Weisbrod B A
J Hum Resour. 1981 Fall;16(4):523-48.
This study is the first benefit-cost analysis of a controlled (random assignment) experiment in the mental health field. It compares, in terms of an unusually wide variety of "tangible" and "intangible" forms of benefits and costs, a traditional hospital-based approach to treating the mentally ill with a nontraditional community-based approach. The study highlights the very different forms taken by the effects of the alternative therapies. Thus it shows how distorted conclusions can result from a failure of benefit-cost analyses to measure benefits and costs comprehensively; a change in form can be mistaken for a change in level of costs or benefits.
本研究是心理健康领域中对一项对照（随机分配）实验进行的首次效益成本分析。它从种类异常广泛的“有形”和“无形”效益及成本形式方面，将传统的基于医院治疗精神疾病的方法与非传统的基于社区的方法进行了比较。该研究突出了替代疗法效果所呈现的截然不同的形式。因此，它表明了效益成本分析若未能全面衡量效益和成本会如何导致得出扭曲的结论；形式上的变化可能会被误认为是成本或效益水平的变化。
