Introduction to personality  (Page 18/21)

Assessing Personality with Objective Tests

The most famous self-report inventory is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (or MMPI ). The MMPI is also probably the most widely used psychological test in the world, and it has stood the test of time (it is currently in its second version, a 1989 revision of the 1943 original). The current version consists of 567 true-false questions, which address not only normal personality traits, but psychopathology and the accuracy of the test-taker as well. The test has several built in "lie" scales, in case a person were trying to fake a mental illness (e.g., if they were trying to fake an insanity defense to avoid responsibility for a crime) or minimize any symptoms they may actually be experiencing. The questions themselves range from rather simple (e.g., I enjoy drama.) to rather strange (e.g., I am a prophet of God.), but when put all together they provide a highly valid assessment that can easily be scored by computer (hence the popularity of the test, for both reasons). NOTE: Those are not actual questions from the MMPI, but they are based on real questions. The MMPI is an empirically based instrument. That is, interpretations are based on the pattern of responding obtained by various psychiatric samples. Since the standard MMPI was developed for adults and is rather lengthy, an abbreviated version was developed for use with adolescents: the MMPI-A.

A number of alternatives to the MMPI have been developed. The California Psychological Inventory has been available almost as long as the MMPI and, more recently, the Personality Assessment Inventory has become popular. Another important test is Millon’s Clinical Multiaxial Inventory (the MCMI), which was developed in accordance with Millon’s own theories on personality development and personality disorders (see Appendix A). The MCMI was designed with certain advantages in mind, including being relatively short compared to the MMPI and being connected with a specific clinical theory. However, since the test was designed specifically to distinguish amongst psychiatric populations, it is not as useful when assessing “normal” individuals (Keller et al., 1990; Groth-Marnat, 2003).

Behavioral assessment and thought sampling are techniques designed to gain an appreciation of what an individual actually does and/or thinks on a day-to-day or moment-to-moment basis. In each case, observers are trained to make precise observations of an individual at precise times. This provides a statistical sample of the individual's actual behavior and/or thoughts over time. Naturally the only person who can record an individual's thoughts is that person himself or herself, but as long as they are carefully informed of the procedure and are fully cooperating, the technique works fine. When applied correctly, the great value of these techniques is that they are truly objective, in other words, they record actual behaviors and actual thoughts.

Assessing Personality with Projective Tests