Chapter 6 - Enhancing the Appropriateness of Treatment Procedures

Abstract

When developing a treatment or program which will potentially have high social validity, planning should begin as soon as a referral is accepted. Consideration should be given as to how the social validity information will be used, as well as who will be using the information. Social validity information may only be needed to ensure the satisfaction of a treatment for those closely connected to the treatment, to evaluate the acceptability of an innovative procedure, or in order to develop a database to share with others. In addition, the individuals who will be using the information may influence the extent to which social validity data is collected. If the information is only to be used by the consultant who is developing the treatment, data collection may be less extensive than if the data is to be used by a human subject board or by a school system. Depending on how the information will be used and who will use the information, the data may need to include rigorous measures of validity and reliability. The extent to which social validity data may be considered convincing may depend upon adherence to a certain conceptualization of social validity. The reliability of the information may be considerably more difficult to ensure, due to the apparent perpetually changing aspects of this construct. The aim for reliability may be to provide a representative sample which could be considered reliable within a certain period of time. Each of these preliminary factors will be discussed, followed by more specific suggestions for enhancing the potential social validity of a treatment or program.