Health and Psychology

Psychological Assessment requires a clear understanding of the question being asked in order to most appropriately select from available measures. 

There are two basic types of assessment of "personality."  Some of the measures restrict the available ways of responding to the questions. Often the format of these measures is a true/false set of possible responses. These types have been referred to as "objective measures."  They tend to be computer scored, although hand scoring and interpretation is also pssible.

Another type allows the person being evaluated to answer more freely and with less restriction.  These types of measures are referred to as "projectve measures."  These have some objective scoring criteria available for use so that the responses would be seen n the same way and evaluated the same way regardless of the person administering the test.

Examples of "objective" personality measures include the MMPI-2, 16 PF, MCMI-III, PAI and others.

Examples of "subjective" personality measures include the Rorschach Inkblot Test, the Thematic Apperception Test, and the Rotter Incomplete Sentences Blank and others.

These tests are used to evaluate people for employment.  There is some controversy on whether it is appropriate to use testing designed for clinical diagnosis to be used on non-clinical populations.  Nevertheless, about 30% of businesses now do some form os psychological or personality screening of applicants for job positions.