ASSESSMENT OF PERSONALITY (PART 1) Personality assessment may be defined as the
measurement and evaluation of psychological traits,
ASSESSMENT FOR EDUCATION
states, values, interests, attitudes, worldview,
Important functions of standardized tools of acculturation, personal identity, sense of humor,
assessment in education settings: cognitive and behavioral styles, and/or related
individual characteristics.
- Are used for screening purposes.
Before all that, however, some background is needed
- Diagnostic data may be used to identify area regarding the use of the terms trait, type, and state.
of weakness that require remediation or other
educational intervention and/or where do Personality trait offered by Guilford (1959, p. 6) has
students excel as well. great appeal: “Any distinguishable, relatively enduring
way in which one individual varies from another.
- Indispensable for purposes of comparison.
Personality type as a constellation of traits and states
- Dynamic Assessment that is similar in pattern to one identified category of
personality within a taxonomy of personalities.
PERSONALITY MBTI, Type A and Type B personality and MMPI
(personality traits and psychopathology).
Dozens of different definitions of personality exist in
the psychology literature. Some definitions appear to Psychological state refers to the transitory exhibition
be all-inclusive. of some personality trait.
For example, McClelland (1951, p. 69) defined
personality as “the most adequate conceptualization SO WHY DO WE NEED TO ASSESS THE PERSONALITY?
of a person’s behavior in all its detail.”
In the corporate world, personality assessment is a
Menninger (1953, p. 23) defined it as “the individual key tool of the human resources department, relied
as a whole, his height and weight and love and hates on to aid in hiring, firing, promoting, transferring, and
and blood pressure and reflexes; his smiles and hopes related decisions. Perhaps as long as there have been
and bowed legs and enlarged tonsils. It means all that tests to measure people’s interests, there have been
anyone is and that he is trying to become.” Others questions regarding how those interests relate to
view the individual in the context of society (Sullivan, personality (Larson et al., 2002).
1953).
In military organizations around the world, leadership
Some definitions focus narrowly on a particular aspect is a sought-after trait, and personality tests help
of the individual (Goldstein, 1963) While some identify who has it (see, for example, Bradley et al.,
theorists avoid any definition at all. 2002; Handler, 2001).
For example, Byrne (1974) characterized the entire In the most general sense, basic research involving
area of personality psychology as “psychology’s personality assessment helps to validate or invalidate
garbage bin in that any research which doesn’t fit theories of behavior and to generate new hypotheses.
other existing categories can be labeled
‘personality.’”
Cohen and Swerdlik (2010) defined personality as an WHO IS ACTUALLY BEING ASSESSED?
individual’s unique constellation of psychological traits
Some methods of personality assessment rely on the
and states. According to Cohen and Swerdlik (2010),
assesses own self report. Assesses may respond to
variables on which individuals may differ, such as
interview questions, answer questionnaires in writing,
values, interests, attitudes, worldview, acculturation,
blacken squares on computer answer forms, or sort
personal identity, sense of humor, and cognitive and
cards with various terms on them—all with the
behavioral styles.
ultimate objective of providing the assessor with a
personality-related self-description.
PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT On the other hand, other methods of personality
assessment rely on informants other than the person
being assessed to provide personality related shorthand indication of how honestly, diligently, and
information. So, for example, parents or teachers may carefully a testtaker responded to test items. MMPI.
be asked to participate in the personality assessment
of a child by providing ratings, judgments, opinions,
and impressions relevant to the child’s personality. WHERE ARE PERSONALITY ASSESSMENTS
CONDUCTED?
- The Personality Inventory for Children 2
Traditionally, personality assessment, as well as other
varieties of assessment, has been conducted in
WHO IS ACTUALLY BEING ASSESSED? schools, clinics, hospitals, academic research
laboratories, employment counseling and vocational
Biases in Ratings
selection centers, and the offices of psychologists and
- Leniency Errors or Generosity Error counselors.
- Severity Errors
- Error of Central Tendency
- Halo Effect HOW PERSONALITY ASSESSMENTS STURCTURED AND
CONDUCTED
One dimension of the how of personality assessment
WHAT IS ACTUALLY BEING ASSESSED?
concerns its scope. The scope of an evaluation may be
Primary content area sampled. Personality measures very wide, seeking to take a kind of general inventory
are tools used to gain insight into a wide array of of an individual’s personality.
thoughts, feelings, and behaviors associated with all
The California Psychological Inventory (CPI 434) is an
aspects of the human experience. Some tests are
example of an instrument with a relatively wide scope.
designed to measure particular traits (such as
This test contains 434 true–false items—but then you
introversion) or states (such as test anxiety), whereas
knew that from its title—and is designed to yield
others focus on descriptions of behavior, usually in
information on many personality-related variables
particular contexts.
such as responsibility, self-acceptance, and
Test taker Response Style. dominance.
Acquiescent Style or Acquiescence – An Some instruments may be designed to focus on as
individual tendency to respond to yes or true little as one particular aspect of personality. For
than no or false on a short-answer test. example, consider tests designed to measure a
personality variable called locus of control (Rotter,
Impression management is a term used to 1966; Wallston et al., 1978).
describe the attempt to manipulate others’
impressions through “the selective exposure Locus (meaning “place” or “site”) of control is a
of some information (it may be false person’s perception about the source of things that
information) . . . coupled with suppression of happen to him or her.
[other] information” (Braginsky et al., 1969, p.
In general, people who see themselves as largely
51).
responsible for what happens to them are said to have
Responding to a personality test in an inconsistent, an internal locus of control.
contrary, or random way, or attempting to fake good
People who are prone to attribute what happens to
or bad, may affect the validity of the interpretations of
them to external factors (such as fate or the actions of
the test data. Because a response style can affect the
others) are said to have an external locus of control.
validity of the outcome, one particular type of
response style measure is referred to as a validity The single most popular personality test in use today
scale. A validity scale is a subscale of a test designed is atheoretical: the Minnesota Multiphasic
to assist in judgments regarding how honestly the test Personality Inventory (MMPI), in both its original and
taker responded and whether observed responses revised forms. Streiner (2003a) referred to this test as
were products of response style, carelessness, “the epitome of an atheoretical, ‘dust bowl
deliberate efforts to deceive, or unintentional empiricism’ approach to the development of a tool to
misunderstanding. Validity scales can provide a kind of measure personality traits”.
One advantage of an atheoretical tool of personality For other measures, a computer programmed to apply
assessment: It allows test users, should they so highly technical manipulations of the data is required
desire, to impose their own theoretical preferences for purposes of scoring and interpretation.
on the interpretation of the findings.
Yet other measures may require a highly trained
Another variable relevant to the how of personality clinician reviewing a verbatim transcript of what the
measurement concerns the frame of reference of the assessed said in response to certain stimuli such as
assessment. inkblots or pictures.
Frame of reference may be defined as aspects of the Nomothetic Approach is characterized by efforts to
focus of exploration such as the time frame (the past, learn how a limited number of personality traits can
the present, or the future) as well as other contextual be applied to all people (e.g., 16 PF).
issues that involve people, places, and events.
Idiographic approach is characterized by efforts to
One example of test that uses to explore frame of learn about each individual’s unique constellation of
reference is the Q-sort. Originally developed by personality traits, with no attempt to characterize
Stephenson (1953). each person according to any particular set of traits
(Gordon Allport’s Assessment).
The Q-sort is an assessment technique in which the
task is to sort a group of statements, usually in
perceived rank order ranging from most descriptive to
DEVELOPING INSTRUMENTS TO ASSESS PERSONALITY
least descriptive.
Logic and reasoning in developing a test (e.g.,
The statements, traditionally presented on index
anorexia nervosa test), such question may involve
cards, may be sorted in ways designed to reflect
various perceptions. They may, for example, reflect 1. Is your current weight at least 85% of
how respondents see themselves or how they would expected body weight for your age and
like to see themselves. height?
2. Do you fear gaining weight?
One of the best-known applications of Q-sort
3. Do you perceive your body as abnormal in any
methodology in clinical and counseling settings was
way?
advocated by the personality theorist and
psychotherapist Carl Rogers. Rogers (1959) used the Data reduction methods involves several types of
Q-sort to evaluate the discrepancy between the statistical methods collectively known as factor
perceived actual self and the ideal self. analysis or cluster analysis. Which is used for
intercorrelations of observed phenomena.
At the beginning of psychotherapy, clients might be
asked to sort cards twice, once according to how they
perceived themselves to be and then according to
how they would ultimately like to be. THE BIG FIVE THEORY
The larger the discrepancy between the sorting, the The Revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO PI-R;
more goals would have to be set in therapy. Costa & McCrae, 1992a) is widely used in clinical
applications and in a wide range of research that
Two other item presentation formats that are readily involves personality assessment. Based on a five-
adaptable to different frames of reference are the dimension (or -factor) model of personality, the NEO
adjective checklist format and the sentence PI-R is a measure of five major dimensions (or
completion format. “domains”) of personality and a total of 30 elements
or facets that define each domain.
The original version of the test was called the NEO
SCORING AND INTERPRETATION
Personality Inventory (NEOPI; Costa & McCrae, 1985),
For some paper-and-pencil measures, a simple tally of where NEO was an acronym for the first three
responses to targeted items is presumed to provide a domains measured: Neuroticism, Extraversion, and
measure of the strength of particular trait. Openness.
The NEO PI-R provides for the measurement of two Group 2: A randomly selected group
additional domains: Agreeableness and of people (who may or may not
Conscientiousness. possess the trait being measured).
Neuroticism domain taps aspects of adjustment and 3. Conduct an item analysis to select items
emotional stability. indicative of membership in the criterion
group. Items in the preliminary pool that
The Extraversion domain taps aspects of sociability
discriminate between membership in the two
and assertiveness.
groups in a statistically significant fashion will
Openness encompasses openness to experience as be retained and incorporated in the final form
well as active imagination, aesthetic sensitivity, of the test.
attentiveness to inner feelings, preference for variety, 4. Obtain data on test performance from a
intellectual curiosity, and independence of judgment. standardization sample of test takers who are
representative of the population from which
Agreeableness primarily a dimension of interpersonal future test takers will come.
tendencies that include altruism, sympathy toward
others, and the belief that others are similarly
inclined.
THE MMPI
Conscientiousness is a dimension of personality that
The MMPI was the product of a collaboration
involves the active processes of planning, organizing,
between psychologist Starke R. Hathaway
and following through.
psychiatrist/neurologist John Charnley McKinley.
Each of these major dimensions or domains of
It contained 567 true–false items and was designed as
personality may be subdivided into individual traits or
an aid to psychiatric diagnosis with adolescents and
facets measured by the NEO PI-R.
adults 14 years of age and older.
Research preceding the selection of test items
CRITERION GROUPS included review of textbooks, psychiatric reports, and
previously published personality test items.
A criterion may be defined as a standard on which a
judgment or decision can be made. In this sense, the beginnings of the MMPI can be
traced to an approach based on logic and reason with
A criterion group is a reference group of test takers an emphasis on item content.
who share specific characteristics and whose
responses to test items serve as a standard according MMPI contains 10 clinical scales. Each of the
to which items will be included in or discarded from diagnostic categories listed for the ten clinical scales
the final version of a scale. were popular diagnostic categories in the 1930s.
The process of using criterion groups to develop test
items is referred to as empirical criterion keying.
DEVELOPMENT OF A TEST BY MEANS OF EMPIRICAL
CRITERION KEYING: SUMMARY
1. Create a large, preliminary pool of test items
from which the test items for the final form of
the test will be selected.
2. Administer the preliminary pool of items to at THE MMPI STANDARDIZATION SAMPLE
least two groups of people.
MMPI clinical scale items were derived empirically by
Group 1: A criterion group composed administration to clinical criterion groups and normal
of people known to possess the trait control groups.
being measured.
In the development of the MMPI, members of the
criterion groups were drawn from a population of
people presumed to be members of a group with a
shared diagnostic label.
By contrast, members of the control group were
normal (that is, non-diagnosed) people who ostensibly
received no such experimental treatment.
The normal control group, also referred to as the
standardization sample, consisted of approximately
1,500 subjects. Included were 724 people who
happened to be visiting friends or relatives at
University of Minnesota hospitals, 265 high-school
graduates seeking precollege guidance at the
University of Minnesota Testing Bureau, 265 skilled
workers participating in a local Works Progress
Administration program, and 243 medical
(nonpsychiatric) patients.
PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT AND CULTURE
Before any tool of personality assessment—an
interview, a test, a protocol for behavioral
observation, a portfolio, or something else—can be
employed, and before data derived from an attempt at
measurement can be imbued with meaning, the
assessor will ideally consider some important issues
with regard to assessment of a particular assessed.
Many of these issues relate to the assesses level of
acculturation, values, identity, worldview, and
language.
ACCULTURATION AND RELATED CONSIDERATIONS
Acculturation is an ongoing process by which an
individual’s thoughts, behaviors, values, worldview,
and identity develop in relation to the general
thinking, behavior, customs, and values of a particular
cultural group.
The process of acculturation begins at birth, a time at
which the newborn infant’s family or caretakers serve
as agents of the culture.
In the years to come, other family members, teachers,
peers, books, films, theater, newspapers, television
and radio programs, and other media serve as agents
of acculturation.
Through the process of acculturation, one develops
culturally accepted ways of thinking, feeling, and
behaving.