Applications and Consequences

of Psychological Testing
• The Nature and Uses of
Psychological Testing
 The Consequences of Testing
• From birth to old age, people encounter tests at
all most every turning point in life.
• Whether a person is admitted to one college and
not another , offered one job but refused a
second, diagnosed as depressed or not—all
such determinations rest, at least in part, on the
meaning of test results as interpreted by persons
in authority.
• Testing: Useful or abusive
 Definition of A Test
• Tests are extremely varied in their formats
and applications. Nonetheless, most tests
posses these defining features:
• 1.Standardized procedure
• 2.Behavior sample
• 3.Scores or categories
• 4.Norms or standards
• 5.Prediction and nontest behavior
 Standardized procedure
• A test is considered to be standardized if
the procedures for administering it are
uniform from one examiner and setting to
another.
• Take the “digit span” test for example, the
directions are : to present the number at
constant rate, to keep a neutral facial
expression when examiner records
subjects’ answer, and to know how to react
to unexpected responses.
 Behavior sample
• Practical limitations of a test says that a
test is only a sample of behavior.
• Yet, the sample of behavior is of interest
only as it permits the examiner to make
inferences about the total domain of
relevant behaviors.
 Scores or categories
• In most cases, all people are
assumed to possess the trait or
characteristic being measured.
 Norms or standards
• An examinee’s test score is usually
interpreted by comparing it with the scores
obtained by others on the same test.
• For this purpose, test developers typically
provide norms.
 Prediction of nontest behavior

• The ultimate purpose of a test is to predict

additional behaviors, other than those
directly sampled by the test.
• The ability of a test to predict nontest
behavior is determined by an extensive
body of validational research, most of
which is conducted after the test is
released.
 Testing vs. Assessment
• The purpose of most tests is to assign
grades to students. They offer limited
diagnostic information to identify areas for
improvement. ...
• Assessment is a more comprehensive
term, referring to the entire process of
compiling information about a person and
using it to make inferences about
characteristics and other psychological
tests.
 Types of Tests
• Intelligence Tests
• Aptitude Tests
• Achievement Tests
• Creativity Tests
• Personality Tests
• Interest Inventories
• Behavioral Procedures
• Neuropsychological Tests
 Intelligence Tests
• Measure an individual’s ability in relatively global
areas such as verbal comprehension, perceptual
organization, or reasoning and thereby help
determine potential for scholastic work or certain
occupations.
• The term intelligence test refers to a test that
holds an overall summary score based on
results from a diverse sample of items.
 Aptitude Tests
• Measure the capability for a relatively
specific task or type of skill; aptitude tests
are, in effect, a narrow form of ability
testing.
• Aptitude tests are often used to predict
success in an occupation, training course,
or educational endeavor, such as GAT.
 Achievement Tests
• Measure a person’s degree of learning,
success, or accomplishment in a subject
or task.
• One instrument may serve both purposes,
acting as an aptitude test to forecast future
performance and an achievement test to
monitor past learning.
 Creativity Tests
• Assess novel, original thinking and the capacity
to find unusual or unexpected solutions,
especially for vaguely defined problems.
• Educators were especially impressed that
creativity tests required divergent thinking—
putting forth a variety of answers to a complex or
ambiguous problem—as opposed to typical
thinking pattern—finding the single correct
solution to a well-defined problem.
 Personality Tests
• Measure the traits, qualities, or behaviors
that determine a person’s individuality;
such tests include checklists, inventories,
and projective techniques such as
sentence completions and inkblots.
 Interest Inventories
• Measure an individual’s preference for certain
activities or topics and thereby help determine
occupational choice.
• Interest tests are based on the explicit
assumption that interest patterns determine and,
therefore, also predict job satisfaction. For
example, if the examinee has the same interests
as successful and satisfied accountants, it is
more likely that he or she would enjoy the work
of an accountant.
 Behavioral Procedures
• Objectively describe and count the
frequency of a behavior, identifying the
antecedents and consequences of the
behavior.
• The assumption is that behavior is best
understood in terms of clearly defined
characteristics such as frequency, duration,
past history, and consequences.
 Neuropsychological Tests
• Measure cognitive, sensory, perceptual,
and motor performance to determine the
extent, locus, and behavioral
consequences of brain damage.
 Uses of Testing
• Classification/ Selection
• Diagnosis
• Treatment planning
• Self-knowledge
• Research

• These applications frequently overlap and, on

occasion, are difficult to distinguish one from
another.
 Classification
• Assigning a person to one category rather
than another.
• Placement, screening, certification, and
selection
 Diagnosis and treatment planning
• Diagnosis consists of two intertwined tasks:
determining the nature and source of a
person’s abnormal behavior, and
classifying the behavior pattern within an
accepted diagnostic system.
• Diagnosis should be more than mere
classification, more than the assignment of
a label.
 Self-knowledge
• Psychological tests also can supply a
potent source of self-knowledge.
• In some cases, the feedback a person
receives from psychological tests can
change a career path or otherwise alter a
person’s life course.
 Research
• Collecting the data from psychological
tests to check the research hypothesis.
Factors Influencing the Soundness
of Testing
• The manner of administration, the
characteristics of the tester, the context of
the testing, the motivation and experience
of the examinee, and the method of
scoring.
 Standardized Procedures in Test
Administration
• Standards for Educational and
Psychological Testing, published by the
American Psychological Association and
other groups.
• Specifications regarding instructions to
test takers, time limits, the form of item
presentation or response, and test
materials or equipment should be strictly
observed.
 Desirable Procedures of Test
Administration
• Sensitivity to Disabilities: try to help the
disable subject overcome his
disadvantage, such as increasing voice
volume or refer to other available tests

• Desirable Procedures of Group Testing:

Be care for time, clarity, physical condition
(illumination, temperature, humidity, writing
surface and noise), and guess.
 Influence of the Examiner
• The importance of Rapport
• Rapport means a comfortable, warm
atmosphere that serves to motivate
examinees and elicit cooperation.
• Examiner sex, experience, and race: the
results are contradictory, inconclusive.
 Background and Motivation of the
Examinee
• Test Anxiety
• Anxiety causes bad performance and then
results in anxiety again v.s. bad performance
history causes anxiety

• Motivation to Deceive
• Does the client have motivation to perform
deceitfully on the tests?
• Is the overall pattern of test results suspicious in
light of other information known about the client?
 • Ethical and Social
Implications of Testing
Ethical and Professional Dilemmas
in Testing

• Is it ethical for the psychologist to deny some

feedback to the candidates?
• Is it an appropriate practice to use a translator
when administering an individual test such as
the WISC-III
• Is the psychologist obligated to report every
case to law enforcement?
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Best interests of the Client: Assessment should
serve a constructive purpose for the individual
examinee.
• With certain worry-prone and self-doubting clients,
a psychologist may choose not to use an
appropriate test, since these clients are almost
certain to engage in self-destructive
misinterpretation of virtually any test findings.
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Confidentiality and the Duty to Warn: The
clinician should consider the client’s
welfare in deciding whether to release
information, especially when the client is a
minor who is unable to give voluntary,
informed consent.
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Expertise of the Test User: A common
error observed among inexperienced test
users is the fanatical, pathologized
interpretation of personality test results.
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Informed Consent: From a legal standpoint, the
three elements of informed consent include
disclosure, competency, and voluntariness.
• Disclosure means the client receive sufficient
information, such as risks, benefits, release of
reports.
• Competency refers to the mental capacity of the
examinee to provide consent. Voluntariness
implies that the choice to undergo an
assessment battery is given freely and not
based on subtle pressure.
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Outdated Tests and the Standard of Care:
Standard of care means “usual, customary or
reasonable” in professional or legal review of
specific health practices, including psychological
testing. Using obsolete tests might violate the
prevailing standard of care.
• Responsible Report Writing: typically use simple
and direct writing that steers clear of jargon and
technical terms.
 Responsibilities of Test Users
• Communication of Test Results: Proper and
effective feedback involves give-and-take dialogue
in which the clinician ascertains how the client has
perceived the information and seeks to correct
potentially harmful interpretations.
• Consideration of Individual Differences:
Practitioners are expected to know when a test or
interpretation may not be applicable because of
factors such as age, gender, race, ethnicity,
national origin, religion, sexual orientation,
disability, language, and socioeconomic status.
The Impact of Cultural Background
on Test Results
• Biasedness of evaluator
• High-mistrust group with an African
American examiner scored much better
than the high-mistrust group with a white
examiner.
 Assessment of Cultural and
Linguistic Minorities
• The likelihood that linguistic barriers and
lack of test sophistication will influence test
results of minorities is a strong argument
in favor of using a careful Multidisciplinary
assessment approach.