Measuring Treatment Philosophy: A Scale for Substance Abuse Recovery Programs

The assessment of the philosophy that guides substance abuse treatment programs has been a difficult subject to approach by those working in treatment research. Differing treatment philosophies are generally represented by multi-dimensional theoretical constructs that do not easily lend themselves t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of substance abuse treatment 1998, Vol.15 (1), p.27-36
Main Authors: Kaskutas, drph, Lee Ann, Greenfield, phd, Thomas K, Borkman, phd, Thomasina J, Room, ma, Joshua A
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
clinical
Humans
Philosophy
Program Evaluation
Psychometrics
Residential Institutions
social model
Social services
Substance Abuse
Substance abuse treatment
Substance-Related Disorders - psychology
Substance-Related Disorders - rehabilitation
therapeutic community
treatment
Treatment Methods
Treatment Programs
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Summary:The assessment of the philosophy that guides substance abuse treatment programs has been a difficult subject to approach by those working in treatment research. Differing treatment philosophies are generally represented by multi-dimensional theoretical constructs that do not easily lend themselves to assessment by quantitative means. In the U.S., substance abuse treatment programs have been suggested as fitting into a disease (or medical) model, a social learning (or psychological) model, or a social community model in designing a treatment regime for clients. This paper presents a Social Model Philosophy Scale (SMPS) to classify the extent to which a given treatment program follows a social model approach to treatment. The final version of the SMPS (available from the first author) contains 33 questions for use in residential programs, divided into six conceptual domains: physical environment, staff role, authority base, view of substance abuse problems, governance, and community orientation. Overall internal reliability is high ( α = .92), with subscale alphas ranging between .57 and .79. Test-retest analyses showed that the information obtained from the SMPS is consistent across time, administrators, and respondents. In addition, the SMPS is brief and easy to administer. Methodology used in item creation and final item selection is reported. Although not designed to distinguish philosophies other than social model, early results suggest that the SMPS may also be used to classify other program philosophies.
ISSN:0740-5472
1873-6483
DOI:10.1016/S0740-5472(97)00246-8