8.3 Evaluation, Assessment & Diagnosis Ethics

Why assessment ethics are a Mississippi JP topic

Candidates sometimes treat Section E as “for psychologists.” Mississippi does not. Rule 1.4.K (and Miss. Code § 73-30-3(d)) state that Counseling/Psychotherapy involves diagnosis, assessment, and treatment by counseling/psychotherapy methods. § 73-30-3(d) lists appraisal techniques, including testing of achievement, abilities, interests, aptitudes, and personality, among counseling/psychotherapy procedures. Rule 4.3 in the Current.pdf labeled Effective 09/16/2025 counts testing and assessment as Direct Services when the method is face-to-face or synchronous, alongside individual, couples/family, and group counseling, toward the 1,200 Direct Services hours inside the 3,000 supervised-hour total. Those sentences answer “may an LPC assess?” They do not answer “may this LPC administer every psychological test in the cabinet?”

ACA E.2.a Limits of Competence is the brake. Counselors use only those testing and assessment services for which they have been trained and are competent. Counselors using technology-assisted test interpretations are trained in the construct being measured and the specific instrument before using that application. They take reasonable measures to ensure proper use by persons under their supervision. A P-LPC’s LPC-S does not convert an untrained supervisee into a neuropsychologist by sitting in the next office.

This OpenExamPrep section is independent study material for the applicant Pass/Fail JP exam. It is not a Board, CCE, NBCC, or ACA publication. Confirm the live Current.pdf if a later effective compilation changes Direct Services examples.

Purpose, welfare, consent, and release of data

E.1.a states the primary purpose of educational, mental health, psychological, and career assessment: gather information for client decision making, treatment planning, and forensic proceedings, using qualitative and quantitative methods. E.1.b Client Welfare. Do not misuse results or interpretations, take reasonable steps to prevent others from misusing them, and respect the client’s right to know the results, the interpretations, and the bases for conclusions.

E.2.b counselors remain responsible for appropriate application, scoring, interpretation, and use whether they score themselves or use technology or other services. E.2.c people who make individual or policy decisions based on results need a thorough understanding of psychometrics.

E.3.a prior to assessment, explain nature, purposes, and specific use of results by potential recipients, in language the client or legally authorized person can understand. E.3.b consider welfare, understandings, and prior agreements when deciding who receives results, and include accurate interpretations with any release of individual or group results. A Starkville school contract that “automatically” emails raw scores to a coach is an E.3 problem even if the inventory felt routine.

E.4 Release of Data to Qualified Personnel. Release assessment data in which the client is identified only with the consent of the client or legal representative, and only to persons recognized as qualified to interpret the data. Mississippi privilege still wants § 73-30-17(a) written consent for ordinary clinical disclosure. E.4 adds a second filter: the recipient must be qualified. A well-meaning parent is not automatically qualified to interpret a personality inventory printout.

Diagnosis: cultural care, prejudice, and the option to refrain

E.5.a Proper Diagnosis. Take special care to provide proper diagnosis of mental disorders. Select and use assessment techniques, including interviews, carefully for locus of treatment, type of treatment, and follow-up. E.5.b Cultural Sensitivity. Culture affects how problems are defined and experienced. Consider socioeconomic and cultural experiences when diagnosing. E.5.c Historical and Social Prejudices in the Diagnosis of Pathology. Recognize historical and social prejudices in the misdiagnosis and pathologizing of certain individuals and groups, and strive to address those biases in yourself or others. E.5.d Refraining From Diagnosis. Counselors may refrain from making and/or reporting a diagnosis if they believe it would cause harm to the client or others, after considering both positive and negative implications.

Mississippi overlay: Rule 1.4 includes diagnosis in the counseling definition, so a clinic custom that “only psychologists diagnose here” is not this Board’s definition. E.5.d still lets you withhold a label that would, for example, be used as a weapon in a custody fight or to deny housing, when you believe reporting it would cause harm. That ethics option does not let you skip a diagnosis merely because paperwork is annoying, and it does not let you invent a billing code you did not assess.

Instruments, conditions, scoring, security, technology, and obsolete data

E.6.a consider validity, reliability, psychometric limitations, and appropriateness, and use multiple forms of assessment when possible. E.6.b if you refer a client for assessment, provide specific referral questions and sufficient objective data so appropriate instruments are used.

E.7.a Administration Conditions. Administer under the same conditions established in standardization. When you must accommodate a disability or when unusual behavior occurs, note those conditions in the interpretation; results may be invalid or of questionable validity. E.7.b provide privacy, comfort, and freedom from distraction. E.7.c ensure technologically administered assessments function properly and yield accurate results. E.7.d Unsupervised Assessments. Unless the instrument is designed, intended, and validated for self-administration and/or scoring, counselors do not permit unsupervised use. Emailing a non-self-administered personality battery for a client to finish “whenever” is an E.7.d miss.

E.8 select and use with caution techniques normed on populations other than the client’s, and recognize effects of age, color, culture, disability, ethnic group, gender, race, language preference, religion, spirituality, sexual orientation, and socioeconomic status, placing results in perspective with other factors.

E.9.a when reporting results, consider personal and cultural background, the client’s understanding, and impact; indicate reservations about validity or reliability due to circumstances or inappropriate norms. E.9.b caution with instruments lacking sufficient empirical data; state purposes explicitly and qualify conclusions. E.9.c counselors who sell scoring or interpretation services still confirm validity and keep ethical responsibility to the examinee.

E.10 Assessment Security. Maintain integrity and security consistent with legal and contractual obligations. Do not appropriate, reproduce, or modify published assessments without acknowledgment and permission from the publisher. Photocopying a copyrighted kit for a P-LPC study group is not “Mississippi Direct Services creativity.”

E.11 Obsolete Assessment and Outdated Results. Do not use data or results that are obsolete or outdated for the current purpose, including noncurrent versions, and make every effort to prevent others from misusing obsolete measures. E.12 assessment construction uses established scientific procedures and current professional knowledge.

Rule 4.3 Direct Services are only face-to-face or synchronous methods. An asynchronous, unsupervised portal quiz that E.7.d would not even allow is a poor candidate for Direct Services credit. Face-to-face or live video testing that you are competent to give can count toward the 1,200. Do not treat the Direct Services example list as a claim that every LPC administers every psychological test.

Forensic evaluation is not therapy with a subpoena

E.13.a forensic primary obligation is objective findings substantiated with appropriate techniques, which may include examining the person and/or reviewing records. Opinions rest on professional knowledge and on data gathered. Define limits of reports or testimony, especially when the individual was not examined. E.13.b Consent for Evaluation. Inform in writing that the relationship is for evaluation, not therapeutic, and identify who will receive the report. Obtain written consent from the person or legal representative unless a court orders evaluation without that consent. When children or adults who lack capacity are evaluated, informed written consent is obtained from a parent or guardian (unless the court-order exception applies).

E.13.c Client Evaluation Prohibited. Counselors do not evaluate current or former clients, clients’ romantic partners, or clients’ family members for forensic purposes. Counselors do not counsel individuals they are evaluating. E.13.d avoid potentially harmful professional or personal relationships with family members, romantic partners, and close friends of people they are evaluating or have evaluated.

A Hattiesburg LPC who has seen a parent in weekly therapy cannot pivot into a custody evaluation of that parent, the other parent, or the children and call it “assessment hours.” That is E.13.c, not a Rule 4.3 opportunity. Refer the forensic question to a competent evaluator who does not hold the therapy role.

Jurisprudence scenario: the Tupelo custody email and the kit in the closet

A Tupelo LPC has treated an adult client for eight months. The client’s attorney emails: “Complete this full personality battery with the children this weekend and write a custody letter. Count it as assessment. Mississippi LPCs diagnose, so you can run any test the psychologist down the hall uses. The kids can take it at home on a phone so we save an office hour.” The closet holds an outdated edition of a restricted instrument the LPC was never trained to score.

Rule 1.4 does include diagnosis and assessment in counseling. Rule 4.3 can count testing as Direct Services only when it is face-to-face or synchronous, and only as part of a lawful supervised-hour path — this treating LPC is not converting a forensic fishing trip into P-LPC hours. E.2.a forbids using instruments without training. E.7.d forbids unsupervised use unless the tool was designed for self-administration. E.11 forbids outdated editions for the current purpose. E.13.c forbids forensic evaluation of current clients and of clients’ family members, and forbids counseling the person you evaluate. The competent answer is to decline the dual role, refuse the closet kit and the phone administration, and refer to a qualified forensic evaluator. Diagnosis authority in Rule 1.4 never meant “every psychological test.”