Psychological Testing and Types of Psychological Tests
1. Psychological testing is basically an assessment test performed by a trained psychologist to evaluate the emotional, intellectual or behavioral functioning of an individual. The technical term for conducting psychological tests is also called 'psychometrics'.
2. The purpose of these tests is to arrive at a diagnosis and treatment.
3. Psychological test can also be defined as a :
(i) sample of an individual's behaviour,
(ii) obtained under standard conditions and
(iii) scored according to a fixed set of rules to arrive at a numeric score.
4. The term "psychological test” may often be confused with psychological assessment. Both the terms are different in following ways:
(a) Assessment is a broader term which covers psychological testing too;
(b) Psychological Assessment involves a process of collecting information through various techniques such as formal or informal interviews, and other qualitative or quantitative techniques but psychological testing is a standardized procedure designed to measure characterizes such as ability personality, aptitude or interest etc.;
(c) Psychological assessment may include interviews, medical information, personal history etc, but psychological test indicates primarily the information collected from the test;
(d) Psychological assessment can be subjective but psychological test is objective in nature.
Psychological tests can be of following types :
(1) Intelligence Test : Intelligence Quotient (IQ as popularly known) purports to measure the intelligence level of an individual. A series of tasks are presented to the individual to be tested, and his responses are graded according to prescribed guidelines. After the test’s completion, results are compiled and compared to responses of the people of same age or grade. Some of the important IQ tests are Stanford- Binet Intelligence Scale, Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale and Bhatia's Battery of Performance Test of Intelligence.
(2) Test of Interest and Aptitude: In such tests, the likes and dislikes of a person towards various common activities are assessed with the aim to measure the potential of the client in a particular professional or educational field. Such tests are normally used in educational and vocational counseling.
(3) Attitude Tests: Such tests are used in marketing for determining the individual or group preferences for a particular brand or item.
(4) Tests of Achievements: These tests are conducted to assess the acquisition of knowledge and skills by an individual after the completion of a training or educational course. The purpose of these tests is to ascertain the strengths and weaknesses of a student in the area in which he was imparted education or training.
(5) Neuropsychological Test: Such a test is often conducted to assess impairment after an illness or injury which is known to effect neuro-cognitive functioning of a person. The tests consist of specifically designed tasks to measure any psychological function which has some linkage with brain structure or pathway.
(6) Personality Tests: These tests involve evaluation of thoughts, attitudes, emotions and behavioral traits which constitute a person's personality. Results obtained from personality tests and inventories help in assessing individual's personality strengths and weaknesses. These tests may also help in identifying certain disturbances in personality.
Personality tests are very useful for the prospective employers as these tests can predict how a person may respond in different professional situations. Many employers use these tests on the prospective employees to assess their suitability for the jobs for which they are sought to be recruited.
Personality test basically of are two types: (a) Self-report inventories in which the test taker reads questions and then rates how well the question or statement applies to him – one of such tests is Minnesota Multiphasic Personality inventory (MMPI), (b) Projective Tests: which involve presenting a person with a vague scene, object, picture or scenario and then asking him to give his interpretation of that item. One such test is Rorschach Ink blot test.
(7) Vocational Tests: Vocational test is a tool designed to assess the abilities, interests, personality traits and required features for success in any particular occupation. These tests are generally to assess how well the participant's profile on these parameters matches the profile of the typical or ideal person in that occupation. For example, if a person wants to be a soldier, his abilities, interests, personality traits and sense of discipline are matched with these qualities found in typical or ideal soldier.
(8) Direct Observation Tests: Generally the psychological tests are ‘rating scale or ‘free response’ tests. This psychological assessment may also involve observation of people engaged in some activity. Such assessment is usually done with a family at their home or children in a class room or in a laboratory. The purpose is to establish pre-intervention baseline of a child's aggressive or hyperactive behaviour or to observe the nature of parent and child relationship so as to understand the discord in it.
