- Mirka Elovainio: The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Social Security and Services Team, Helsinki, Finland.
- Minna Kivipelto: The Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL), Social Security and Services Team, Helsinki, Finland.
PURPOSE: In this study our purpose is to evaluate the structural validity and internal consistency of the KEY, which is an effectiveness evaluation measure grounded in critical realism (CR) and designed to measure social work effectiveness. The KEY is completed collaboratively by the client and the social worker before and after interventions.
MATERIALS AND METHODS: Research material consists of 454 working-age social work clients from four Finnish municipalities. The data was collected between March 2018 and late 2019 via a cross-sectional survey. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) with structural equation modeling was employed to assess construct validity, while Cronbach's alpha measured internal consistency.
RESULTS: Results demonstrated that the KEY exhibited a good data fit, with a normed fit index ranging from 0.94 to 0.87, indicating acceptable psychometric properties.
DISCUSSION: The key findings of this study demonstrate that the KEY measure possesses satisfactory psychometric properties and structural validity. The KEY proved to be a suitable tool for use in adult social work and for measuring the effectiveness of social work.
CONCLUSION: It is recommended that future studies focus on the predictive validation of the KEY measure, which becomes possible when longitudinal data are collected.