Chapter 8 Personality Assessment

1. Chapter 8Personality Assessment

2. Objective Tests • Objective test involve the administration of a standard set of questions or statements to which the examinee responds using a fixed set of potions. • Many objectives test use a true false or yes/no response format others provide a dimensional scale (e.g. o=strong disagree; 1= disagree; 2= neutral; 3= agree; 4= strongly agree).

3. Advantages of Objective Test • Objective tests of personality or self-report have had a central role in the development of clinical psychology. • First of all, their economical. After only brief instructions, large groups can be tested simultaneously, or a single patient can completed inventory alone. Even computer scoring an interpretation of these tests are possible. • Second, scoring and administration are relatively simple and objective. This in turn tends to make the interpretation easier and seems to require less interpret to skill of the part of the clinician. • A final attraction to self-report inventories, particularly for clinicians who are disenchanted with the problems inherent in projective tests, is their appearance objectivity and reliability.

4. Disadvantages of Objective Tests • For clinicians who tend to pay little attention to mediating variables such as motives or cognitions, this is a virtue rather than aid defect. • Inventories often provide a single overall score, which may reflect various combinations of these behaviors, cognitions, and needs. Therefore, to individuals were achieved the same score may actually be quite different, even in reference to the personality traits or construction in question. Thus, the same score on a measure may have several alternative interpretations. • Other difficulties involved a transparent meeting of some inventories questions, which can obviously facilitate faking on the part of some patients. Some tests tend to develop heavily on the patience self-knowledge. • In addition, the forced choice approach prevents individuals from qualifying or elaborating their responses to that some additional information may be lost or distorted the limited understanding or even the limited reading ability of some individuals may lead them to misinterpret question or to answer questions and a random fashion.

5. Methods of Test Construction for Objective Tests • Content validation. The most straightforward approach to measure it is for clinicians to decide what it is they wish to assess and then simply ask the patient for that information. • Ensuring content validity -content validation methods involve (a) carefully defining all relevant aspects of the variable you are attempting to measure; (b) consulting experts before generating items;(c) using judges to assess each potential items relevance to the variable of interest; and (d) using psychometric analysis to evaluate each item before you can include it in your measure.

6. Methods of Test Construction for Objective Tests • Potential problems are inherent in the content validity approached to test construction. • First, it can clinicians assume that every patient interpreted a given item in exactly the same way? • Second, when patients accurately report their own behavior or emotions? • Third, will patients be honest, or will they attempt to place themselves in a good light? • Fourth, can clinicians assume that the experts can be counted on to define the essence of the concept they are trying to measure?

7. Empirical Criterion KeyingObjective Tests . • The most prominent example of this general math that is the original Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. In this approach, new assumptions made as to whether a patient is telling the truth or the response really corresponds to behavior or feelings. What is important is that certain patients describe themselves in certain ways. • The import and assumption inherent in this approach is that members of a particular diagnostic group will tend to respond in the same way. Consequently, it is not necessary to select test items in a rational, theoretical fashion. All of that is required is to show on an empirical basis that the members of a given diagnostic group respond to a given item in a similar fashion. • The utility of the item is thus determined solely by the extent to which discriminates among known groups. • Of course, the criterion keying method has its problems. Foremost is the difficulty of interpreting the meaning of a score. • Although demonstrating that the tests can discriminate among various patient groups is one aspect of establishing the validity of a task, the sole use of the empirical criterion keying method to select items for a test is not recommended.

8. Factor Analysis WorkObjective Test • The idea is to examine the intercorrelations among the individual items from many existing personality inventories. Succeeding factory analyses will then reduce or purify scales thought to reflect basic dimensions of personality. The exploratory factor analytic approach is atheoretical. One begins by capturing a universe of items and then proceeds to reduce them to basic elements-personality, adjustment, diagnostic affiliation, or whatever-in attempt to arrive at the core traits and dimensions of personality. • Confirmation factor analytic approaches are more theory driven, seeking to confirm a hypothesize factor structure for the test items. • This trend of the factory analytic approach to test construction is the emphasis on an empirical demonstration that items purporting book to measure a variable or dimension of personality are highly related to one another. • A limitation to this approach is that it does not in and of itself demonstrate that these items are actually measuring durable of interest; we only know that the items tend to be measuring the same thing.

9. Construct Validity ApproachObjective Test • This approach combines many aspects of the content validity. Empirical criterion keying, and factor that analytic approaches. In this approach, skills are developed to measure specific concepts from a given theory. The selection of items is based on the extent to which they reflect the theoretical construct under study. Item analysis, factor analysis, and other procedures for used to ensure that a homogeneous skill is developed. • Because of its comprehensiveness, construct validity approached to test construction is both the most desirable at the most labor intensive. In fact, establishing the construct validity of the test is a never ending but process, with empirical feedback used to refine both the theory and the personality measure.

10. The MMPI and MMPI-2 • The MMPI back was long the best example of empirical keying approach to test construction. Published by Hathway and McKinley in 1943, it is still considered the preeminent self-reported inventory. The MMPI, which has been used for virtually every predictive purposing imaginable, ranging from the likelihood of episodes of psychosis to marriage suitability.

11. Description: MMPI • The basic purpose was to identify the psychiatric diagnoses of individual. • The following psychiatric categories were used: hypochondriasis, depression, hysteria, psychopathic deviation, paranoia, psychasthenia, schizophrenia, and hypomania. Two additional skills, masculinity-femininity and a social introversion it were added later. These skills names reflected a diagnostic classification system that was used in 1940's and 1950's but is now antiquated. • The original MMPI was composed of 550 items to which the patient answered true, false or cannot say. Only those items that differentiated a given clinical group from a nonclinical group were included. • Although the test was originally designed for people aged 16 and older, the MMPI has been used with individuals considerably younger. The test was Machines Corp. or hand scored. Indeed, it was possible to completely administer, score, and interpret the MMPI by computer.

12. Description: MMPI-2 • With our original MMPI standardization sample had been criticized for many years as unrepresentative of the general U.S. population. • For restandardization, all 550 items were retained, but 82 were rewritten. The original meaning of the items were preserved, but the language was made more contemporary. In addition, 154 new items were added to the top item pool, bringing the total to 704 items. But after adjustments, the final version of theMMPI-2 now includes 567 of the larger pool of 704 items. However, only the first 370 items in the test booklet are administered when only the traditional validity and clinical scales are of interest. • Participants for the restandardization sample came from Minnesota, Ohio, North Carolina, Washington, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and California, and the samples were based on U.S. census data from 1980. • The authors of the MMPI-2 state that it can be used but individuals were in least 13 years old and or can read at eighth grade level. It can be administered individually or in groups. It has only one booklet form. It can be computer scored, and non-English-language versions of the test are available. It also has an adolescent version (MMPI- A).

13. MMPI: Validity Scales • A potential problem itself reported inventories, including the MMPI-2, is their susceptibility to distortion through various test-taking attitudes or responds sets. For example, some respondents may wish to place themselves at a favorable light; other may fake bad to increase the likelier to receive aid. Obviously, if the condition is not aware of these responses out in a given patient, the test interpretation can be a gross error. • To help detect malingering-faking bad- other response sets or tests-taking attitudes, and carelessness or misunderstanding, the MMPI-2 continues to incorporate the traditional for validity scales that were included in the original MMPI. • 1.? Scale. This is the number of items left unanswered. • 2. F scale. The 60 items were seldom answered in the scored direction by the standardization group. A high F score may suggest deviant behavior, or other hypothesis about extra tests characteristics or behaviors. • 3. L (lie) scale. This includes 15 items who's endorsed places the respondent of very positive light. • 4. K (Defensiveness) Scale. PS 30 items suggest defensiveness and admitting certain problems. These items reportedly detect faking good. • 5. Fb (Back-page Infrequency) Scale. These 40 items are scoring in the end of the test are infrequently endorsed. • 6. VRIN (Variable Response Inconsistency) Scale. This consisted of 67 pairs of items with either similar opposite content. High BRIN scores suggest random responding. • 7. TRIN (True Response Inconsistency) scale. This consists of 23 item pairs that are opposite in content. High TRIN White scores suggest a tendency to give true responses indiscriminately; low TRIN scores suggest a tendency to give false responses indiscriminately. • These seven MMPI-2 validity scales provide a means for understanding the test respondence motivation and test-taking attitudes.

14. MMPI: Short Forms • These scales where typically shorten the MMPI to considerably less than the traditional 550 items. Some lost of interpretative power can also be expected. • More generally, one short form of any psychological tests should, but perhaps, rarely be developed and, if so, should be subjected to quite stringent standards of reliability of validity as a stand-alone measure. • Interpretation patterns: profile analysis. • Because the original scales were developed to predict psychiatric categorization, the initial use of the MMPI depended on simple interpretations based on elevated scale scores. • However, the medical experts quickly taught that some compartmentalize interpretations or oversimplification. Some nonclinical respondents achieve White high SC scores, and so do other diagnostic groups. • Interpretation has now shifted to an examination of patterns, or profiles, of scores. • Interpretation through content. • Thus, a major change of improvement in the clinical use of the MMPI and MMPI-2 have been a shift away from differential psychiatric diagnosis based on the elevation of a single score to a more sophisticated profile analysis of scale scores considered as measures of personality traits.

15. Supplementary Scales • There are 450 supplementary scales for the MMPI. For the MMPI-2, there are 12 supplementary scales

16. A Summary Evaluation of the MMPI and MMPI-2 • SCREENING. Many clinicians are attracted to theMMPI-2 because of its screening capabilities. When information about the severity of a patient's problem is needed, and when the condition was general hypothesis about a patient's diagnostic status, the MMPI-2 can be a valuable asset. • THE QUESTION OF PERSONALITY DYNAMICS. The MMP I -2 is atheoretical. The MMPI- 2 is primarily a measure of various symptoms of psychopathology. Although the features tapped by the MMPI-2 items may suggest certain personality traits or styles, it was not developed with personality constructs in mind.

17. MMPI: Reliability and Validity • When the MMPI is used in the manner for which it was designed and validated, it psychometrics properties are likely to be adequate for the clinical research purposes. There are two issues related to the validity of MMPI-2 scores: incremental validity is supported if scaled scores provide information about a person's behavior, personality features, where psychopathology features that is not provided by other measures. • As for the validity of cutoff scores, it is important to keep in mind that the optimal cutoff scores will vary depending on the nature of the population of the patients sampled. • MMPI-2 cutoffs were derived using the distribution of scores from the normative sample. Therefore, these cutoffs may or may not be appropriate in certain clinical context.

18. MMPI: Personnel Selection and Bias • Lack of trust in our social institutions and the concern of minorities have been reflected in criticisms of the tests. Given the nature of the original sample that MMPI was validated on, questions have been raised as to whether the instrument may be biased against certain ethnic and racial groups.

19. The Revised NEO-Personality Inventory • The revised NEO- Personality Inventory is a self- reported measure personality features that comprise the influential model of personality known as the five-factor model. • But five factors or domains are neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience, agreeableness, and conscientiousness. Each domain as six facets or subscales-personality traits that represent various aspects of each domain. • The NEO-P I-R consists of 240 items. Individuals read each of the 240 statements on a five-point scale (strongly disagree, disagree, neutral, agree, and strongly agree)

20. NEO-Personality Inventory continued • The Neo-PI-R was developed using a rational-empirical test construction strategy that emphasized construct validity. Items selection was based on empirical performance; that is the most reliable and valid items were retained. • Factor analysis or performed to ensure that the item loaded on their respective factors. Approximately half of the NEO-P I-R items are reverse scored; that is, lower scores of more indicative of the trait in question. • The more controversial aspects of the NEO-PI-R lack of the validity scale to evaluate the respondence test-taking approaches.

21. NEO-Personality Inventory continued • NORMS. Adult norms of based on 500 men 500 women on from several samples of community residents. The normative sample closely approximates U. S. Census Bureau projections for 1995 in the distribution of fact age and racial groups. The NEO-PI-R manual represents normative data for college students as well. • RELIABILITY AND STABILITY. NEO-P I-R scores show excellent levels of both internal consistency and test-retest reliability. • Factor structure. Factor analysis have, in general, the support the hypothesize five-factor structure of the NEO-P I E-R. • VALIDITY. The NEO-P I-R manual presents a variety of evidence attesting to the validity of the instrument scores.

22. NEO-Personality Inventory continued • CLINICAL APPLICATIONS. • Axis II personality disorders involve by definition, maladapted personality traits, these disorders represent and of this application for usage of the Neo-PI-R. Further, investigators have begun to evaluate the utility to of the neo-P I-Re in assessing personality characteristics of individuals with Axis I mood, anxiety and substance used as orders. Taken together, these studies suggest that the neo-P I-R and related instruments hold some promise in the area clinical assessment. • ALTERNATE FORMS. • A 68-item short form of the neo-P I-R, known as the neo-five factor inventory may be used when a relatively short measure of the five major personality dimensions are desired. Another version of the neo-P I-R is used for observer ratings. • .

23. LIMITATIONS OF THE NEO-P I-R • First the NEO-P I-R has been criticized for its relative lack of validity items. • Second, the use of the NEO-PI-R for clinical diagnostic purposes remain to be demonstrated. • Third, but too little research is being conducted on the use of the NEO-P I-R in treatment planning to warrant the routine use of this measure in clinical settings at this time. • Finally, several psychometric criticisms have been leveled NEO-P I-R, including intercorrelation among certain domain scores and the placement of certain facets with book in particular domains

24. PROJECTIVE TESTS • Projective tests can be traced to Hermann Rorschach's classic 1921 monograph, in which he described the use of inkblots as a method for the differential diagnosis of psychopathology. • In 1935, Morgan and Murray introduced the Thematic Apperception Test and 1938; Murray carefully described the process of projection. The term projective really came into popular use following L. K. Frank's widely discussed a 1939 paper on projective methods.

25. The Nature of Projective Tests • Projective techniques, taken as a whole, but tend to have the following distinguishing characteristics: • In response to what a structure on ambiguous stimulus, examinees of force to impose own structure and, in so doing, reveals something of themselves. • The stimulus material is unstructured. • The method is indirect. • There is freedom of response. • Response interpretation deals with more variables.

26. Projective Test Measurement and Standardization • The project is, by their very nature, seemed to resist psychometric evaluation. • Standardization. There are so many interacting variables that standardization interpreter approaches would surely destroy the holistic nature of projective tests. After all, they say, interpretation is that art. • Reliability. Test-retest reliability may be affected by psychological changes in the individual. It is true that clinicians can opt for establishing reliability through the use of alternative forms. Even split-half is difficult to ascertain because of the difficulty of demonstrate the equivalents of the two halves of each test. • Validity. Because projective have been used for such a multiplicity of purposes, there is little point in asking general questions.

27. The Rorschach • The Rorschach consists of 10 cards on which a printed inkblots that are symmetrical from the right to left. Five of the ten cards are black and white and the other five are colored. • ADMINISTRATION. The clinician hands the patient the first card and says, " Tell me what you see-what might be for you. There are no right or wrong answers. Just tell me what it looks like to you.” All the subsequent cards are administered in order the clinician takes down verbatim everything the patients says. Some clinicians also record the length of time it takes the patient to make the first response to each part as well as the total time spent on each card. • The clinician also notes which the position of the card as each responses given. All spontaneous remarks or exclamations are also recorded. Following this phase, the clinician moves to whether what is called the inquiry. The patient is reminded of all previous responses, one by one, and ask why what it was that prompted each response. The patient is also asked indicate for each card the exact location of the various responses.

28. The RorschachScoring Techniques • Location refers to the area of the card to which the patient responds. • Content refers to the nature of the objects seen. • Determinants refer to those aspects of the card that prompted the patience response. • Exner's comprehensive system of scoring is most frequently used. • RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY. The Rorschach responses can be scored reliably across raters. • RORSCHACH INKBLOT "METHOD“ Weiner argued that he Rorschach is best conceptualized as a method of data collection, not a test.

29. The Thematic Apperception Test • The Thematic Apperception Test was introduced by Morgan and Murray in 1935. It purports to reveal patience basic personality characteristics through the interpretation of their imaginative productions in response to a series of pictures. • Most clinician issues that T A T as a method of informing psychological needs at of disclosing how the patient interacts with the environment. The TAT is used in for the content of personality and the mold of social interactions. With the T A T, clinicians are likely to make specific judgments. The TAT is less likely to be used to assess the degree of maladjustments than to reveal the locus of problem, the nature and needs or the quality of interpersonal relationships.

30. TAT Description • Their 31 TAT cards most of the people in a variety of situations, but a few contain only objects. And one is a blank card. Some are said to be useful for boys and men, some for girls and women, and some for both genders. Murray suggested that 20 of the 31 cards be selected for a given examinee. • ADMINISTRATION. In practice, clinicians typically select somewhere between six and 12 cards for administration to be a given patient. • Exact instructions used vary from clinician to clinician it goes something like this: Now, I want you to make up a story about each of these pictures. Tell me who the people are, what are they doing, what they are thinking or feeling, what led up to the scene, and how it will turn out. OK?

31. TATReliability and Validity • Is very difficult to evaluate the reliability and validity of the T A T in any formal sense. There are so many variations in instructions, methods of administration, number of cards used, and the type of scoring system if any, that hard conclusions are virtually impossible. • The same methodological issues arise when studying reliability.

32. Sentence Completion Techniques • Rotter Incomplete Sentences Blank - the complete sentence blank consists of 40 sentence stems. Each of the completions can be sorted all law a seven. Scale to provide a general index of adjustment-maladjustment. • ADVANTAGES. The scoring is objective and reliable. It can be used easily and economically, and it appears to be a good screening device. The ISB provide a cognitive and behavior picture of the patient rather than a deep, psychodynamic picture.

33. Incremental Utility • Incremental validity refers to the degree of which a procedure and adds to the prediction obtainable from other sources. For an assessment procedure to be of real value, it must tell clinicians something of importance that they cannot get from merely inspecting the base rates for the population of interest. • Finally, it should be noted that a given assessment instrument must demonstrate incremental validity over other more economical measures to justify its use.

34. Illusory Correlation • The interpretation of projective tests responses depend heavily on the psychodiagnostician's experience. • Illusory correlation based on associative strength can introduce a powerful source of error.

35. The Use and Abuse of Testing • Testing is big business. Psychological, educational, and Personnel Corporations sell many thousands of tests each year. • Protections. The American psychological Association's ethical standards require that psychologists use only techniques or procedures that lie within their competence. • In addition, the purchase of Testing Materials is generally restricted by the publisher to individuals or institutions that can demonstrate their competence in administering, scoring, and interpreting tests. • The question of privacy. The examinee must be given only test relevant to the purpose of the evaluation. • The question of confidentiality. Information revealed to psychiatrist and clinical psychologist is typically regarded as a privilege, there are continuing assaults on the right to withhold such information. For example, the Tarasoff decision of the plant California Supreme Court makes it clear that information provided by a patient in the course of therapy cannot remain privileged if that information indicates that the patient may be dangerous. • The question of discrimination. Within psychology, attacks have centered on ways in which test discriminate against minorities. It is often charge that most psychological tests are really designed for white middle-class population and that other groups are being tested with the devices that are inappropriate for them. • Test bias. It is important to remember that significant differences between man scores on a test different groups do not in and of themselves indicate test bias or discrimination. Rather, test bias or discrimination is a validity issue. That is, if it can be demonstrated that the validity of a tests varies significantly across groups, then a case can be made that the test is biased for that purpose

36. Computer-based Assessment. • Computers have been used for years to support tests and to generate psychological profiles. Now they are also used to a minister in interpret responses to clinical interviews, IQ tests, a self reported inventories, and even projective tests. The reason given for using computers include cutting costs, enhancing its clients' attention and motivation, and standardizing procedures across clinicians. The increasing use of Internet-mediated psychological assessment raises a number of issues. First relatively few studies have demonstrated that Internet-based vs. traditional psychological test possess the same psychometric qualities. Second, online assessment may also be subjects to confounding factors like a lack of control over the testing situation, distractions, or technical problems. All these may serve to make the on line test scores less valid. • Computer -based test interpretations have the advantages of generating interpretive findings quickly, of minimizing subjectively in selecting interpretations of scores, and of accessing a large databases and processing potentially complex scores patterns, there are numbers of limitations as well. • Limitations:First many CBTI systems have not been adequately scrutinized from a scientific standpoint, and thus, in accurately interpretations result. • Second, the impression of scientific precision may lead clinicians to indiscriminately use CBTI material when it is not relevant or not appropriate. Therefore, CBTIs must be shown to be reliable, valid, and clinically useful.

37. Ultimately, the have of any clinical assessment instrument will depend on whether the information provided by the test is useful for planning, conducting, in evaluating treatment.