Family Assessment Form

Frequently Asked Questions

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What is the Family Assessment Form (FAF)?
The Family Assessment Form (FAF) is a practitioner developed, user-friendly tool designed to help child welfare and family support workers assess family functioning, develop meaningful service plans, monitor progress, and to assist agencies in measuring program outcomes. Developed by Children’s Bureau between 1985 and 1987, validated through research, and used in hundreds of agencies across the country, the FAF is available in both paper and software versions.

What does the FAF measure?
The FAF gives practitioners a structured way to document a psychosocial assessment by collecting information in 6 areas of family functioning – living conditions, financial conditions, social support, caregiver/child interactions, developmental stimulation, and caregiver interactions. Each of the above areas contains sub-items for a total of 38 items that collectively serve as a reliable and valid outcome measure of family functioning. Two additional areas, consisting of 20 items, are used for assessment purposes only; caregiver history and caregiver personal characteristics.

How will the FAF benefit our organization?
The FAF improves practice and the ability to measure program outcomes. The FAF software exponentially increases its value to practitioners and agencies as a tool to expedite assessment, facilitate service planning, document casework, train staff, gather and analyze data, and measure and report on program activity and client outcomes. By integrating routine clinical tasks, required service documentation, and measurement of service results into one process, the FAF software encourages quality practice and saves agency resources. It builds the capacity of agencies to measure and document outcomes of their work with families, and to gather and analyze data in a systematic and ongoing manner. This, in turn, supports agencies to use this information to improve their practice, make sound program planning decisions, and pursue additional funding.

What kinds of programs use the FAF?
The FAF was initially developed by Children’s Bureau between 1985 and 1987 as a practice-based instrument to help child welfare practitioners standardize the assessment of family functioning and service planning for families receiving home-based services. Since then, it has been used with innumerable families in many different program settings, including community-based and office-based programs, in agencies all over the world. It has been used in family preservation, family support, family reunification, foster care and adoption, maternal and child health, early intervention, and head start programs among others.

What organizations use the FAF software?

The following is a partial list of FAF users as of March 2007.

Antelope Valley Hospital, Healthy Homes Program - Lancaster, California
Asian Pacific Counseling and Treatment Centers – Los Angeles, California
Children’s Bureau of Southern California – Los Angeles and Orange Counties, California
DePelchin Children’s Center – Houston, Texas
The Family Centre – Edmonton, Canada
Juvenile Court Services – Sioux City, Iowa
Mercer House – Casper, Wyoming
Multicultural Community Services, Inc. – Edison, New Jersey
Native American Rehabilitation Association of the Northwest – Portland, Oregon
Respite Care of San Antonio – San Antonio, Texas
The California Community College Foundation – Los Angeles, California
Youth Health Services, Inc. – Elkins, West Virginia
YWCA of Rochester – Rochester, New York

Eight community-based child abuse prevention collaboratives funded by First5LA use the FAF software. They include the following agencies:

The Help Group – Sherman Oaks, California
San Fernando Valley Community Mental Health – Van Nuys, California
Bienvenidos Children’s Center, Inc. – East Los Angeles, California
Human Services Association – Bell Gardens, California
St. John’s Well Child and Family Center – Santa Monica, California
SPIRITT – La Puente, California
Shields for Families – Los Angeles, California
Para Los Ninos – Los Angeles, California
Hollygrove – Los Angeles, California
St. Anne’s – Los Angeles, California
Plaza Community Center – East Los Angeles, California
Korea Town Community Center – Los Angeles, California
South Bay Center – El Segundo, California
NCADD – Torrance, California
City of Inglewood Parks & Community Services – Inglewood, California

Is the FAF a valid and reliable measurement instrument?
Yes. The FAF has been used in formal research studies through which its reliability and validity has been tested including inter-rater reliability, inter-item reliability, and construct validity based on factor analysis. For further details please see the Research section of this web site.

What kind of training is required to use the FAF?
Staff needs training and support in incorporating the FAF into their practice. Children’s Bureau encourages agencies to actively involve practitioners in the decision to use FAF in their programs so as to increase worker “buy-in.” Once a decision has been made to use the FAF, an initial training of about 6 hours is needed to orient staff to the workings of the instrument as a clinical tool. An additional 2 hours is needed to train them on the use of the software. On-going supervision and practitioner discussions related to using the FAF in practice should be integrated into routine program or agency practice to gain the most benefit from using the instrument. On-site training offered by Children’s Bureau can be arranged by contacting fafsupport@all4kids.org

Can the FAF software be customized to our agency?
While the core elements of the FAF are set in their current, research-validated format, there is the ability to create additional assessment factors and items unique to individual agencies. A small flat fee is charged to activate this “Create a Factor” feature in the FAF software.

What computer equipment is needed to run the FAF software application?
Minimum Requirements:
Pentium II 300MHz
64MB RAM (recommend 128MB RAM)
Windows 98SE or above

The FAF can run on a single computer, a peer-to-peer network, or on a server network configures as a LAN, WAN, or VPN. The FAF also runs using Remote Access software.

In what program is the software written?
The FAF software was built with a Visual Basic user interface and MS ACCESS for the database and reports.

Is the data exportable?
Not at this time. A built-in export feature will be added to the FAF software application in the future.

Is there technical assistance available?
Yes. Children’s Bureau provides both practice and technical support for those who have purchased the FAF.

How long does it take to complete the FAF?
Practice experience has demonstrated that a trained FAF user completes the initial family assessment in less than one hour. Workers are generally given 3-4 contacts with the family to complete the initial assessment. Following each of these contacts, workers complete sections of the FAF taking about 15 minutes each time. For follow-up assessments, for example at termination of service, completing the FAF takes about 15 minutes.

How long does it take for workers to become proficient at using the FAF?
Workers must use the FAF in practice to gain confidence and competence. Depending on the number of families being assessed, it takes about 3 months for workers to become proficient at using the FAF as a clinical tool. It is important for agencies to provide regular and on-going supervisory support for workers during this initial learning period.

Learning to use the FAF software application is very easy. The software is very intuitive and therefore becoming proficient, with consistent use, takes about 1 month. A detailed User Manual, written for those with little computer expertise, accompanies the FAF software application.

What kinds of reports does the FAF software generate?
The FAF software currently contains 25 reports. Additional reports will be added as user requests are evaluated. These include: family functioning reports, service plan, contact notes, closing summary (individual family), and reason for closing summary (groups of families), caseload reports, demographic report, and database statistics report. Family functioning reports are in graphic form and can be run for individual families, groups of families, by program type and program location. These reports reflect family functioning outcome ratings at various points in time including changes between points in time, percentages of families that changed, and amount of change. Reports may be printed in both portrait and landscape formats and several of them have optional variations. For example a caseload report may be run for an individual worker or for a group of workers.

What are the security features of the FAF software?
The FAF software is Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliant through such features as data encryption, password protection, and security levels enabling a worker to be able to view only their his/her own caseload. It is also suggested that any computer user accessing FAF, activate the Windows Screensaver feature if the computer is to remain idle for a short period of time, such as 10 minutes.