A Web Based Tool to Support a Personalized Therapeutic Path Through the Use of Psychological Tests

Abstract

Psychology tests are tools used to evaluate specific aspects of individual psyche and behavior, in clinical practice and for research purposes. They are validated and standardized both in the administration procedures and interpretation of results. Nowadays, most of these tests are questionnaires administered to patients on paper support. The patient’s answers to the questionnaires constitute a basis for self-presentation and self-awareness at the beginning of the therapeutic path. The computer is a valuable aid allowing a quickly consultation of all the answers and highlighting the most salient ones. The main aim of this work was to design, develop and test a computerized support tool for the interpretation of psychological tests that allow good interaction between groups of therapists sharing the same operating modes. The developed system allows: first the storing of the numerical values corresponding to the answers to the questionnaires of the patients; then it creates a complete ’Picture’ of the patient and allows the automatic computation of the correlation between the indexes of the various scales. The graphical correlations between scales can be also a valuable aid in finding the outliers, so patients far away from the trend line.