Personality Assessment

Goals

1. Understand the roles of personality assessment

2. Understand the main ways of assessing personality that have been proposed/developed, with strengths and weaknesses

3. Understand unique challenges to personality assessment

4. Understand how to evaluate the quality of a personality assessment

5. Insight into two or three of the most popular personality “tests” – strengths/weaknesses

Role of Personality Assessment

Where is personality assessment done?Discuss

HRI/O Consultants

Testing companies (e.g., PAR, Pearson)Clinical practice

Dating

Role of Personality Assessment

Where is personality assessment done?

• Formal/Professional Venues• Empirical Research• Everyday life

Types of Personality Assessment

What types of personality assessment are you familiar with?

If we wanted to know if one person is more extraverted than another, how could we find out?

Discuss

Types of Personality Assessment

Clues to Personality (Kinds of data):• Why “clue”?• Each method has advantages & disadvantages

1.Self-report data•Examples?•Pros/cons?

BFI

Note: Images borrowed from http://mgto.org/personality-in-class-discussing-traits-through-examples/

Neuroticism

BFI

Note: Normative data are from 255 in Fall 2009, N = 38

Neuroticism

Trait Mean SD “68% range”

Neuroticism 2.8 .8 2.0 - 3.6

Extraversion 3.5 .7 2.8 – 4.2

Openness 3.3 .7 2.6 – 4.0

Agreeableness 4.0 .6 3.4 – 4.6

Conscientiousness 3.7 .7 3.0 – 4.4

Personality Research MethodsPersonality Assessment - Methods

2. “Informant” data• Examples• Pros/cons

(Nearly) First impression ratingsof “row-mates”

Neuroticism: (sensitive/nervous vs. secure/confident). The tendency to experience unpleasant emotions easily, such as anger, anxiety, depression, and vulnerability. Neuroticism also refers to the degree of emotional “liveliness.”

Extraversion: (outgoing/energetic vs. solitary/reserved). Energy, positive emotions, surgency, assertiveness, sociability and the tendency to seek stimulation in the company of others, and talkativeness.

Openness to experience: (inventive/curious vs. consistent/cautious). Appreciation for art, emotion, adventure, unusual ideas, curiosity, and variety of experience. Openness reflects the degree of intellectual curiosity, creativity and a preference for novelty and variety a person has. It is also described as the extent to which a person is imaginative or independent, and depicts a personal preference for a variety of activities over a strict routine.

Agreeableness: (friendly/compassionate vs. analytical/detached). A tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others. It is also a measure of one's trusting and helpful nature, and whether a person is generally well tempered or not.

Conscientiousness: (efficient/organized vs. easy-going/careless). A tendency to be organized and dependable, show self-discipline, act dutifully, aim for achievement, and prefer planned rather than spontaneous behavior.

Personality Research MethodsPersonality Assessment - Methods

4. Life Outcomes•Examples•Pros/cons

Personality Research MethodsPersonality Assessment - Methods

3. Behavioral data• “Natural” B data (eg, ESM, EAR, ARRB)• “Laboratory” B data (in-lab obs, exp, pro, pro)• Pros/cons

Challenges to Personality Assessment

What are some of the fundamental challenges that complicate personality assessment?

Discuss

Examples:

•Social desirability

•Self-insight

•Hypothetical constructs

•No “direct access” to the qualities of the objects

Personality AssessmentWhat is being measured?

Many personality variables are “theoretical constructs” or “latent variables”

Unseen characteristics that we assume exist somewhere inside the person.

Personality Research MethodsPersonality Assessment

Subject’s self-report Score on BFI

Extraversion Scale

Subject’sExtraversio

n

Subject’sExtraversio

n

Friend’s rating of subject’s Extraversion

Subject’s Talkativeness

# of friends in social network

Personality AssessmentWhat is being measured?

Many personality variables are “theoretical constructs” or “latent variables”

Unseen characteristics that we assume exist somewhere inside the person.

Is this unique to personality psych?

•Memory, attention, hunger

•Gravity

Personality AssessmentDirect Access to qualities of objects?

Unique to personality?

How to measure “talkativeness”?

How to measure existence of a planet?

How to measure length of a piece of lumber?

Personality Assessment - Quality

Quality of measurement

How do we know if a personality assessment technique or tool is good?

Two facets of measurement quality:• Reliability• Construct Validity

Personality Assessment - Quality

Reliability• Is the “observed” score a precise reflection of the “true”

characteristic (whatever that characteristic might be)

• If we do the measurement over and over, do we get the same score each time? Do we consistently get the same score?

2 Kinds of reliability• Test-retest reliability

• Internal Consistency reliability

Personality Assessment - Quality

Construct Validity• What is the characteristics that’s reflected by the

test score?• Does the test measure what its supposed to

measure?• E.g., if we have a questionnaire that supposedly

measures depression – does it really measure depression?

• Depression is the “construct”, is our test a valid measure of that construct?

Personality Assessment - Quality

Mike’s Brief Neuroticism Questionnaire (MBNQ)Circle yes or no for each statement:

1. I often get worried NO YES2. I often hear strange voices NO YES3. I have a fear of heights NO YES4. I often get stressed out NO YES5. I like animals NO YES6. My favorite color is blue NO YES

Personality Assessment - Quality

How can we empirically evaluate a scale’s construct validity?

1. Content validity

2. Convergent validity

3. Discriminant validity

Personality Assessment

Every time you hear about or go through a personality assessment, you should wonder about measurement:

• How were the variables measured?• Are there potential disadvantages to the

measurement technique?• Was the measure (eg, questionnaire) reliable

and valid?

Goals

1. Understand the roles of personality assessment

2. Understand the main ways of assessing personality that have been proposed/developed, with strengths and weaknesses

3. Understand unique challenges to personality assessment

4. Understand how to evaluate the quality of a personality assessment

5. Insight into two or three of the most popular personality “tests” – strengths/weaknesses

Some well-known (if not particularly useful or valid) personality assessment tools

Rorshach

MBTI – Meyers Briggs Type Indicator (e.g., used by WFU career services)

NEO-PI-R – NEO- Personality Inventory

HEXACO

MMPI – Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inv