The assessment of lifetime psychopathology: a comparison of two interviewing styles.

A structured respondent-based version of the SADS-L interview was compared with a semi-structured investigator-based version of the same interview in terms of efficiency in assessing lifetime psychopathology. There was substantial agreement across most Research Diagnostic Criteria (RDC) categories, but there was less agreement on the rating of symptoms. The implications of these similarities and differences between the techniques are discussed.