two studies investigating the interrater agreement of severity scales for family maltreatment used in America's largest child and family maltreatment agency: the U.S. military's Family Advocacy Program (FAP). The USAF-FAP Severity Index is a multidimensional rating system for clinicians' evaluations of the severity of seven forms of family maltreatment: partner physical, emotional, and sexual abuse; child physical, emotional, and sexual abuse; and child neglect. The first study evaluated the reliability of the scale as it is used in the field. The second study compared a generalizable sample of clinicians' ratings to an established gold standard of what the ratings should have been. The Severity Index demonstrated fair-to-good levels of reliability, suggesting that with minimal cost, investigating caseworkers can routinely assess, and make fairly reliable ratings of, the severity of seven forms of family maltreatment for each case they investigate.