Unit III Assessing Personality
Lead – in
1. Try to assess your personality and determine what makes you special.
2. How well does the following personality profile fit to you?
You have a need for other people to like and admire you.
You have a tendency to be critical of yourself.
You have a great deal of unused potential that you have not turned to your advantage.
While you have some personality weaknesses, you are generally able to compensate for them.
Your adjustment to the opposite sex has presented problems to you.
More disciplined and self-controlled outside, you tend to be worrisome and insecure inside.
At times, you have serious doubts as to whether you have made the right decision or done the right thing.
You prefer a certain amount of change and variety and become dissatisfied when hemmed in by restrictions and limitations.
You do not accept others’ statements without satisfactory proof.
You have found it unwise to be too frank in revealing yourself to others.
3. Read the following and choose the best answer for you:
a) these statements provide an accurate account of your personality;
b) these statements aren’t tailored to you;
c) these statements aren’t applicable to your particular age.
Pre-reading
1. Look through Text D and find Russian equivalents to the underlined words and expressions.
2. Match the following terms with their definitions:
1. Psychological tests |
a) The ability of a test to measure what it is supposed to measure |
2. Reliability |
b) An ambiguous stimulus presented to a person for the purpose of determining personality characteristics |
3. Validity |
c) A test consisting of a series of ambiguous pictures about which a person is asked to write a story, which is then taken to be a reflection of the writer's personality |
4. Projective personality test
|
d) Standard measures devised to objectively assess behavior |
5. Rorschach (ROAR shock) test |
e) A method of gathering data about people by asking them questions about their behavior |
6. Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) |
f) A test used to identify people with psychological difficulties |
7. Self-report measures |
g) An assessment tool used in employment settings |
8. Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) |
h) Consistency in the measurements made by a test |
9. California Psychological Inventory
|
i) A test consisting of inkblots of indefinite shapes, the interpretation of which is used to assess personality characteristics |
10. Edwards Personal Preference Schedule
|
j) An assessment tool used to identify personality traits |
3. Scan the text and suggest appropriate headings for each part:
- Asking a Little to Learn a Lot
- The Keys to Assessing Personality
- The Informed Consumer of Psychology: Assessing Personality Assessments
- Looking into the Unconscious: Projective Methods
Text D
Part I
If you think the statements given above the text provide a surprisingly accurate account of your personality, you are not alone: Most college students think that the statements are tailored just to them. In fact, though, the descriptions are intentionally designed to be so vague as to be applicable to just about anyone (Forer, 1949; Russo, 1981).
The ease with which we can agree with such imprecise statements underscores the difficulty in coming up with accurate and meaningful assessments of people’s personalities (Johnson, Cain, Falke, Hayman, & Perillo). Just as trait theorists were faced with the problem of determining what were the most critical and important traits, psychologists interested in assessing personality must be able to define what are the most meaningful measures of discriminating between one person’s personality and another’s. To do this, they use psychological tests, standard measures devised to objectively assess behavior. Such tests are used by psychologists to help people make decisions about their lives and understand more about themselves; they are also employed by researchers interested in the causes and consequences of personality.
When we use a ruler, we expect to find that it measures an inch in the same way as the last time we used it. When we weigh ourselves on the bathroom scale, we hope that the variations we see on the scale are due to changes in our weight and are not errors on the part of the scale (unless the change in weight in the wrong direction!).
In the same way, we hope that psychological tests have reliability - that they measure what they are trying to measure consistently. We need to be sure that each time we administer the test, a person taking the test will get the same results - assuming that nothing about the person has changed relevant to what is being measured.
Suppose, for instance, when you first took the College Boards you scored a 300 on the verbal section of the test. Then, when taking the test again a few months later, you scored a 700. Upon receiving your new score, you might well stop celebrating for a moment to question whether the test is reliable, since it is unlikely that your abilities could have changed enough to raise your score by 400 points.
But suppose your score changed hardly at all, and both times you received a score of about 300. While you couldn’t complain about a lack of reliability, if you knew your verbal skills were above average you might be concerned that the test did not adequately measure what it was supposed to measure. The question has now become one of validity rather than of reliability. A test has validity when it actually measures what it is supposed to measure.
Knowing that a test is reliable is no guarantee that it is also valid. For instance, we could devise a very reliable means for measuring the circumference of the skull, if we decided that skull size is related to trustworthiness. But there is certainly no guarantee that the test is valid, since one can assume with little danger of being contradicted that skull size has nothing to do with trustworthiness. In this case, then, we have reliability without validity.
On the other hand, if a test is unreliable, it cannot be valid. Assuming that all other factors - such as a person’s motivation, knowledge of the material, health, and so forth - are similar, if someone scores high the first time she takes a specific test and low the second time, the test cannot be measuring what it is supposed to measure, and is therefore both unreliable and invalid.
Test validity and reliability are prerequisites for accurate personality assessment. We turn now to some of the specific sorts of measures used by psychologists in their study of personality.
Part II
If someone wanted to assess your personality, one method he/she might use would be to carry out an extensive interview in order to determine the most important events of your childhood, your social relationships, and your successes and failures. Obviously, though, such a technique would be extraordinarily costly in terms of time and effort.
It is also unnecessary. Just as physicians do not need to drain your entire blood supply in order to test it, psychologists can utilize self-report measures that ask people about a sample of their range of behaviors in order to infer the presence of particular personality characteristics.
The most frequently used personality test is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, or MMPI, developed by a group of researchers in the 1940s and later revised (Hathaway, Monachedsi, & Salasin, 1970). Although the original purpose of this measure was to differentiate people with specific sorts of psychological difficulties from those without disturbance, it has been found to predict a variety of other behaviors. For instance, college students’ MMPI scores have been shown to be good predictors of whether a person will marry within ten years and whether he or she will get an advanced degree (Dworkin & Widom, 1977).
The test itself consists of a series of 550 statements to which a person respond' “true,” “false,” or “cannot say.” The questions cover a variety of issues, ranging from mood (“I am happy most of the time”) to occupational questions (“I would like to be a soldier”) to physical and psychological health (“I am seldom troubled by constipation” and “Someone has control over my mind”). There are no right or wrong answers, of course. Instead, interpretation of the results rests on the pattern of responses. The test yields scores on ten separate scales (see Figure 1) plus three scales meant to measure the validity of the respondent’s answers. For example, there is a “lie scale” that indicates, from items such as “I can’t remember ever having a bad night’s sleep,” when people are falsifying their responses in order to present themselves more favorably.
How did the authors of the MMPI determine what was indicated by specific patterns of responses? The procedure they used is typical of personality-test construction. When the test was first devised, groups of psychiatric patients with a specific diagnosis, such as depression or schizophrenia, were asked to complete a large number of items. The authors then determined which items best differentiated members of these groups from a comparison group of normal subjects, and these specific items were included in the final version of the test. By systematically carrying out this procedure on groups with different diagnoses, they were able to devise the ten separate scales which identified different forms of abnormal behavior.
When the MMPI is used for the purposes for which it was devised - identification of personality patterns - it has proved to do a reasonably good job (Butcher & Owen). However, like other personality tests, it presents the opportunity for abuse. For example, employers who use it as a screening tool for job applicants may interpret the results improperly, relying too heavily on the results of individual scales instead of taking into account the overall patterns of results, which require skilled interpretation. Other tests, such as the California Psychological Inventory and the Edwards Personal Preference Schedule are more appropriately used in employment settings; they can also be used to provide people with information about their personalities, helping them to identify their strengths and weaknesses and to make informed career choices.
Figure 1.
Part III
If you were shown the kind of inkblot and asked what it represented to you, you might not think that your impressions would mean very much. But to a psychoanalytic theoretician, your responses to such an ambiguous figure would provide valuable clues to the state of your unconscious, and ultimately to your general personality characteristics.
The inkblot is representative of, projective personality tests, in which a person is shown an ambiguous stimulus and asked to describe it or tell a story about it. The responses are then considered to be “projections” of what the person is like.
The best-known projective test is the Rorschach test. Devised by Swiss psychiatrist Hermann Rorschach (1924), the test consists of a series of symmetrical stimuli that are shown to people who are then asked what the figures represent to them. Their responses are recorded, and through a complex set of clinical judgments on the part of the examiner, people are classified into different personality types. For instance, respondents who see a bear in one form are thought to have a strong degree of emotional control, according to the rules developed by Rorschach.
The Thematic Apperception Test, or TAT, is another well-known projective test. The TAT consists of a series of pictures about which a person is asked to write a story. The stories are then used to draw inferences about the writer’s personality characteristics.
By definition, tests with stimuli as ambiguous as the Rorschach and TAT require particular skill and care in their interpretation. In fact, they are often criticized as requiring too much inference on the part of the examiner. However, they are widely used, particularly in clinical settings, and their proponents suggest that their reliability and validity are high.
Part IV
It is not unusual today to be required to take a personality test before being offered a job. Likewise, there are many organizations which - for a hefty fee - will give you a battery of personality tests that purport to steer you toward a career for which your personality is particularly suited.
Before you rely on the results of such testing too heavily - as a potential employee, employer, or consumer of testing services - you should keep the following points in mind:
Understand what the test purports to measure. Standard personality measures are accompanied by information that discusses how the test was developed, to whom it is most applicable, and how the results should be interpreted. If possible, you should read the accompanying literature; it will help you understand the meaning of any results.
Remember that decisions should not be based solely on the results of any one test. Test results should be interpreted in the context of other information- academic records, social interests, and home and community activities. Without these data, individual scores are relatively uninformative at best, and may even be harmful.
Tests are hot infallible. The results may be in error; the test may be unreliable or invalid; you may have had a “bad day” when you took the test; the person scoring and interpreting the test may have made a mistake. You should not place undue stock in the results of the single administration of any test.
In sum, it is important to keep in mind the complexity of human behavior - particularly your own. No one test can provide an understanding of the intricacies of someone’s personality without considering a good deal more information than can be provided in a single testing session.
Post – reading
1. Read the text thoroughly and answer the following questions:
a) What is the main reason for doing psychological tests?
b) What test can be considered reliable?
c) What is more reasonable: to carry out an extensive interview or ask people about a sample of their range of behaviours?
d) What are the disadvantages of MMPI?
e) What projective tests do you know?
What are the main points you should keep in mind in testing?
Summarize the main characteristics of the tests described above. Comment on them.
Follow-up
I. Say if the statement is True or False. If the statement is False give the correct variant using the text above.
1. Psychological tests are standard measures used to subjectively measure behavior.
2. Psychological tests must be reliable and valid.
3. Self-report measures of personality, such as the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) ask people about a sampling range of their behaviors; the results are then used to infer personality characteristics.
4. Projective personality tests such as the Rorschach test and Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) present an ambiguous stimulus, which the person must describe or tell a story about.
5. When using the results of personality assessments, it is not important to keep in mind what the test is designed to measure and the importance of not relying totally on any single measure or score.
II. Unit Review. Give the correct variant for each item.
The primary application of personality tests is
determining whether or not someone is honest
analyzing someone’s qualifications for a particular position
providing an objective measure of behavior
determining whether the taker is depressed or schizophrenic
___________________ refers to the consistency with which a test evaluates its takers.
______________ refers to the accuracy with which a test measures the object it proposes to measure.
Projective tests have such high reliability and validity that confidence can be placed in a personality evaluation based on a single test. True or false?
The Rorschach test employs symmetrical inkblots which resemble specific objects. A subject who sees something different from the typical response is likely to have a psychological disturbance, often requiring treatment. True or false?
III. Project work. Choose one of the psychological tests given above which appeals to you most of all and you consider the most reliable and valid. Use different media sources to find out more information about this test to justify your answer. Make up a good presentation in class. Be ready to answer the questions of your classmates.
IV. Project work. Search the Internet for the modern psychological tests for assessing personality. Present at least one of them in class.