A Systems-Actuarial Method for the Differential Diagnosis of Handicapped Children

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Abstract
A developing body of research suggests that little, if any, notable consistency is to be found among child diagnosticians in their performance of diagnostic decision-making activities or among the diagnostic decisions that result. This poses a potentially serious dilemma to the extent that, in order for diagnostic decisions to be valid and useful, they must first be consistent. As a measure toward approaching some greater degree of diagnostic reliability and consistency, a system called multidimensional actuarial classification is presented for use in the differential diagnosis of mental retardation, inadequate adaptive behavior, social maladjustment, academic under- and overachievement, learning disabilities, and other disorders in school-children. Each decision in the systems-actuarial method is based on the statistical probability of relationships among a number of dimensions of child characteristics that are derived through standardized procedures for collecting information from the child, the psychologist, parents, and teachers.