Verifying the independent variable in single-subject research

Assessment of treatment integrity in psychotherapy research.

“…Manuals reduce the variability in treatment implementation (Drozd & Goldfried, 1996;Rounsaville, Chevron, & Weissman, 1984) and enhance treatment integrity (Ehrhardt, Barnett, Lentz, Stollar, & Reifin, 1996;Schinke, Gilchrest, & Snow, 1985). Manuals can (a) discuss the theoretical basis of a treatment, (b) outline its structure, (c) detail required and auxiliary components, (d) specify therapist behaviors (e.g., provide verbatim statements to be made by therapists), (e) describe the sequence of the techniques, (f) give procedures for competent implementation of tasks, and (g) provide procedures for handling deviations (e.g., Dobson & Shaw, 1988;McMahon, 1987;nelsen, 1985). nezu and nezu (2008) suggested developing treatment manuals with treatment integrity implementation and assessment procedures in mind, including detailing adequate and inadequate performance criteria, specifying relevance of therapists' behavior by context, and matching treatment manual and treatment integrity protocol.…”

Treatment integrity and therapeutic change: Issues and research recommendations.

“…The purpose of a psychotherapy manual is to specify the treatment and strategies for its acceptable implementation. Manuals guide and standardize intervention delivery by discussing a theoretical basis of CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGY: SCIENCE AND PRACTICE V12 N4, WINTER 2005 the intervention, specifying rationales for adherence, spelling verbatim statements to be made by treatment agents, describing characteristics of the treatment process, sequencing the techniques, providing examples of treatment operations, and procedures for handling deviations (e.g., Dobson & Shaw, 1988;McMahon, 1987, Nelson, 1985. Manuals reduce the variability in treatment implementation (Drozd & Goldfried, 1996;Rounsaville, Chevron, & Weissman, 1984) and enhance treatment integrity (Erhardt et al, 1996;Schinke et al, 1985).…”

Applying Clinical Trials in Social Work Practice

“…In fact, the majority of social workers employ an eclectic approach to treatment (Nelsen, 1985). Clearly, CCTs in social work will have to include more specific descriptions of intervention.…”

“…So far, as the above example of the study by Comey (1984Comey ( , 1987 indicates, social-work-based CCTs tolerate some degree of variation in intervention and are able to compare more global modes of intervention. Alternatively, as Nelsen (1985) proposed, practitioners in intervention should audiotape or videotape interviews, so that an independent rater can verify what type of intervention took place. Furthermore, detailed coding manuals of intervention can be developed to describe the specific activities to be provided to clients in each treatment.…”