Objective Personality

Inventories
Objective Personality Inventories
• They ask clients to give answers to fixed formats
• The information is based on self-report by the client
• Specific Instructions and rules for administration
• Even an untrained person or computer can perform the administration
Objective
• Because the format is structured and because the soring and
interpretation are based on statistical comparisons with normative group
Truthfulness, Reliability and Validity

The validity of any of these tests rests on the assumption:

• That examinees are telling the truth

• That they are valid judges of themselves

• That the questions are clear

False (untruthful) Responses
• Respondents may be unwilling to tell the truth
• They may not even know the truth about themselves
• Response tendencies or sets, such as acquiescence, social desirability,
over cautiousness and extremeness, also influence score validity.
• Acquiescence – tendency to agree rather than disagree when in doubt
• Social desirability – the tendency to respond in a more socially
acceptable manner
• It is best to use personality inventories as aids in decision making
Norms, Reliability and Validity
• The norms must be interpreted cautiously
• Situational factors usually have more influence on personality than
they do on a person’s ability
• Personality Is less stable than ability
• Personality tests have lower reliabilities than tests of ability or
achievement
• Jingle Fallacy – the believing of the examinee that groups of items
(scales) with similar names measure the same variable.
Single-Construct and Symptom Inventories

• The first personality inventory was constructed during World War I by

R. S. Woodworth

• A-S Reaction study was another note worthy multiple choice

instrument designed by G. W. Allport and F. H. Allport in 1928
Beck Inventories
Beck Depression Inventory
• Designed to assess the nature and intensity of depression
• Focuses on symptoms present during the preceding 2 weeks
• 21 items
• 0-9 score is classified as normal
• 10-18 as mild-moderate depression
• 19-29 as moderate-severe depression
• 30 or above as extremely severe depression
Beck Hopelessness Scale (BHS)
• 20 items scale
• Three major aspects of hopelessness
• Feelings about future
• Loss of motivation
• And expectations
Beck Scale for Suicide Ideation
• Was designed to evaluate suicidal thinking and attitude and thereby
to identify individuals at risk for suicide
Beck Anxiety Inventory
• To measure anxiety in adults and adolescents
Self-Concept and Self-Esteem
• The self concept consists of how a person views himself in comparison
to those of other people
• The self-Esteem consists of how the self is evaluated by the person
Inventories
• Coopersmith Self-Esteem Inventories
• Pier-Harris Children’s Self-Concept Scale
• Behavioral Academic Self-Esteem
• Self-Esteem Index
Inventories Based on Content Validation
• The development of such questions is essentially based on developing
items that correspond to the content of what you are trying to
measure
• It is derived from an understanding of the construct base don theory,
clinical experience, and/or research
• The first multiscore adjustment inventory was the Bernreuter
Personality Inventory (1931) of 125 items and six variables.
Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
• Composed of series of two-choice items
• Based on Carl Jung’s theory of personality types
• Four bipolar scales
• Introversion – Extroversion
• Sensing – Intuition
• Thinking – Feeling
• Judging – Perspective
Personality Research Form

• Based on Henry Murray’s Trait Theory of Personality

• A set of 5 true false inventories

• For grade 6 through adulthood

• Two scales to detect invalid profiles

• Faking bad

• Faking Good
Inventories Based on Factor Analysis
• Factor Analysis considers the patterns the descriptions of personality
have to each other by calculating all the possible intercorelations
between various descriptions
• This results in a series of items that are highly correlated and form
clusters known as Factors
• Guilford and co-workers identified 10 traits of personality
• Cattell later identified 16 Personality Factors
• Further reduced to five Global Factors
16 Personality Factor Questionnaire
• Author: R. B. Cattell
• Fifth edition consists of 185 three-choice items
• Testing time: 35 to 50 minutes
• Scored by hand or computer
• Most recent updated norms were developed in 2002
Adult Personality Inventory
• 324 items, self report inventory
• 21 content scales and
• 4 validity scales
• 7 personality characteristics
• Extroverted
• Adjusted
• Tough-minded
• Independent
• Disciplined
• Creative
• enterprising
Eysenck Personality Questionnaire
• By H. Eysenck
• Age range : 7 years through adulthood
• Administration Time : 10 to 15 minutes
• Dimensions:
• Neuroticism (N)
• Extroversion (E)
• Psychoticism (P)
• Lie Scale (L)
Neo Personality Inventory
• By Costa and McCrae
• 240 items
• Administration time: 30 minutes
• Ratings on 5 point scale
Neuroticism:
Anxiety, Hostility, Depression, Self-consciousness, Impulsiveness,
Vulnerability
Extroversion:
Warmth, gregariousness, assertiveness, activity, excitement-seeking,
positive emotions
Openness to Experience:
Fantasy, aesthetics, feeling, actions, ideas, values
Agreeableness:
Trust, modesty, compliance, altruism, straightforwardness, tender-
mindedness
Conscientiousness:
competence, self-discipline, achievement striving, dutifulness, order
Deliberation
Inventories Based on Criterion Keying
• The criterion portion refers to the use of some outside comparison or
contrast group that has some identified characteristic
• Tested to see how well they differentiate the two (or more) groups
• Selected items are then keyed in the direction that indicates they are
good discriminators
Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory
• Hathaway and McKinley
• Assess personality characteristics that are indicative of psychological
abnormality in adults
• 550 statements
Validity Scales of MMPI
Cannot Say – depicts defensiveness
Raw lie – to place oneself in favourable light
Infrequency - to place oneself in less favourable light
K score – overcriticalness or overgenerosity in evaluating oneself
MMPI - 2
• Change due to dated language or awkward expressions
• 567 true-false questions
• Takes about 90 minutes to complete
• The higher the T-score, the stronger the meaning is for the person
• Personality analysis based on the pattern displayed by the entire
group of scores
Computer-Based test Interpretation (of
MMPI-2)
• Program mimics the clinical judgement of experienced
psychodiagnosticians

• Even the most complex interpretations are usually not as

individualized

• Not an adequate substitute for clinical judgment

• Trained clinicians should review and fine-tune the information

California Psychological Inventory
• Harrison Gough in 1957
• 480 true – false statements
• Assess more positive, normal and interpersonal aspects of personality
Fourfold Typology
Alphas – externally oriented and norm favouring
Betas – internally oriented and norm favouring
Gammas – externally oriented and norm doubting
Deltas – internally oriented and norm doubting
Personality Inventory for Children

• D. Lachar and C. P. Gruber

• 275 true – false items

• 40 minutes by a parent

• Because of low reading comprehension of children, self-report

inventories are less reliable