Download the 2007 Annual Outcomes Report here.

The Problem-Solving Questionnaire

When youth perceive others as threatening, hostile, or unfair, they often respond defensively with aggression. While most children learn to distinguish between threatening and non-threatening social interactions, aggressive children have a strong tendency to interpret situations as threatening. These youth are suspicious and defensive and they expect others to take advantage of them or treat them unfairly.  Many researchers believe that a distorted perception of the world as well as errors in thinking cause children to misinterpret social relationships.  For these youth, even neutral or ambiguous interactions are seen as dangerous.
 
The Problem Solving Questionnaire (PSQ) measures a child’s perceptions by presenting a series of neutral situations and asking the child to respond.  Children’s responses identify how they perceive social situations and how they would interact.  Our pilot study showed that children who scored high on the Problem Solving Questionnaire were likely to fail when discharged from residential placement. Those children who scored low on the PSQ were much more likely to succeed.  The PSQ, administered at the time of discharge, was able to predict with a very high degree of accuracy, which children would succeed and which would not.  There are a number of ways in which this simple instrument could be very useful to providers of services to children and adolescents.
  
1.  Within 15 minutes, the PSQ can be administered and scored giving clinicians information on whether or not that child is likely to succeed after discharge.
 
2.  PSQ scores, from this very simple instrument, can be matched with the information agencies are already gathering to evaluate the effectiveness of particular treatment approaches.
 
3.  By looking at the PSQ scores of children with certain diagnoses, agencies will have information needed to determine when children are ready for discharge.
 
4.  Agencies can begin to share this information in a “best practices” manner to improve services in all programs.  That is, as correlations are made between treatment approaches and successful outcomes, agencies can share these findings. This would assist individual agencies in pioritizing training and education topics and funding.  
 
5.  Agencies will have a tool that will help match children to the most appropriate level of care.
 
6.  PSQ scores can be used to help determine the intensity and type of aftercare services youth will need.
 
7.  If the PSQ is given at intake and again at discharge, the tool will provide information regarding changes in a child’s thinking – not just changes in behavior which is influenced by the child’s immediate environment and therefore more subject to change.
 
For further information on how to order the PSQ, click HERE.

Student Data Reporting System Annual Report:

This report provides information from over 55 programs from 18 member agencies on the characteristics and outcomes of children discharged from placement each year. Information provided includes types of problems experienced by children, consumer satisfaction with MCCCA agency services, follow-up information on discharged youth.

To obtain an order form to purchase an SDRS Report or to be added to the newsletter e-mailing list, call 651-290-6264 or e-mail mregan@mccca.org.