Crossroads: The Psychology of Immigration in the New Century

linguistic group in the United States—Spanish speakers—
there are only two tests with Spanish adaptations: the
Weschler Intelligence Scale for Children Spanish (WISC-
IV Spanish; Wechsler, 2005) and Bateria III (Muñoz-
Sandoval et al., 1998). There are two more with Spanish
administrations but English norms: the Kaufman Assessment
Battery for Children (2nd ed.; Kaufman & Kaufman, 2004)
and the Differential Ability Scales (2nd ed.; Elliot, 2007).
There are no appropriate intelligence tests for Cantonese,
Hmong, Somali, Farsi, Urdu, and myriad other linguistic
groups found in the United States. If accurate diagnosis is
not possible, teachers and psychologists may need to work
with these students without it. For example, individualized
attention and scaffolding approaches can be helpful to
children regardless of whether they are having difficulties
due to cultural adjustment, learning/emotional disabilities,
or both (Birman, Weinstein, Chan, & Beehler, 2007).
Studying how to intervene with newly arrived immigrant
children in the absence of valid assessments as well as
through the medium of interpreters and translators is an
important direction for future research.
assessment in Clinical settings
In clinical settings, many of the same problems exist
concerning reliability and validity of the actual instruments
available as well as adequately trained clinicians who
are linguistically and culturally astute. As standardized
psychological instruments are conceived and developed from
the perspective of a particular culture and language (e.g., the
majority culture) and are thus fundamentally culturally bound
and driven (Vazquez-Nuttall et al., 2007), it may be necessary
to use varied assessment methods such as qualitative and
dynamic testing (Vazquez-Nuttall et al., 2007).
Concerns about the validity of standardized tests come
to the forefront when using tests that were originally
developed and standardized for one group (e.g., U.S.born,
monolingual, English-speaking, European American
youth) with racial/ethnic and linguistic minority youth
(Vazquez-Nuttall et al., 2007). Theory and evidence to
support interpretations of test scores obtained through the
use of such tests are also compromised for this population
(American Educational Research Association [AERA],
APA, & National Council on Measurement in Education,
1999). While the scope of this report does not permit an indepth
discussion of test validity, reliability, bias, and fairness
in reference to racial/ethnic minority, older adult, and
immigrant groups, the reader is encouraged to go to the
following sources for further information: ABA and APA
(2008), Aiken (2002), AERA et al. (1999), Helms (2006), and
Wall and Walz (2004).
In deliberating which standardized instruments to include
in an assessment battery for immigrant and linguistic
minority clients and whether these instruments can be used,
clinicians should examine the extent of cultural and linguistic
differences between the clients and the dominant culture
(Hambleton, Merenda, & Spielberg, 2005; Ortiz, 2008a). For
example, the WISC-III Spanish and the WISC-IV Spanish
(Wechsler, 2005) have been developed for youths (ages
6–16) who are ELLs and relatively new to American culture.
Despite limitations, the WISC-IV Spanish, when properly
administered, provides a generally reliable and valid measure of
overall intelligence and more specific cognitive processes for
children who report greater linguistic proficiency in Spanish
than English and who are relatively new to the United States
(Ortiz, 2008b; Park-Taylor, Ventura, & Ng, 2010).
In the area of projective personality assessment, Tell Me
a Story (TEMAS; G. Constantino, Malgady, & Rogler,
1988) was created as a culturally sensitive revision of the
Thematic Apperception Test (TAT; Dana, 1977). TEMAS has
promising construct-related validity but has yet to establish
criterion-related validity and demonstrate it is better than
the TAT in assessing the personality characteristics of
minority children (Center for Psychological Studies, 2008).
(For more information regarding accommodating steps that
can be taken, see Ortiz, 2008a; Park-Taylor et al., 2010.)
The past decade has witnessed the development and
publication of a number of important frameworks,
procedures, and/or models for undertaking culturally
inclusive assessment procedures (Dana, 2005; Grieger, 2008).
A procedure that has been well received by researchers and
practitioners alike is the multicultural assessment procedure
(MAP) formulated by Ridley, Li, and Hill (1998). This
procedure is designed to offer an assessment protocol that is
practical, driven by theory, and can be scientifically validated.
The MAP comprises four phases: collecting culturally
salient data via multiple methodologies; formulating a
working hypothesis through accurate interpretation of the
data; testing the hypothesis as necessary; and providing an
assessment report that is accurate, complete, and reflects a
process of hypothesis testing (McKitrick, Edwards, & Sola,
2007).
50 Report of the APA Presidential Task Force on Immigration