iagnostic comparisons. For their study, 76 homeless adults were interviewed over one year. The authors found that substance abuse is prominent in the homeless population and that mental illness is also a problem. Surprising results also demonstrated that this group tended to have regular contact with their family members. For this study, different assessment techniques were used and each yielded different results, which was a problem and limitation of the study. For example, lowest estimates of mental illness were obtained from psychiatric hospitalization in the past 6 months or from DSM-III diagnosis. Additionally it has been determined that rates based on diagnostic interviews with a single encounter tend to underestimate mental illness for this group. Another study limitation was the small sample size (Toro & Wall).
Walker (1999) reports on domestic violence around the world, and notes that issues confronting psychologists tend to be similar for ea
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