Assessment of personality

Self-report measures, projective techniques and behavioural analysis.

Psychology5 questions
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The essentials

Personality assessment means evaluating and analysing a person's behaviour patterns, traits and characteristics in order to understand, predict or help the person. Psychologists use three broad kinds of methods: self-report measures, projective techniques and behavioural analysis.

Key points

  • Self-report measures are structured inventories where the person answers questions about himself or herself. Examples: MMPI (Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, developed by Hathaway and McKinley; widely used for clinical diagnosis), EPQ (Eysenck Personality Questionnaire) and 16PF (Cattell's Sixteen Personality Factor Questionnaire).
  • Problems with self-reports: social desirability (giving socially acceptable answers) and acquiescence (tendency to agree regardless of content).
  • Projective techniques are based on psychoanalytic theory: when given ambiguous stimuli, people project unconscious feelings, needs and conflicts. Examples: Rorschach Inkblot Test (ten inkblot cards), Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) by Morgan and Murray (people make up stories about pictures), Rosenzweig's Picture-Frustration Study (assesses aggression in frustrating situations), sentence completion test and draw-a-person test.
  • Projective tests need extensive training to score and interpret; responses are not judged right or wrong.
  • Behavioural analysis includes interviews (structured or unstructured), observation, behavioural ratings, nominations by peers and situational tests (observing behaviour in a created situation).
  • Rating errors: halo effect (rating based on one favourable trait), middle category bias (choosing middle ratings) and extreme response bias (choosing extreme ratings).

Exam tips

  • Match each test to its stimulus: inkblots (Rorschach), pictures with stories (TAT), cartoons of frustrating situations (Rosenzweig).

Common mistakes

  • Calling MMPI a projective test; it is a self-report inventory.
  • Assuming projective tests are quick and objective; scoring is time-consuming and depends on trained judgement.

Practice questions

Which of the following is a projective technique?Easy
In the Thematic Apperception Test, the person is asked toEasy
While filling a personality inventory for a job, a candidate marks "I never get angry" because it looks good, though it…Medium
A supervisor rates an employee high on honesty, punctuality and teamwork only because the employee is very well-dressed…Medium
A psychologist wants to study how a child typically reacts when blamed or blocked by others, using cartoon pictures of …Hard
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