Psychological Tests, Their Types and Users

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Table of Contents

Introduction
Types of tests
Users and uses of tests
Reliability and validity
Conclusion
References

Introduction

Psychological testing is sampling an individual’s behavior with the aim of determining characteristics such as attitude, enthusiasm, interests, needs and value. Psychological tests are strictly controlled and scored according to fixed set of rules that give numeric classification. From psychological tests it is possible to establish the knowledge one has on a particular subject.

Types of tests

Mental ability test: This relies on cognitive functions such as intelligence, memory and creative thinking. It is divided into individually administered tests and group administered tests.
Achievement test: This is aims at determining an individual’s level of knowledge in a specific subject. This test is classified into five: The batteries test, single subject test, government sponsored test and individual achievement test. Only the latter is individually done while the others are done in groups.
Personality Test: This is measures human character or disposition. Personality tests are grouped into two, the objective personality test and projective personality test. The objective test has direct answers as the respondent only has to answer either true or false. The projective test on the other hand is ambiguous and the respondent has to answer unstructured questions.
Interest and attitudes tests: These include the vocational interest measures which aid in searching of employment opportunities. The attitude scales measure an individual’s attitude towards issues such as capital punishment (Hogan, 2007).
Neuropsychological Test: this is health related and yields information about brain functioning. This test is widely applied in these aforementioned tests as the brain function is a major cause of personality.
The speed vs. power tests: This analyzes how an individual performs simple tasks in a specified amount of time. A power test involves complicated material that is delivered with no limitation on the time.
The individual vs. group tests: An individual test is administered to one person at a given time. The response of the person is recorded and used to evaluate his or her psychology. Group tests, conversely, are discussion questions given to groups of people.
The maximum vs. typical performance tests: Maximum performance test looks for the best the individual performs a given task. Typical tests on the other hand test for the personality of the person without them trying harder to maximize their ability.
Norm-referenced vs. criterion-referenced tests: Norm-referenced tests use a generalized percentile. The criterion-referenced tests emphasizes on individual performance as indicated by set standards and not how the performance compares to other people who sat the test.

Users and uses of tests

There are four categories of uses of tests: Clinical use, educational use, personnel use and research use. In clinical use, tests are employed in clinical counseling or neuropsychology by psychological counselor or a neuropsychologist. A clinical test helps in identification of psychological problems of patients and determines the most efficient way solving the problem.

Educational uses are applied by teachers, educational administrators and parents, primarily to determine the efficiency of the learning process. Achievement tests show students’ competence and grades the students (Hogan, 2007). They may also be used to predict the success of the educational measures applied to a student.

Personnel use is common with users such as the military and businesses. Initial tests are done to select the most qualified individuals i.e., the individuals most likely to be successful in fulfilling the institution’s requirements. After selection, tests are done to assign the selected individuals to tasks they are likely to perform best.

The use of psychological tests in research is divided into three. First as a definition of the dependent variable, wherein, the tests are used to define specific features of research. Secondly, tests are used to describe the samples collected in research. Thirdly, they are used to test the validity of the research tests themselves to ensure that they provide reliable information on social-behavioral characteristics (Hogan, 2007).

Reliability and validity

Reliability is the stability of the test. A reliable test will give approximately the same result if taken repeatedly. Validity of a test is the assurance that the test is actually measuring what it is supposed to measure. The indices of validity and reliability range between zero and one, good indices are above 0.75. Valid tests have significant concepts and predict future performance of the concept.

Conclusion

All good psychological tests have these three things in common: They have a sample of behavior, standardized conditions of operation and a standardized scorecard. The tests have to be reliable and valid for the results to be considered significant. Reliability is dependent of validity since an unreliable test cannot be said to measure anything.

References

Hogan, T. P. (2007). Psychological Testing. A Practical Introduction, Second Edition. Virginia: John Wiley & Sons Inc.

Murphy, K. R. (1994). Psychological testing: principles and applications. london: Prentice Hall.

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Psychological Tests, Their Types and Users

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