ABSTRACT
The focus of this chapter is on family assessment, the process by which one defines and measures the behavioral, cognitive, and affective components of family life. Virtually any effort on the part of a therapist to describe the nature of family behavior or formulate its meaning can be thought of as assessment. In that vein, family assessment is an all-pervasive activity that occurs throughout the implementation of any therapeutic regime. For the purpose of this chapter, we distinguish informal assessments, those made by therapists routinely during the course of their work, from formal assessments, those valid and reliable measurements of family life, which are derived from a specifiable theory. If we restrict our attention to formal assessment, it is safe to say that this is among the most neglected topics in the entire family therapy field. The reasons for the peripheral role of formal assessment in family therapy are in part historical. Most of the early pioneers of family therapy were trained in disciplines where formal attempts at measurement of human behavior were largely ignored. Most recently, the advocates of the “new epistomology” within family therapy circles have voiced distain for formal assessment devices because of the elusive nature of objectivity and reliance on linear models of causality (Gurman, 1983).
