4 – 19 – 99/ Test 2 Tonight

The Legal Aspects of Psychology TestingChapter 15B

PART ONE from my notes from her lectureUndertrained/poorly trained newly licensed people screw up the interpretations and overpathologize. Too many false positives. People are not really sick.

Federal rules – Expert witnesses are based on their education, training & experience. They are paid lots of money for this. Not every psychologist is going to qualify.

The uses of tests are widespread. Psychology and legal field have guidelines to follow. There are guidelines for the practitioners, students and any individual who’s working for a psychologist.

Psychologists are there to protect the client. They have to act in the best interest of the client.

Guidelines – professional codes handed down from the APA. APA cannot punish you if you are not a member. Only if you belong to the group can they punish you.

On trial, you risk yourself in you are found in contempt. But then you violate your ethics as a counselor to not harm your patient by giving out private information. The APA can censure or reprimand you depending on the deed. The worst case scenario is that they kick you out of their organization. Costly in terms of fines and re – education. Bad consequences for this. Ex. screwing a client is a no – no. You cannot have a friend as a client.

You are duty bound to break confedionality if someone is a threat to themselves and/or others.

Before 1985, test manuals did not have all that validity information like they do now. Every test post 1985 has this information for us written in the test booklets. Before 1985 psychometric measures were not enforced.Revisions have to be made if the test is offensive to some people/races.

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Standards: PRIMARY & SECONDARY. All primary standards must be met before the tests are used. Such as Informed Consent, where the patient knows what’s going on. The patient is to be given the results of the test. And you cannot release the test scores without consent.

4 – 26 – 99 Legal Code and Standards are different from the Ethics code. If you break the legal code you go to jail. If you break the standards then nothing happens to you if you are not a member of the APA. Ethics code – the worst the APA could do is kick you out. The flavor of the ethics code is to always act with integrity. To make sure no one, no entity including our field is harmed by our actions.

If the ETHICS CODE conflicts with the LEGAL CODE then we have to adhere to the higher standard; that means even if it means going to jail for the sake of your client.

OUTLINE OF PRINCIPLES & STANDARDS – WORKBOOK p. 128 – 135. If we are going to develop tests we have to make sure the tests are

valid and reliable before making them available. Because some people can be harmed by bad tests.

These ethics codes applies to everyone in the field of psychology. We have to adhere to the general principles & make make sure

others follow the rules of the general principles. 1.04 psychologists should only be working within the boundaries of

what they know. Don’t give out tests we do not know how to administer. Only after we have taken appropriate steps to become experts in our field.

It is wrong for psychologists to act out a Dual lifestyle by treating his patients as well as his friends and family. If you were a teacher then you should act only as a teacher to student not as a therapist to client. 2.01 p. 131

Continue 2.01 we have to have data to back up our interpretations/diagnosis from our test results.

2.02 Important! Page 131 & 131. This comes from the heels of the general standard. There are lots of overlap in these rules. “Psychologists refrain from the misuse of assessment techniques, interventions, results and interpretations and take reasonable steps to prevent others from misusing the information these techniques provide.”

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2.03 Remember about pre-1984 tests didn’t have validity information. Testing standards were not developed before then. Now we are told to make sure our standardization is representative of the target population and to provide information on reliability and validity. Prior to that time there were no set standards for the development of tests. Now we have to use scientific procedures. Most of the tests from the 30’s & 40’s would not exist today if we used these standards were used back then.

Most of the projective tests do not meet the scientific rigor to become an appropriate test.

Many tests do not meet the scientific standards to become an approved test today with our standards.

2.04 psychometricians must know all the validity information on tests.

2.07 Don’t use outdated tests with no re-norming. Norms can get outdated so they must be updated. People change with the times.

2.08 Because of human error we use interpretation services to give us a leg up on the interpretation results. “Psychologists who offer assessment or scoring procedures to other professionals accurately describe the purpose, norms, validity, reliability & applications of the procedures and any special qualifications applicable to their use.

2.10 Nobody can have access to the MMPI. If the public knew the answers to the test the test would not be valid as an IQ test. We don’t want people to be familiar with these tests to protect the integrity of the tests. Its our responsibility to keep it a secret.

5.01 There are limits to confidentiality – we are duty bound to tell on patients when they are abusers to others or themselves. People still unload their secrets to the therapists even after being told about breaking confidentiality. And they still say “please don’t tell, please don’t tell” But we have to and it works out in the end.

We are now going to electronically record the therapy sessions. Awkward to the patient.

5.04 maintenance of records. We are responsible to keep the records confidential; locked droors.

5.05 We can only disclose information when mandated by law or when John Doe has not made a payment for a session, you can tell someone you are just seeing him. Normally that information is also not disclosed.

Or you can disclose information when the patient gives their okay.

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If someone tells you they have killed someone, you cannot tell anyone. But if they say they will kill someone then you can report the case.

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Chapter 15B Professional Standards, Ethical Issues and courtroom testimony.(Notes from text)

BEST INTERSET OF THE CLIENTWhen used ethically and professionally tests help users make fair and sound decisions about individuals and groups. Several ethical principles recognize that all psychological services, including assessment, are provided within the context of a professional relationship. Therefore, we are enjoined to accept the responsibility implicit in this relationship. The practitioner is guided by one overriding question: What is in the best interests of the client? Assessment should serve a constructive purpose for the individual examinee. If it doesn’t, the practitioner is probably violating one or more specific ethical principles.

CONFIDENTIALITY AND THE DUTY TO WARNPractitioners have a primary obligation to safeguard the confidentiality of information, including test results, that they obtain from clients in the course of consultations. Such information can be ethically released to others only after the client or a legal representative gives consent, usually in written information. In most states a psychologist who learns in the course of testing that the client has physically or sexually abused a child is obligated to report that information to law enforcement. Psychologists also have a duty to warn that stems from the 1976 decision in the Tarasoff case. She was a young woman who was murdered in California by a student from India. His therapist warned the police but not the parents. Clinicians must communicate any serious threat both to the potential victim and to law enforcement agencies.

EXPERTISE OF THE TEST USER The test user must accept ultimate responsibility for the proper application of tests. From a practical standpoint this means that the test user must be well trained in assessment and measurement theory. The user must possess the expertise needed to evaluate psychological tests for proper standardization, reliability, validity, interpretative accuracy and other psychometric characteristics.

INFORMED CONSENTBefore testing is done, the test user should obtain informed consent from test takers or their legal representative. The Standards Manuel

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devotes a separate standard to it: “Informed consent implies that the test takers or representatives are made aware, in language that they can understand, of the reasons for testing, the type of tests to be used, the intended use and the range of material consequences of the intended use and what testing information will be released and to whom.”Even young and retarded kids should receive an explanation of the reasons for testing.

OBSOLETE TESTS & THE STANDARD OF CAREStandard of care is a loose concept that often arises in the professional or legal review of specific health practices, including psychological testing. Practitioners of testing must be wary of obsolete tests, since their use might violate the prevailing standard of care. Ex. The MMPI-2 is now the standard of care, not the first MMPI, in MMPI based assessment of psychopathology.

I/O psychology is the subspecialty of psychology that is concerned with the behavior in work situations. In its broadest sense, I/O includes diverse applications in business, advertising and the military. For example, I/O psychologists act as consultants to help design and evaluate hiring procedures, business may ask I/O psychologist to appraise the effectiveness of advertising and military leaders rely heavily upon I/O testing for recruits.

There are different approaches to Personnel Selection. 1. Autobiographical data2. Employment interview – worst.3. Cognitive ability tests4. Personality, temperament & motivation tests5. Paper & pencil integrity tests6. Work samples and situational tests – these two are the best tests.

Biodata – (page 392) Objective or scorable autobiographical data, biodata, are typically secured by means of a structured form variously referred to as a biographical. This is information collected during the interview & entered into a formula for prediction. The rationale for the biodata approach is that future work related behavior could be

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predicted from past choices and accomplishments. Biodata have predictive power because certain character traits which are essential for success are also stable & enduring. Interviewers look to see how long this person has been at one job. If he’ll just quit after getting hired. Employers cannot ask you when and where you were born. That is age discrimination. They can ask questions that are relevant to the job you are being interviewed for. The validity of biodata has generally positive findings. Cross – validated correlations between biodata score and length of tenure were .58 for minorities and .56 for nonminoritites.

The EMPLOYMENT INTERVIEWInterviews are bad for getting to know someone. They have poor predictor reliability. A STRUCTURED INTERVIEW works out a little better, where everyone is asked the same questions.

COGNITIVE ABILITY TESTS Cognitive ability can refer either to a general construct akin to Intelligence or to a variety of specific constructs such as verbal skills, numerical ability, spatial perception or perceptual speed. A vast body of empirical research offers modest to strong support for the validity and fairness of standardized ability tests in personnel selection. An ongoing debate in I/O psych. is whether employment testing is best accomplished with highly specific ability tests or with measures of general cognitive ability. The weight of the evidence seems to support that “g” are better predictors of training and job success than cognitive tests.

In class we took the Wonderlic Personnel Test (very hard)Wonderlic Personnel Test – the WPT is really a group test of general intelligence. It is popular because it is fast to take at 12 minutes and numerous parallel forms. The Reliability of the WPT is quite impressive, especially considering the brevity of the instrument. Internal consistency reliabilities usually exceed .90. no accommodation is made for non-native speakers.

Bennett Mechanical Comprehension TestThis test looks for Specific abilities. In many trades and occupations, the understanding of mechanical principles is a prerequisite to successful performance. This test consists of pictures about which the examinee must answer straightforward questions. The BMCT has been widely used since WWII for military and civilian testing, so an

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extensive body of technical and validity data exists for this instrument. Split half reliability coefficients range from the .80’s to the low .90’s. Based on a huge body of earlier research, the concurrent and predictive validity of the BMCT appear to be well established. The problem is that it’s an old test that needs to be updated. It is sexist and offensive to minorities. Modernization could increase the acceptability of the test to these groups.

WORK SAMPLE & SITUATIONAL EXERCISES A work sample is a miniature replica of the job for which examinees have applied. We “take the content of a person’s job, shrink it down to a manageable time period and let the applicants demonstrate their ability in performing this replica of the job. Work samples are for “Blue Collar” jobs. Such as a typing test. It is the single best predictor for skilled work with a predictive validity at .45 to .60 A situational exercise is approximately the white – collar equivalent of a work sample. They are used for managerial and professional positions. These tests are based on the conventional wisdom that the best predictor of future performance in a specific domain is past performance in that same domain.

The In – Basket TestThe classic paper in the in-basket test is the monograph by Frederikson. The candidate is instructed to be a manager and perform tasks a manager would do. What needs to be completed first; how do you prioritize information coming to you. Information would be telephone calls, letters, memoranda and other documents. Has good predictive validity.

Integrity Tests p.400 A problem with integrity tests is that their proprietary nature makes it difficult to scrutinize them in the same manner as traditional instruments. Overt Integrity Tests typically consist of two sections. The first is a section dealing with attitudes toward theft and other forms of dishonesty. The second is a section dealing with overt admissions of theft and other illegal activities. These overt tests can be easily faked compared to personality based integrity tests.

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Personality Based integrity Tests typically do not contain obvious references to theft or other forms of undesirable employee behavior. A serious problem with most integrity tests is the very high fail rate, typically in the 30 to 60 percent range. Integrity tests are the final hurdle for job seekers. So this test is a way to filter out the applicants. Organizations, which employ these tests, must be in a position to turn away the majority of applicants. Has an average validity coefficient of .41 when integrity tests were used to predict supervisory ratings of job performance. These tests predicted global disruptive behaviors(theft, illegal activities, absenteeism, tardiness, etc…)

Ability and Personality tests are for selection, evaluation, screening for promotion. Also for enhancement for the employees. It’s quicker and inexpensive. Also easier to interpret. Such as the Shipley & the Wonderlic test we took. There are the multiple aptitude test batteries, like the DAT. Then specific ability tests, like the Bennett Mechanical Comprehensive Test.

Employment Testing 1. Biodata2. Interviews3. Work samples & situational exercises4. Ability & Personality TestsIntegrity tests – they have a lot of false positives; they identify people as dishonest when they are really not. Still a huge demand for this test. There is a 1988 law that prohibits polygraph testing for job selection.

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5 – 3 – 993rd lecture for FINAL

Read Chapter 11: Vocational, Career & Values Testing

Due Next Monday 5 – 10 – 99 Homework #12 “mock personality test” due next week. Homework #13 will be done in class ETHICS assignment due (2 pages).

Extra Credit – Find three websites that give psychological tests and take one. Read directions in handout. Evaluate the 3 tests we look at. DUE AT THE LAST DAY OF CLASS. 5 – 17. This will move the distribution up higher. Look at the Study Guide for the Final. FINAL is on May 24th at 7:30pm.

LECTUREChapter 10B

The Wonderlic, along with the Bennett test, has had significant race differences in test results. In 1971 there was a Supreme Court Case, “Griggs Vs. Duke Power”. A black man worked for the Duke Power Co. in Illinois and he wanted to transfer out to a new location. In order to transfer, the company made you take the Wonderlic and Bennett tests. You had to score above the national mean in order to transfer. This was their co. policy. He did not pass the co. cut off point to pass. He noticed that only whites were passing the tests. The test was disproportionality harder for the black workers than the white workers, so the test did discriminate against blacks. There was no discriminatory intent by the Duke Company. Then the Supreme Court reversed the ruling of the lower court and said you cannot give out tests for employment purposes without their proper validation. Griggs ruling is against the use of tests for employment uses without proper validation.

Court made these points:1. Fairness in employment testing is determined by consequences,

not intent.2. Testing practices must have a demonstrable link to job

performance. Griggs was already doing the job he wanted to do when he transferred. The test had nothing to do with the job he was doing. HAVLENA SAID TO REMEMBER THIS ONE.

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3. Burden is on the employer to show that the test is job related. The employer should have access to job validity information.

Prior to 1964, there was no problem taking a test to get a job. No legal hassles yet. 1964 was the year of the Meyers Vs. Motorola case. First case where employment testing was a primary issue. A black applicant wanted to get a job at a television assembly plant. He had relevant experience to do the job as a repairman. But he was denied employment because he did not pass an IQ test of mental ability. He sued Motorola. The court ruled in his favor, the test was biased against the uneducated & people with a disadvantaged background. But the higher court overturned this ruling. This case is important is because it set a precedent that you could walk into court and file a case against the use of tests because of discrimination.

Also in 1964, the Civil rights Act passed. Title VII prohibits employment discrimination against race, color & gender. Every place has this posted up. The EEOC resulted from this act. Stands for Equal Employment Opportunity Commission – they created the guidelines. The guidelines were for fair employee selection procedures that companies had to adhere to. First published in 1966 but the guidelines were vague. Only after several cases passed that it became clearer, such as the Griggs case.

Then in 1975, Albermarle Vs. Moody came. You cannot use the supervisor’s ratings as the criteria against which you would validate a test. This is way too subjective.

Then in 1978, Washington Vs. Davis case says it is acceptable to use the employee’s performance in an on the job training as a criterion against which you could validate a test. This strengthened the EEOC’s power in terms of setting new guidelines. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled that performance in a police officer training program was a sufficient criterion against which to validate a selection test.

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In 1978, the EEOC finally published “THE UNIFORM GUIDELINES ON EMPLOYEE SELECTION”. It is this document & its’ provisions that are used extensively in court to decide cases of unfair employment practices.

It is this 1978 Guidelines that specifically defines ADVERSE IMPACT. When selection procedures favor applicants from one group (whites) over other groups (women), we would say that selection procedure has adverse impact. If those minority groups were not selected less than 4/5th the rate of the group that was most often selected.

Adverse Impact means a particular employment decision results in negative consequences more often for members of one protected group than for members of the non protected group. Adverse Impact is legally determined through the 4/5 rule. That is, the percentage of blacks hired must be at least 80% of the percentage of whites who are hired. Refers to percentages and not raw numbers.

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Test FairnessTesting practices are unfair if members of a sub population obtain lower scores, but the differences in scores are not reflective in differences of job performance. If women and minorities obtain low scores on a selection test; it is unfair to use those tests if those differences in scores are not reflective in differences in the ability to do the job. This is what happened in the Griggs case. He was already doing the job. The test he took didn’t have anything to do with the job; the test did not equate with an inability to do the job. So Fairness was defined in how those testing scores were being used. Guidelines also regulate affirmative action. 1978 guidelines also lay out technical standards for evaluating test validity for selection tests.

Cognitive ability tests have good predictive validity, like the Wonderlic or the Shipley, run as high as .63. And also Job tryouts have very high predictive validity. Cognitive ability tests are on the top of the heap with Job Tryouts a close second. Interviews are .14 for predictive validity. Poor prediction. Education does not correlate with job performance at .1 Age also has no correlation with job performance. (Don’t need to know the numbers for these, just what they mean.)

WONDERLIC TEST We are now going over the Wonderlic test. This is the 12 minute test of intelligence we took in class on the day we got our test 2 results back. B.F. Wonderlic first used the test in 1938. 32,000 businesses in the U.S. use this test as their primary selection procedure technique. It is a Short, Group, Timed test of 12 minutes and 50 questions with an ascending level of difficulty. Why do companies use this test? Because it correlates .9 with the Wechler Adult Intelligence Scale.

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SURVEY OF INTERPERSONAL VALUESFor interest inventories, the problem is the subjects can always choose a neutral answer such “doesn’t apply to me” or “no opinion”. Problems of response sets:1. Acquiescence – means “conformity” or “compliance”2. Social Desirability

To avoid this problem, some tests use a Forced Choice Format – used in the SIV test. 2 statements that are equal in social desirability. Choose one that is most like you and choose one that is least like you and leave one statement blank. We had to choose whether we wanted to or not; it didn’t fit in with the way we wanted to respond to the question. The results on a forced choice format are called Ipsative Measurement. Every single item whether we chose it or not is designed to load on one of the scales of the test. In selecting an item that loads on one of the scales, you have not selected an item that would have gone to another scale. You cannot have uniformly high or low scores on ipsative measurement. A certain number of points will be allocated. Every single person’s score will add up to this same number, but the scores will load up on different scales for each individual. The scale scores are relative to one another. Lower scores on one scale means you value this scale less than this other person who scored high on it; this doesn’t mean you don’t value it at all. The SIV is used for companies to get the employees to get to know each other; for employment enhancement. But used more for vocational and marital counseling. Given to people aged 14 years and above. Adequate psychometric properties. Good enough for self – knowledge. SIV looks at 6 psychological constructs. There are gender differences so genders are compared separately. What we use for norms are percentiles for different ages too. We are looking at norms for college students.1. Support – females are high2. Conformity – “ “3. Recognition – males are high4. Independence – “ “5. Benevolence – females are high6. Leadership – males are highSo this test follows gender stereotypes.

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Intelligence tests, Aptitude tests, Cognitive ability tests – the Wonderlic, are some of the best predictors off success in business and school. These tests tells us what a person is capable of and therefore allow us to predict success in business or school. But all these tests, cognitive IQ tests, do not tell us whether we will be happy with our careers. Aptitude, intelligence, cognitive & ability tests are tests of MAXIUMUM PERFORMANCE. They tell us what we are capable of under the best of conditions; what we are maximally capable of producing. They do a good job at telling if we will be successful in our jobs but does not say anything about job satisfaction. To predict satisfaction, we use interest inventories, personality tests, values surveys. These are considered tests of typical performance. Tell what we are like on a daily basis. Just because we have the capability to do the job doesn’t mean we will like it. We’d all make good secretaries but not all of us would like doing it.

Interest has a genetic component. It is a stable trait by high school or later. Behavioral Geneticists say kids are born with a predisposition toward certain interests. There are significant correlations between parents and their kids. While there are few interests between parents and their adopted non-biological kids. Identical Twins reared apart are alike – provides the best evidence for the heritability of traits. People like what they do well in. these abilities are a function of temperament or inherited. Interest inventories really predict what we want to do, not what we are good in. This is because career choice goes beyond interests. This is a function of ability and opportunity. We might want to become a veterinarian but do not have the proper math skills. Also be extremely motivated because though it is hard work, it is not really profitable.

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INTERESTS & VOCATIONS

Anne Roe, a personality theorists, in the 50’s said the primary factor in career choice is whether a person is “people oriented” or a “nonperson oriented”. It is like a measure of introversion and extroversion.

J.L. Holland analyzed personality types according to six major areas. Came up with the acronym “RIASEC”1. R – realistic, likes to work with tools and things than work with

people. Do not like expressing themselves.2. I – investigative, you like science activities. Like problem solving.

Not good with people either. Ex. Engineers, Scientists, Social Scientist Researchers.

3. A – artistic, high self-expression. Acting and creating. Also wants to work alone. They like individuality – musicians and artists. They want to be original and intense.

4. S – social, if you valued benevolence than you would score high in this. They want to be the center of attention. Do not like physical exertion. Very good at self-expression. Are good leaders and achievers and listeners and being popular.

5. E – Enterprising, Good talkers, very persuasive, politicians and salesmen and lawyers. They like power and status and wealth. Like to see results immediately.

6. C – conventional, like high structure. They like office work and conformity. They do not want to be in charge. Hate ambiguity. Value wealth and status also. Most of these occupations bank jobs, a math teacher, and computer experts.

We use interest inventories for occupational and educational counseling. Not for job selection/placement. Give this inventory to people who want to know what they would do well in terms of job satisfaction. Reliability is .8 range, very high. The validity is also adequate. The scores correlate with job satisfaction. We do need to know that scores on these interest inventories correlate with motivation, socioeconomic status, response sets and faking. VERY HIGH FACE VALIDITY – that’s the problem on these interest inventories. We could make the results turn out to be the we want them to turn out.

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SSI p. 104 in our workbook. It was Developed by Strong in 1927 and revised by David Cambell. SII – strong interest inventory by E. Strong and CISS by Cambell. SII – Counseled people on how their profile fit with people who were

satisfied with their jobs. Identified a major theme, then look to see how your profile fit with

others profiles who were satisfied with their jobs. This is for the purpose of occupational & educational counseling. High school kids can use this, 9th grade and up. Prior to this, kids do

not have a realistic view on occupations.

EMPIRICAL KEYING This is a technique where they found people who were already

happy with their specific occupation/jobs and developed norms based on those individuals profiles. They then used them as the normative group against which your profile would be compared to, to see if you would also be satisfied with the job.

Over the long run, we will change but our interests remain stable.

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5 – 10 – 99 4th lecture for Final/CHAPTER 13A

NEXT WEEK: Homework #13 we’ll do in class next week. Test question for Final is due – write on “acting with integrity”

lecture. HW#15 p.80 Projective assignment” TAT test. Ask the subject what

going on with this picture. Read chapters 13 & 14

PERSONALITY|Most personality tests have a Barnum effect.

Each person is consistent to some extent, we have coherent traits and action patterns that arise repeatedly. Second, each person is distinctive to some extent. Behavioral differences exist between individuals. Personality is “what people are like on a daily basis” And what makes them unique. We are interested in the assessment of behavior that is typical in performance – what people are like a consistent daily basis. Also what makes us unique.

We would NOT see good correlation between personality tests because no one single criterion is adequate to describe personality.

Different tests and techniques assess different part of personality. It is going to be an accumulation of data that will support its CONSTRUCT

VALIDITY.

Construct validity – we’re looking at multiple sources of information to see whether these tests are valid or not. Many techniques to choose from. Clinical observation – made by a trained observer Structured interview – over the phone or face to face. Certain

personal information is given. Structured interviews ask the same questions in the same order all the time. Opposite of an unstructured interview.

Unstructured interview – allows the subject to determine where the conversation is going. Therapists rely on these interviews.

Rating scales – Completed by the subject (self-report) or someone who knows the subject.

Checklists – Simplest and cost effective device for personality assessment. Fairly reliable. A related technique is the Q – sort technique. This is where traits are listed on cards and the subject is asked to sort the pile from “most like them” to “least like them”.

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Projective techniques – Techniques that use ambiguous stimuli to get at unconscious thought processes.

Two of the oldest personality assessment techniques are PHRENOLOGY & GRAPHOLOGY. Phrenology is feeling the bumps on one’s head; the bumps represent/correlate to certain traits the person has. This is a “clinical observation” technique. But it doesn’t really work. Graphology is handwriting analysis – lacks any real statistical validity. Fortune 500 Companies are hiring “graphoanalysts” to assess whether or not they have good future employees whom will earn 6 figure salaries. There is a “no – better than chance rating” in concurrent validity in graphology but it still goes on today. In Class – we’re looking at handwritings of famous people: Robert Citron – “forget that money doesn’t grow on trees and is

used to having your own way”, independent. This assessment was made “after the fact” when he invested in bad deals. But he really wasn’t independent in his decisions. Havlena said this description is probably a standard one where a few sentences have been omitted to fit Citron’s personality.

Bob Dornon – Congressman from Santa Ana. “you have a way of getting along with people” and “concise and to the point” Havlena said this is wrong about him.

Reverend Schuller – from the Crystal Cathedral. “Always immaculate. Too peaceful”. Havlena said we’re dealing with Barnum like descriptions for all of these.

CURRENT APPROACHES TO PERSONALITY

Psychoanalysis Psychoanalysis was the original creation of Sigmund Freud (1856 – 1939). Freud postulated that the root cause of hysteria was buried memories of traumatic experiences such as childhood sexual molestation. He believed that the unconscious was the reservoir of instinctual drives and a storehouse of wishes and thoughts that would be unacceptable to our conscious self.

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Freud divided the mind into three structures, the EGO being the most important for finding personality. The EGO is reality based and mediates between the desires of the chaotic ID that wants and wants and the SUPEREGO, THE moral/ethical part of personality. The EGO is largely conscious. Psychoanalysts theorists like projective methods, so to assess the EGO, they ask subjects to tell “stories”

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Type Theories Separates personality into different types. People have a set of traits that develop a personality that will cause you to act the same way across different environments. Sorts people out into different types/categories. Ex. “type A” people whom hyperactive. Havlena mentioned about the work of Sheldon’s body types – mesomorph/athletic, ectomorph/skinny, and endomorph/fat. PHENOMONOLOGICAL Theories Phenomenological theories of personality emphasize the importance of immediate, personal, subjective experience as a determinant of behavior. Stresses the “the self”. What is the individual meaning we assign to experience. Personal experience is what is important here and how we personally deal with situations. Havlena gave the example of a molested kid growing up to be screwed up adult and another kid with the same experience but growing up to be a normal adult. p. 502 in text The most influential phenomenological theorists was Carl Rogers. His contributions to personality theory, known as Self – Theory, are well appreciated by students. He popularized the Q – Technique. This is a procedure for studying changes in self-concept. It consists of a large number of cards, each containing a printed statement such as “I am poised”, “I am likeable” and the subject is asked to sort out the statements into 9 piles. One pile will have items most like him while the other pile has items least like him.

Social Learning Theory View behavior to be learned as situation specific. The environment and your experience count in learning behavior. And social learning theorists agree that cognition does play a role in behavior. This means that just knowledge of experience can change your behavior. This is different from trait theory where you are the same across situations. But social learning theorists say we lean to act quiet in a church and loud in a concert – even though our true self hasn’t really changed. We know how to act appropriately in a given situation. Scoring a Q – sort is usually a matter of comparing or correlating the distribution of items against an established norm.

5 FACTOR MODEL OF PERSONALITY Universal dimensions of personality have these broad recurrent factors. These major traits are seen all over the place. The factors generalize across procedures of evaluations, culture, sex and age.

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1. Introversion/extraversion – the single most reliable measured trait in personality.

2. Agreeableness (friendliness)/hostility 3. Conscientiousness – kindness, attention to details.4. Neuroticism/emotional stability5. Openness to new experiences.

All these share a genetic component, especially neuroticism and extraversion. So you might have to fight the urge to become one of these if you inherited these traits from your parents. Havlena mentioned another test that shows where you lie on these traits called the NEO – PI, stands for neuroticism, extraversion, openness and personality inventory.

IDIOGRAPHIC APPROACH TO PERSONALITYPersonality Vs. Nomothetic approach. “Personality” – different traits respond to different situations; everyone has a unique complex personality. Nomothetic means what is common in behavior. Tries to explain behavior in a general way, but this is an unrealistic method that doesn’t work.

Personality Objective MeasuresCan be classified in three ways by the way they were developed.

1. Theory guided measure – The Meyers – Briggs test is one, which is based on Karl Jung’s work. Also Jenkins test to test for type A behavior

2. Factor Analytic – Measure personality traits that have been clustered through factor analysis. (16PF Test – know this test)

3. Criterion keyed (MMPI,CPI) – with these inventories test items are assigned to a particular scale only if they discriminate between a well defined criterion group and a relevant normal control group. Has the highest validity coefficients for criterion keyed measures. We need to identify a group of people to make a norm out of. Then take a control group and compare them to find unique traits true only to the norm/mental patient’s sample. Then we will “key” this “trait” only to whatever group we are trying to assess, ex. Mental patients or students etc…

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The reliability and validity of personality assessment poses a problem because of the response sets; they are acquiescent. “we may say yes to everything”. It’s not really true to your personality. Sometimes we may want to make ourselves look good or bad and choose items to make this so. People may want to get out of work or plead insanity in court case. So all personality tests must come with their validity scales/information to circumvent this trickery. Mood can affect outcomes, these are measures of STATES; we always change our moods. If we are in a good or bad mood will affect our test taking choices. If you just failed a test, you’re likely to answer questions differently than in a “normal” state. So never rely on just one personality test. Use multiple sources of information. Our ethics requires that we have proper validation for the interpretation that we make.

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5 – 17 – 99PROJECTIVE TESTS

Projective Tests – Use Vague and ambiguous stimuli to elicit a response thought to reveal unconscious aspects of personality. Designed to get at much deeper levels than self – report measures. Hi – face validity. Poor validity. But reliability techniques work a little, but most have lousy reliability and validity. These tests may help the therapist to help the client. Projective tests are not totally useless. But you cannot use these techniques to make decisions about people for gaining jobs, gaining child custody & in court cases – because these tests do not meet the psychometric criteria needed to make it a valid test.

There are 4 classifications used for the Projective Categories. 1. ASSOCIATION TECHNIQUES – Associate a word or picture to

something else. The Rorschach test does this. Ask individuals “what does this mean.” Proponents say how we relate to the stimuli depends on what is going on in our subconscious. What does this association mean? Two different therapists may hear the same story but give different meanings to them. So we have poor inter – rater reliability. W/O reliability there is no validity.

2. COMPLETION TECHNIQUE – Ex. My mother is ____. Then the subject fills in the blank. The Rotter test is one like this.

3. CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES – Ask the individual to construct a story about something. The TAT and CAT does this. Use stories to give us clues to find out what’s going on in these subjects.

4. EXPRESSION TECHNIQUE - Any type of projective drawing. Example: “Draw a person”, “house – tree – person” test & the “Kinetic family drawing”. For the HTP test, if you draw a good detailed job of a house it says you are stable. Expression techniques are usually part of battery. We often ask people to draw pictures – draw themselves or another gender. Drawing is something non – threatening. Great for kids who cannot say it, but draw their problems.

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Projective Tests provide hypothesis or suggestions to clinicians about possible areas of concern. They might suggest that diagnosis, but it would never confirm a diagnosis – the test will just give clues. Projective tests are used as a vehicle for a clinical interview. There is something non – threatening about this; so the therapist can have a clinical interaction with his client. Over the years, the Rorschach has become intimidating. “the patient feels the therapist knows something that they don’t know.” Neo – Freudian and psychoanalysts love projective tests to get at some unconscious aspect of their personality. These tests are still popular despite their non-validity.

These are the most frequently used tests in the U.S.1. MMPI – 2 (personality)2. WAIS – R (Adult IQ)3. Bender Visual Motor4. Rorschach Test – 4th most popular test. Patients expect to get this

test no matter what. People see it a lot on TV and movies. Gives the therapist a lot of power & latitude.

5. WISC – III6. TAT – Thematic Apperception Test.7. Sentence Completion Test8. Draw A Person 9. House – Person – Tree – this comes in at #910. Peabody Picture Vocabulary11. Rotter Incomplete sentence – comes in at #11

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THE RORSCHACH TESTAssociation Test

The Rorschach consists of 10 inkblots devised by Herman Rorschach (1184 – 1922) in the early 1900’s. Each inkblot is displayed on a white background. There two phases, the free association phase and the inquiry phase. In the inquiry phase the examiner asks questions to clarify the exact blot location and to determine which aspects of the blot, such as the form or color, played a part in the creation of the response. Based on information collected during the inquiry phase, the examiner can then code the location, determinants, form quality and content of each response according to one or more formal scoring systems. Rorschach died before he could complete his scoring methods, so the systematization of scoring was left to his followers. Five American psychologists produced overlapping but independent approaches to the test. EXNER have synthesized these earlier approaches into the Comprehensive Scoring System. Once the entire protocol has been coded, the examiner can compute a number of summary scores that the primary basis for hypothesizing about the personality of the examinee. Support for this conjecture is at best mixed. Inter – rater reliability went from zero to .9 with the structural summary through the Exner scoring system

ROTTER INCOMPLETE SENTENCES The Rotter Incomplete Sentences Blank (RISB) consists of three similar forms, high school, college and adult, each containing 40 sentences stems written mostly in the first person. In the objective scoring system each completed sentence receives an adjustment a score from 0 (good adjustment) to 6 (poor adjustment). These scores are based initially on the categorizing of each response as follows. Omission Conflict response – indicative of hostility or unhappiness. Positive response – indicative of positive or hopeful attitude Neutral response – declarative statement with neither + or -.Positive responses get a score from 0 to 2. Neutral response gets a 3.

And a negative response gets a 4 to 6 – represents psychological conflict. The most common scoring system is to look at a CONTENT ANALYSIS. Look across the test and seek out themes/areas that are

constantly being revisited by the examinee.The original purpose of the test was to determine the fitness of soldiers, in terms of psychological adjustment, after coming back

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injured home from WWII. Were they psychologically okay to return to duty? This was the original purpose of the test. They were trying to measure PSYCHOLOGICAL ADJUSTMENT. The test is semi – structured projected. There is some degree of structure. We do ask the same questions over again to different people in the same order.

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Continue with the Rotter… The normative group in the 1950’s was out of date. Any response hinting at being a homo was seen as abnormal, given the highest conflict score. “I wish I had a beer” was okay back then, not today. They have norms and a scoring system so inter – rater reliability is high. Even though the norms are problematic, this is the most valid of all the projection tests because it is semi – structured.

THEMATIC APPERCEPTION TEST Second most popular projective test. Old style pictures. Developed by Dr. Henry Murray of Harvard. 4 years of age and up, old enough to articulate their responses. Any theory can be used as the basis of interpretation – Murray says this in the manual. He had his own personality theory in mind – NEEDS & PRESS as the determinants of personality. Needs are BIOLOGICAL, food and sex. Then PSYCHOGENIC NEEDS, like status and achievement. PRESS, the influence of the environment. Like a loss or rejection in life. A birth of a sibling or luck or death. The stories that they make up represents what’s going on in their unconscious part of their personality. If he sees a “hero” in the picture then that supposed to be him in the there. There are 31 pictures. Even a “blank” one. Don’t use all 31 cards. Pick 6 – 10 cards. You pick the cards with the best “stimulus pull” for your client. Some of the cards are for adults and others are for children. The kid’s one has animals on the cards. On the back of each card, there is a designation for males or females and for either children or adults. A content analysis is done. Every doctor has his or her own administration. They ask for a beginning, middle and end – for the pictures. Havlena is showing us pictures from the TAT – a kid is looking at a violin, a man is crying, a man is standing next to a naked woman.

Poor reliability and validity.

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