ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with the evaluation of programs for older people. Human service workers are interested in evaluating programs largely because they wish to know which interventions are effective and with what persons or groups they are effective. Such knowledge enables human service workers and others to use the most effective intervention for a given problem, and to use that intervention with the group or population with which it is most likely to achieve maximum effectiveness. The preparation of social workers who could conduct evaluative research was initially focused on doctoral and master’s level social workers and was characterized by an increase emphasis on research courses in social work curricula. The static-group comparison design is a preexperimental design that involves the comparison of two groups of persons. One group is exposed to the intervention and the other group is not. Both groups are given posttests only.
