In this account of the drafting of the Evaluation Research Society (ERS) Standards, the author notes that the committee was concerned not only with a broad range of evaluation applications, but also with different forms of evaluation. The absence of specificity in the standards reflects the committee's steering between opposing views. (Author/LC)

Institutional factors that constrain the Congress's use of evaluation research are illustrated by a case history of congressional deliberations about the Professional Standards Review Organization program. Guidelines for researchers who would like to make their work more useful in the policymaking process are proposed. (Author/BW)

In its role as a broker between the scientific community and the Congress, the Office of Technology Assessment evaluates the soundness of scientific conclusions for policy makers and ensures that research findings are included in formative policy analysis. (Author)

These authors argue that evaluation in medical settings is best taught using experimental and quasi-experimental paradigms as a basic framework. Three types of health evaluation courses at the master's, doctoral, and professional doctoral levels at the University of Michigan that stress the crucial connection between evaluation and policy are…

To enable decision makers to become more aware of the levels of confidence that can be placed in the results of particular computerized decision models, methods for establishing confidence levels are discussed. The U.S. General Accounting Office has developed criteria and review procedures for evaluating computerized policy analysis models.…

To better understand policy formation, evaluators should be aware of the perspectives from which legislators view evaluators. Illustrations of the impact of evaluation and research projects on policy are provided. (Available from: Jossey-Bass, Inc., 433 California St., San Francisco, CA 94104, single issue, $6.95.) (Author/GDC)

Efforts of the 96th Congress to use evaluation data in considering whether to change policies about reimbursement for psychotherapy services. (Author/BW)

Seven chapters present 31 propositions challenging traditional ideas about the nature and practice of program evaluation. Methods to improve evaluation models and approaches and ways to address intermediate and advanced evaluation issues are explored. The discussion also serves as an introduction to the most analytical and comprehensive of the…

Information use in senior-level university decision-making councils involves organizational, interpersonal, and individual processes. Leadership styles emphasizing a group-process team approach to decision making are best for utilizing information to form policy. (Available from: Jossey-Bass, Inc. 433 California St., San Francisco, CA 94104,…

Seven articles highlight evaluations that are especially investigative in nature to examine how common elements in these studies can be used to improve evaluation and practice. The evaluator is seen as detective, ethnographer and management consultant, national program monitor and analyst, and international development specialist. (SLD)

Seven articles focus on child and adolescent mental health services, highlighting major evaluation issues, considering the contribution of evaluation to improvement of these services, and describing efforts to overcome distinctive problems in these areas. Policymakers and providers of services are optimistic about the use of evaluation of program…