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Coefficients of Agreement Between Observers and Their Interpretation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

A. E. Maxwell
A. E. Maxwell*
Affiliation:
Institute of Psychiatry, De Crespigny Park, London SE5 8AF
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Summary

The measurement of agreement between ratings of patient symptomatology by two or more psychiatrists is discussed. It is noted that coefficients which allow for possible chance agreement are to be preferred, but they involve assumptions about the way in which chance factors may operate. Assumptions which involve prior probabilities of the incidence of a symptom appear to be too stringent, and a new coefficient, called the RE coefficient, is recommended in which chance is assumed to operate in a purely random way. Binary scales are discussed in detail, but methods of dealing with scales of wider range are also referred to.

Type
Research Article
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 130 , Issue 1 , January 1977 , pp. 79 - 83
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists 1977 

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References

Cohen, J. (1969) A coefficient of agreement for nominal, scales. Educ. Psychol. Measmt., 20, 37–46.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fleiss, J. L. (1975) Measuring agreement between two judges on the presence or absence of a trait. Biometrics, 31, 651–9.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Maxwell, A. E. & Pilliner, A. E. G. (1968) Deriving coefficients of reliability and agreement for ratings. Brit, J. math. statist. Psychol., 21, 105–16.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
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