Validation of a 28-item version of the Systemic Clinical Outcome and Routine Evaluation in an Irish context: The SCORE-28

This paper describes the development, in an Irish context, of a 3-factor, 28-item version the Systemic Clinical Outcome and Routine Evaluation (SCORE) questionnaire for assessing progress in family therapy. The 40-item version of the SCORE was administered to over 700 Irish participants including non-clinical adolescents and young adults, families attending family therapy, and parents of young people with physical and intellectual disabilities and cystic fibrosis. For validation purposes, data were also collected using brief measures of family and personal adjustment. A 28-item version of the SCORE (the SCORE-28) containing three factor scales that assess family strengths, difficulties and communication was identified through exploratory principal components analysis. Confirmatory factor analysis showed that the factor structure of the SCORE-28 was stable. The SCORE-28 and its 3 factor scales were shown to have excellent internal consistency reliability, satisfactory test-retest reliability, and construct validity. The SCORE-28 scales correlated highly with the General Functioning Scale of the Family Assessment Device, and moderately with the Global Assessment of Relational Functioning Scale, the Kansas Marital and Parenting Satisfaction Scales, the Satisfaction with Life Scale, the Mental Health Inventory – 5, and the total problems scale of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. Correlational analyses also showed the SCORE-28 scales were not strongly associated with demographic characteristics or social desirability response set. The SCORE-28 may routinely be administered to literate family members over 12 years before and after family therapy to evaluate therapy outcome.