Social-Emotional Assessments

Social-emotional assessments are needed when a child or teenager has problems with anxiety, anger, sadness, or has difficulty interacting with peers, teachers, or parents. They open a window into a child's inner world and often serve as a starting point for therapy.

Social emotional assessments are not as common as psychoeducational or gifted assessments. However, this does not mean they are less important. In fact, they often complement psychoeducational and/or gifted testing to provide a more comprehensive picture of a child's functioning. This type of psychological assessment is used to determine a child's personality, as well as their perception of themselves, their family and other people in their world. By understanding a child's inner world, feelings, and important issues in their lives, strategies may be suggested to improve and secure their psychological well-being and facilitate healthy development. It must be noted that this assessment is not used to determine a child's cognitive functioning. Evaluating cognitive functioning typically requires standardized testing through psychoeducational or gifted assessments .


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DOES MY CHILD NEED AN ASSESSMENT?

DOES MY CHILD NEED A SOCIAL EMOTIONAL ASSESSMENT?

Social emotional assessments

A social emotional assessment may be recommended if your child experiences any of the following issues:

  • Significant anxiety, fear, sadness, or depression
  • Difficulty regulating emotions
  • Anger issues , explosiveness, aggression, defiance to authority
  • Poor self-esteem, negative view of himself and the world
  • Behavioral problems, incompliance, frequent conflicts
  • Difficulty connecting with peers
  • Conflictual sibling relations
  • A child has been a victim of bullying or abuse by peers or adults
  • A child has been adopted, and is experiencing conflict with his adoptive family
  • A child has experienced a significant change or loss in their lives: Divorce, immigration, illness or death in the family, birth of a sibling, loss of a pet

Many children experience some form of emotional or physical trauma, but the parents might not be aware of the real impact of this event on their child's feelings and thoughts. A social emotional assessment is helpful for children who have been abused, neglected or have had trouble coping with challenging life experiences. In these instances, the assessment will help reveal the child's psychological reaction to the event and suggest supportive strategies to help them process their feelings and reduce their distress.

In addition, parents may desire to gain a deeper understanding of their child's personality in order to choose parenting strategies that are right for their child. For example, many children are unaware of or unable to tell others about their feelings, especially if they are painful or uncomfortable. Furthermore, some children keep their feelings to themselves because they do not want to upset their parents or afraid that the parents might disapprove of them. Unknowingly, the child may express their distress through challenging behavior or physical complaints, such as stomach ache, fever, diarrhea or vomiting. If you are unsure about the extent of your child's emotional needs, a social emotional assessment may help clear up the concerns you are having.

METHODS USED DURING THE ASSESSMENT

METHODS USED DURING THE SOCIAL EMOTIONAL ASSESSMENT

This assessment is tailored to your child's needs in order to provide a detailed account of their psychological functioning. The assessment must be administered by an experienced, licensed psychologist. It utilizes a combination of formal (structured, norm-referenced) and informal (semi-structured, interpretive) testing techniques. Both verbal and non-verbal methods are implemented during the social emotional assessment. Verbal methods include semi-structured interviews with the child and the caregivers, creative story-telling, and sentence completion tasks while non-verbal methods include drawings, visual story making and play techniques. Observation of children's play with a new person (i.e., the therapist), with each parent, and with siblings (when needed), provides rich information about the child's fantasy world, their interaction style with different people, and their ability to engage and communicate with others. Furthermore, children often express their hidden issues symbolically through play. The child's caregivers and teachers may be asked to complete developmental questionnaires. If needed, a phone interview with a teacher may be arranged.

WHAT DOES A SOCIAL EMOTIONAL ASSESSMENT INVOLVE?

WHAT DOES A SOCIAL EMOTIONAL ASSESSMENT INVOLVE?

Social emotional assessments

The social emotional assessment typically requires four one-hour sessions and a feedback interview. In the initial consultation the parents will meet with the psychologist and provide detailed background information about their motivation for seeking assessment. A detailed history of the child and the family will be taken as well. Any pertinent documentation, such as previous psychological or medical reports, school reports or notes, report cards, etc. will be reviewed at this meeting. If any additional information is required (From teachers or other adults involved with the child) it will be discussed at this time. Any required questionnaires will also be given to parents at this time.

The psychologist will spend the beginning of the first assessment session getting to know your child and making sure they feel comfortable and secure by allowing them to draw, choose a game they would like to play, or simply chatting with them about their interests. This will indicate to your child that they are in a safe environment and will help ease them into the assessment. In the rest of the sessions, a child will engage in variety of activities, either one-on-one with the therapist or together with their parent, as required. The specific activities will be chosen according to the child's age, developmental level and the concerns in question.

During the feedback session, the child's parents will meet with the psychologist who will provide a comprehensive verbal report of the assessment results, including written recommendations such as suggestions for further professional intervention, literature and resources and strategies that can be implemented at home. A full written report is not typically issued unless it is specifically requested and may require an additional fee.

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