MMPI: QUESTIONS TO ASK

Cheryl L. Karp, Ph.D., Leonard Karp, J.D.

INTRODUCTION

The MMPI is the most frequently used clinical test. Therefore, it is employed quite often in court
cases to provide personality information on defendants or litigants in which psychological
adjustment factors are pertinent to resolution of the case. It is easy to administer and provides an
objective measure of personality. Since it is such a well-researched and highly reliable
instrument, it is often used in custody evaluations. It provides clear, valid descriptions of people's
problems, symptoms, and characteristics in broadly accepted clinical language. The profiles are
easy to explain in court and appear to be relatively easy for people to understand. However, with
any psychological instrument, it is important to acquaint yourself with the background of the test
and to acquaint yourself with the assets and liabilities of any test used to assess your client.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, or MMPI, was developed in the late 1930s by a
psychologist and a psychiatrist at the University of Minnesota. It was originally intended for use
with an adult population, but was then extended to include teenagers, mostly for teens in the
middle years, about 15 and 16. It required at least a sixth-grade reading level, so it was definitely
not applicable for average children below the age of about 13 or for retarded persons. The MMPI
was sometimes given to bright children of 11 or 12 years, but then great caution was exercised in
the interpretation of the results. When the MMPI was completely revised in 1989 (see MMPI-2,
next section), adolescent norms were not developed. The new instrument was not intended to be
used for adolescents. Therefore, the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality
Inventory-Adolescent (MMPI-A) was developed. Although the MMPI has undergone a complete
revision, resulting in the MMPI-2, the MMPI is
discussed here since many psychologists still report results from the MMPI and it forms the basis
for the MMPI-2.

The MMPI has ten clinical scales and three validity scales plus a host of supplementary scales.
The clinical scales were originally intended to
distinguish "pure" groups with psychiatric disorders. Therefore, the actual names of the scales
assert bold and, sometimes, exotic-sounding
psychiatric labels. For example, Scale 1 is referred to as the hypochondriasis scale, Scale 8
is labeled the schizophrenia scale, Scale 9 is labeled the hypomania scale, Scale 4 is the
psychopathic deviate scale, and Scale 7 is the psychasthenia scale. Other scales reflect
more understandable symptoms such as Scale 2, depression; Scale 3, hysteria; Scale 5,
masculinity-femininity; Scale 6, paranoia; and Scale 0, social introversion.

Researchers quickly found out that the scales were not able to be "pure" measures of the
psychiatric diagnostic groups (in part this is due to the overlap in symptoms in some of the
disorders). Thus, an elevation on Scale 8 did not mean that the client was definitely
schizophrenic. As a result, the numbers of the subscales quickly replace the psychiatric labels in
common usage. Thus, instead of talking about the hypochondriasis scale, the clinician will talk
about Scale 1.
Researchers also found out that it was common for people to score high on more than one scale
at the same time and that interpretations using two or more scales tended to be more
sophisticated or refined, more useful, and more accurate. Therefore, patterns of elevations were
distinguished, and the numbers were used as a shorthand to describe the elevations. Thus, a 24
meant that there were elevations above the "normal" range on scales 2 and 4, and 2 was the
higher elevation. When the elevations are noted (either as done here or when presented as a
graph), the result is called a "profile." Researchers literally went out and gathered data on the
personality characteristics of those who scored high on the 2-4 or any other combination
(sometimes relevant clustering involving three scales, such as a 4-6-8). The amount of research
is impressive.

As mentioned earlier, the MMPI is vulnerable to faking because of the transparency of some of
the items. The three validity scales are designed to help the psychologist identify abnormal
response sets that might suggest "faking good" or "faking bad." In spite of these special scales, it
is easier for the client to slant answers to give a favorable or unfavorable impression with the
MMPI than with the Rorschach, for example. On the other hand, it is much more difficult to
consistently bias the MMPI than an instrument of less complexity and more transparency, such as
the Thematic Apperception Test (the TAT).

The nature of the instrument, with true and false answers and patterns readily identifiable, has
prompted the development of books to supply interpretations of the results. The information is
given in the form of descriptive statements that tend to be true of clients whose scores yield
certain profiles. These books tend to be called "cookbooks" by psychologists. Thus, if the result
shows a 2-4 profile, one can look in any number of "cookbooks" to find the personality descriptors
attached to elevations on 2 and 4 alone and then as a combined pattern.

In the hands of a skilled and experienced psychologist, the MMPI is a powerful instrument and
allows for powerful presentation in court. However, the MMPI must be interpreted in light of the
biographical and other information about the client. "Blind interpretations," where nothing is
known of the client except perhaps gender, may be useful for testing a psychologist's memory
about the descriptive statements attached to certain individual scale elevations or certain
profiles. They are not useful, and may be dangerous, in interpreting MMPI results for forensic
work or any other professional psychology work. For example, an elevation on Scale 8
(schizophrenia) may have a different interpretation if the client is in a psychiatric hospital than if
the person is a respected professor at a university, with no history of psychiatric disorder, who is
interested in yoga or some other occult or esoteric study.

The psychologist administering and interpreting the MMPI must pay attention to all relevant
factors, including age, sex, education, social class, religious background, place of residence, and
other historical data. This information must be integrated correctly with research data, such as is
found in the "cookbooks," in order for the interpretation to be valid.

Computer use has brought other problems to the area of MMPI interpretation. Computer
programs have been developed to allow computers to score the raw data (anywhere from 399
true and false answers for the "abbreviated" MMPI form to almost 600 answers for the full MMPI
form), produce the files in printed graph form, and do the work of fetching interpretative
information from "cookbooks." Undeniably, the computers save valuable time for psychologists.
Yet, their use with the MMPI has opened the way for some serious problems.

This advanced technology lends an image of "truth" or "accuracy" to the printout results that may
mislead even psychologists. Also, this technology is more readily available to nonpsychologists
than is wise. Persons with no or minimal training in psychology and psychological testing may
use a computer report to make statements about a person's personality functioning that sound
definitive or are presented as such. Even generally competent and respectable practitioners in
fields normally thought to be "allied to" psychology, such as psychiatry or clinical social work, can
make the grievous error of believing that they have acted responsibly or done a good job when
they make conclusions about a client based solely or predominantly on the MMPI, using a
computer to produce scores and interpretations. The MMPI needs to be interpreted in light of
many factors often not considered by the computer programs. Computer programs frequently
require only information about the client's sex, age, and achieved education level, not other
factors such as current life stressors or other life experiences or environmental factors.

Furthermore, when used as part of a testing battery, the MMPI results must be integrated with all
the testing and historical data and finally interpreted in light of all of the psychologist's
psychological knowledge. Doing this may alter the psychologist's original interpretation of the
MMPI, as will be discussed below in the section on the interpretation of the Rorschach.
Nonpsychologists should not and usually cannot administer a whole test battery and interpret it
appropriately.

Secondly, many computer reports focus mainly on giving statements about the elevation of each
individual scale, with perhaps cursory statements about the highest two scales considered
together. Unfortunately, there is not a statement at the beginning of the computer printout
explaining whether the statements are from research with a normal or abnormal population. For
example, an elevation on Scale 4 (the psychopathic deviate scale) may yield statements about
interesting personality qualities such as "independence" or "anger." (one psychologist working
with a codependency program was heard repeatedly calling Scale 4 the "anger" scale, an
interesting oversimplification.) Such single-scale interpretative statements may be of help
describing a normal person who is an independent thinker, who follows society's mores
and laws, but reserves the right to make his or her own moral judgments and may lawfully and
appropriately challenge authority. It does not begin to do justice to the "independence" from
society's norms seen in a person with a history of seriously breaking society's mores and rules,
such as the person expelled a number of times from school for various offenses or the person
with a long history of violence or trouble with the law.

Thus, one can have the undesirable result that a psychologist may erroneously (and
incompetently) use single statements from a computer to present someone accused of
molestation in a rather favorable light, ignoring the fact that the overall pattern of the 4-9,
combined with a history of violence against others and minor legal charges and convictions,
demands a more serious and less favorable view of the client. On the other hand, you can have
a parent with an elevation on Scale 4 labeled a probable antisocial personality (formerly known as
psychopath or sociopath), while the elevation really suggests less sinister characteristics.

Antisocial persons and persons recently traumatized in some manner in interpersonal interactions
(e.g., a rape victim or a man or woman recently divorced) may superficially share some
characteristics reflected in an elevation on Scale 4, which can confuse interpretation of MMPI
results. An elevated Scale 4 may suggest that the client does not allow himself or herself to
become significantly close to others emotionally, has a lot of anger, and may be likely to
misrepresent or lie about circumstances. A closer look at this is warranted.

A person with an antisocial personality disorder typically shows interpersonal distancing, that is,
does not allow himself or herself to become significantly close to others. The person recently
traumatized may likewise keep people from getting close. However, the similarity may end on the
surface, because the antisocial personality may be charming in person but unable to bond. The
traumatized person may be less charming in person and may be quite able to bond but fearful of
doing so because of the trauma. Likewise, persons with antisocial personality disorders usually
have a more or less disguised well of anger, typically feeling mistreated by society and entitled to
act out against individuals or institutions. It is easy to see that a rape victim might have a well of
anger, sometimes directed against the perpetrator and sometimes directed
inwardly.
Persons with antisocial personality disorders typically lack guilt about their exploits; they simply
hate being caught. Rape victims typically experience inappropriate guilt and hate what has
happened and what they have become." A convicted felon may have a 2-4 elevation, suggesting
significant depression (the 2 is the "depression" scale), while sitting in a county jail on murder 1
charges or charges of domestic violence. Persons with personality disorders often develop real
and significant depressions when caught and suffering the consequences of their misbehaving or
criminal acts. Yet, a victim of domestic violence might just as easily have a 2-4 elevation, but the
interpretation of the two profiles would or could be very different.

When it comes to the characteristic of lying and breaking society's mores and laws, the superficial
similarities are likely to end. Persons with antisocial personalities may, indeed, lie about the legal
charges confronting them and, for that matter, about many things. Like the antisocial personality,
the rape victim may be putting emotional distance between herself and others and also may have
a lot of anger. However, it does not follow, therefore, that, like the antisocial personality, the rape
victim is also likely to lie and misrepresent circumstances and is also likely to have broken
society's laws in the past or likely to break them in the future.

The best and most significant computer programs are extremely complicated and sophisticated.
The good programs integrate the elevations from all the scales to eliminate contradictions that
one can find looking only at individual scales (one scale may suggest that the person is
depressed, while another scale may suggest that the person is optimistic). The most commonly
used computer services are probably the ones from Minnesota (from the National Computer
Service, with James Butcher, one of the experts in MMPI work as developer and advisor) and the
one from Los Angeles (developed by Alexander Caldwell, another giant in the field of the MMPI).

The importance of having a skilled and competent psychologist to interpret testing results,
including the computerized MMPI, cannot be stressed enough. Here are some things to watch
for in evaluating whether a psychologist is adequately handling the MMPI:

1. Most psychologists trained in clinical psychology refer to the MMPI scale evaluations by
numbers (2-4 or 4-6-8). If the psychologist mainly uses the scales' official names or stresses
these official names, look further; the psychologist's primary training may not have been in the
field of clinical psychology.

2. If the psychologist does not readily integrate the MMPI scale information, but is content with
mainly singlescale descriptors, take care in using the psychologist. Not only may the
psychologist be ineptly interpreting the MMPI, but the psychologist's testimony would be very
vulnerable to attack by a skillful cross examination or on rebuttal by a competent psychologist.

3. If the psychologist does not integrate the MMPI data with historical information and other
testing data, and account for anomalies, then the work is not adequate.

4. To be most helpful, your psychologist consultant should be acquainted with the major
developments in MMPI interpretation. The psychologist should be acquainted with the work of
the Minnesota group and the Caldwell group and those associated with the work of those two
groups. Caldwell has developed an alternative way of looking at and interpreting the scales that
helps one understand that the 2-4 of the rape victim is different from the 2-4 of the convicted felon
and helps one understand why that is so.

Custody evaluations or domestic violence litigation would be simpler and easier if there were
MMPI patterns or profiles reliably correlated with the "perfect parent" or conviction for domestic
violence or, better yet, highly correlated with admission of guilt in domestic violence cases. There
are no such "molester" or "domestic abuser" profiles identified yet, but there may be in the
future.

There has been research seeking to identify profiles of molesters. The populations studied have
mainly been men in custody who are nonfamily molesters or are a mixed group of nonfamily
molesters and incest molesters. This population may be very different from the general
population of domestic violence abusers, molesters, or physical abusers of spouses or children.
Furthermore, the number of people in the group studied have been too small for much weight to
be given to the conclusions in terms of generalizing to other groups or the population at large.
Some of the elevations seen on the profiles of the convicted offenders are not surprising; for
example, an elevation on Scale 4 is common. One would never be surprised to see someone
convicted (often of multiple offenses) scoring high on Scale 4 of the MMPI, but that would be
common for anyone in penal custody.

THE ADVENT OF THE MMPI-2

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), described above, has been in use
now for over 50 years. In that time, no revisions in item content or wording were made. Over the
last 10 years, there have been increasing complaints that some of the items were out of date,
sexist, awkward, or ambiguous. In addition, two items which contained religious content specific
to Christianity were found to be offensive to other religious sectors.

According to James Butcher, one of the researchers responsible for the revision of the MMPI,
the MMPI-2 is a valid revision and expansion of the original MMPI. He asserts that continuity with
the previous empirical literature has been assured. The original validity and clinical scales have
been kept virtually intact in the MMPI-2. According to Butcher, however, new norms based on
nationally representative samples provide a sounder comparative base. Therefore, the
information on the MMPI covered above is still accurate.

In addition to the original validity scales (LFK), there have been three new validity scales
included in the MMPI-2: FB, VRIN, and TRIN. FB refers to the F scale, only for the back side or
the second half of the test. VRIN is the variable response inconsistency scale which attempts to
indicate a random response pattern or an inconsistent pattern of responses. The TRIN refers to
the true response inconsistencies scale and indicates invalid profiles due to a true set or a false
set. A true set is when a person answers true to two inconsistent items such as most of the time I
feel blue and I am happy most of the time. A false set would be answering false to both items.
The validity scales are extremely important in the interpretation of the entire test since it indicates
the degree to which a clinical profile is a valid picture of the person being
evaluated.

In the past, one of the complaints of the MMPI was the lack of uniformity in the T-score
distributions of the clinical scales, therefore, making it difficult to compare relative T-scores.
During the restandardization, this problem was corrected so that the 8 clinical scales (omitting
scales 5 and 0) and the 15 new content scales have uniform T-scores making it much easier to
compare clinical and content scales. Scale 5 (masculinity/femininity scale) and Scale 0
(introversion scale) were not included since they are not comparable measures of
psychopathology and these scales differ in their distribution.

With the uniform T-scores, a T-score of 65 is at the 92nd percentile across the clinical scales
and a T-score of 70 is equal to a percentile rank of 96. A T-score of 65 has proven to be the best
cutoff for critical items. In general, it is hoped that the MMPI-2 will answer the problems raised
with the original MMPI. Many researchers are dubious of these new findings and still prefer the
original version. However, the MMPI-2 is the preferred test at the present time, although many
computer test interpretations will include both profiles.

OVERVIEW OF THE MMPI-2 SCALES

The MMPI-2 contains seven validity scales and ten clinical scales that are nearly identical to
the original MMPI. Following is a description of the validity scales as well as the clinical scales for
the MMPI-2.

Validity Scale

The "Cannot Say" Scale ("? scale") - The "?" scale is simply the number of omitted items
(including items answered both true and false). The MMPI-2 manual suggests that protocols with
30 or more omitted items should be considered invalid and not interpreted. Other experts
suggest interpreting with great caution protocols with more than 10 omitted items and not to
interpret at all those with more than 30 omitted items.

L Scale - The L scale originally was constructed to detect a deliberate and rather
unsophisticated attempt on the part of the respondent to present him/herself in a favorable light.
People who present high L scale scores are not willing to admit even minor shortcomings, and
are deliberately trying to present themselves in a very favorable way. Better educated, brighter,
more sophisticated people from higher social classes tend to score lower on the L scale.

F Scale - The F Scale originally was developed to detect deviant or atypical ways of
responding to test items. Several of the F Scale items were deleted from the MMPI-2 because of
objectionable content, leaving the F Scale with 60 of the original 64 items in the revised
instrument. The F Scale serves three important functions:

1. It is an index of test-taking attitude and is useful in detecting deviant response sets (i.e.
faking good or faking bad).

2. If one can rule out profile invalidity, the F Scale is a good indicator of degree of
psychopathology, with higher scores suggesting greater psychopathology.

3. Scores on the F Scale can be used to generate inferences about other extratest
characteristics and behaviors.

K Scale - Compared to the L Scale, the K Scale was developed as a more subtle and more
effective index of attempts by examiners to deny psychopathology and to present themselves in a
favorable light or, conversely, to exaggerate psychopathology and to try to appear in a very
unfavorable light. Some people refer to this scale as the "defensiveness" indicator, as high
scores on the K Scale are thought to be associated with a defensive approach to the test, while
low scores are thought to be indicative of an unusually frank and self-critical approach.

Subsequent research on the K Scale has indicated that the K Scale is not only related to
defensiveness, but is also related to educational level and socioeconomic status, with better-
educated and higher socioeconomic-level subjects scoring higher on the scale. It is not unusual
for college-educated persons who are not being defensive to obtain T-scores on the K Scale in a
range of 55 to 60, and persons with even more formal education to obtain T-scores in a range of
60 to 70. Moderate elevations on the K Scale sometimes reflect ego strength and psychological
resources.
 Back F (Fb) Scale - The Fb scale consists of 40 items on the MMPI-2 that no more than 10
percent of the MMPI-2 normative sample answered in the deviant direction. It is analogous to the
standard F scale except that the items are placed in the last half of the test. An elevated Fb scale
score could indicate that the respondent stopped paying attention to the test items that occurred
later in the booklet and shifted to an essentially random pattern of responding.

VRIN Scale (Variable Response Inconsistency) - The VRIN scale was developed for the
MMPI-2 as an additional validity indicator. It provides an indication of the respondents'
tendencies to respond inconsistently to MMPI-2 items, and whose resulting protocols therefore
should not be interpreted. It consists of 67 pairs of items with either similar or opposite content.
Each time a person answers items in a pair inconsistently, one raw score point is added to the
score ont he VRIN scale. It is suggested that a raw score equal to or greater than 13 indicates
inconsistent responding that probably invalidates the resulting protocol, although this scale is still
experimental.

TRIN Scale (True Response Inconsistency) - The TRIN scale was developed to identify
persons who respond inconsistently to items by giving true responses to items indiscriminately or
by giving false responses to items indiscriminately. The TRIN scale consists of 23 pairs of items
that are opposite in content. Two true responses to some item pairs or two false responses to
other item pairs would indicate inconsistent responding. The MMPI-2 manual suggests that as
rough guidelines TRIN raw scores of 13 or more or of 5 or less may be suggestive of
indiscriminate responding that might invalidate the protocol, however, this scale is still considered
experimental.

Clinical Scales

Scale 1: Hypochondriasis (Hs) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients who
manifested a pattern of symptoms associated with the label of hypochondriasis. A wide variety of
vague and nonspecific complaints about bodily functioning are tapped by the 32 items. All the
items on this scale deal with somatic concerns or with general physical competence. Scale 1 is
designed to assess a neurotic concern over bodily functioning. A person who is actually
physically ill will obtain only a moderate elevation on Scale 1. These people will endorse their
legitimate physical complaints, but will not endorse the entire gamut of vague physical complaints
tapped by this scale. All but one of the original items were retained on the MMPI-2.

Scale 2: Depression (D) - This scale was originally developed to assess symptomatic
depression. The primary characteristics of symptomatic depression are poor morale, lack of hope
in the future, and a general dissatisfaction with one's own life situation. Very elevated scores on
this scale may suggest clinical depression, while more moderate scores tend to indicate a general
attitude or life-style characterized by poor morale and lack of involvement. Of the original 60
items, 57 have been retained in MMPI-2.

Scale 3: Hysteria (Hy) - This scale was developed to identify patients who demonstrated
hysterical reactions to stress situations. All 60 original items have been retained in the MMPI-2.
Items in Scale 3 consist of two general types: items reflecting specific somatic complaints and
items that show that the client considers himself or herself well socialized and adjusted. Such
people generally maintain a facade of superior adjustment and only when they are under stress
does their proneness to develop conversion-type symptoms as a means of resolving conflict and
avoiding responsibility appear. Scale 3 scores are related to intellectual ability, educational
background, and social class. Brighter, better-educated persons of a higher social class tend to
score higher on the scale. In addition, high scores are much more common among
women than among men in both normal and psychiatric populations.
 Scale 4: Psychopathic Deviate (Pd) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients
diagnosed as psychopathic personality, asocial or amoral type. General social maladjustment
and the absence of strongly pleasant experiences are assessed by the 50 items included in Scale
4. Scores on Scale 4 tend to be related to age, with adolescents and college students often
scoring in a T-score range of 55 to 60. Black respondents have also been reported to score
higher than white persons on Scale 4. Scale 4 can be thought of as a measure of rebelliousness,
with higher scores indicating rebellion and lower scores indicating an acceptance of authority and
the status quo. High scorers are very likely to be diagnosed as having some form of personality
disorder, but are unlikely to receive a psychotic diagnosis. Low scorers are generally described
as conventional, conforming, and submissive. All 50 items in the original scale have been
retained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 5: Masculinity-Femininity (Mf) - Scale 5 was originally developed by Hathaway and

McKinley to identify homosexual invert males. The test authors identified only a very small
number of items that differentiated homosexual from heterosexual males. Scores on this scale
are related to intelligence, education, and socioeconomic status. It is not uncommon for male
college students and other college-educated males to obtain T-scores in the 60 to 65 range.
Scores that are markedly higher than expected for males, based on the persons' intelligence,
education, and social class should suggest the possibility of sexual concerns and problems. High
scores are very uncommon among females. When they are encountered, they generally indicate
rejection of the traditional female role. Of the 60 items in the original scale 5, 56 have been
maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 6: Paranoia (Pa) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients who were
judged to have paranoid symptoms such as ideas of reference, feelings of persecution, grandiose
self-concepts, suspiciousness, excessive sensitivity, and rigid opinions and attitudes. Persons
who score high on this scale usually have paranoid symptoms. All 40 items in the original scale
have been maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 7: Psychasthenia (Pt) - This scale was originally developed to measure the general
symptomatic pattern labeled psychasthenia. This
diagnostic label is not commonly used today. Among currently popular diagnostic categories, the
obsessive-compulsive disorder probably is closest to the original psychasthenia label.
Psychasthenia was originally characterized by excessive doubts, compulsions, obsessions, and
unreasonable fears. The person suffering from psychasthenia had an inability to resist specific
actions or thoughts regardless of their maladaptive nature. In addition to obsessive-compulsive
features, this scale taps abnormal fears, self-criticism, difficulties in concentration, and guilt
feelings. The anxiety assessed by this scale is of a long-term nature or trait anxiety, although the
scale is somewhat responsive to situational stress as well. All 48 items from the original scale
have been maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 8: Schizophrenia (Sc) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients
diagnosed as schizophrenic. All 78 items in the original scale have been maintained in the MMPI-
2. The items in this scale assess a wide variety of content areas, including bizarre thought
processes and peculiar perceptions, social alienation, poor familial relationships, difficulties in
concentration and impulse control, lack of deep interests, disturbing questions of self-worth and
self-identity, and sexual difficulties. Misinterpretations of reality, delusions, and hallucinations
may be present. Ambivalent or constricted emotional responsiveness is common. Behavior may
be withdrawn, aggressive, or bizarre. Scale 8 is probably the single most difficult scale to
interpret in isolation because of the variety of factors that can result in an elevated score. Scores
on this scale are related to age and to race. Adolescents and college students often obtain T-
scores in a range of 50 to 60, perhaps reflecting the turmoil associated with that period in life.
Black subjects, particularly males, tend to score higher than white subjects, perhaps suggesting
the alienation and social estrangement felt by many blacks.
 Scale 9: Hypomania (Ma) - This scale was originally developed to identify psychiatric patients
manifesting hypomanic symptoms. Hypomania is characterized by elevated mood, accelerated
speech and motor activity, irritability, flight of ideas, and brief periods of depression. Some of the
46 items deal specifically with features of hypomanic disturbance, while others cover topics such
as family relationships, moral values and attitudes, and physical or bodily concerns. Scores on
this scale are clearly related to age and to race, with adolescents and college students typically
obtaining scores in a T-score range of 55 to 60, while elderly persons often achieve scores below
a T-score of 50. Black persons typically score higher than white persons on the scale, often
scoring in a T-score range of 55 to 65. All 46 items in the original scale have been maintained in
the MMPI-2.

Scale 0: Social Introversion (Si) - Scale ) was developed later than the other clinical scales,
but it has come to be treated as a standard
clinical scale. This scale was originally designed to assess a person's tendency to withdraw from
social contacts and responsibilities. All but
one of the 70 items in the original scale have been maintained in the MMPI-2. The items on this
scale are of two general types. One group of
items deals with social participation, while the other group deals with general neurotic
maladjustment and self-depreciation. High scorers are
generally seen as socially introverted, while low scorers tend to be sociable and extroverted.
High scorers are very insecure and uncomfortable
in social situations. They tend to be shy, reserved, timid, and retiring, while low scorers tend to be
outgoing, gregarious, friendly, and talkative.

THE MMPI/MMPI-2 IN DOMESTIC RELATIONS CASES

In a State Bar of Texas advanced Family Law course, David McClure made an interesting
comment that psychological testing in custody disputes date back to the Old Testament, when
King Solomon attempted to resolve a custody dispute of an infant. We are all familiar with his
declaration that he would satisfy each woman by splitting the child in half, giving one-half to each
of the women. He granted custody of the child to the woman who put the child's safety and
welfare before her own needs. In today's world, King Solomon would have appointed a
psychologist to conduct a full psychological evaluation to determine which mother had better
parenting skills and perhaps which mother was determined to be the "psychological parent."

The MMPI/MMPI-2 has been cited extensively in appellate cases involving custody evaluations
as well as in cases where one party is attempting to limit parental rights for the sake of the
children's welfare. Since the general goal in custody evaluations is to establish custody and
visitation arrangements that are in the best interests of the children involved, courts often turn to
psychological assessment to help determine which parent is best suited to be the primary
custodial parent. MMPI-based assessment of parents can provide valuable information in
identifying not only psychological and behavioral problems that might argue against a grant of
custody but also characteristics that may suggest mature parenting abilities.

In providing expertise in forensic evaluations, psychologists are often asked to provide expert
opinions about the emotional health of the parents as well as assessing any possible
developmental or adjustment problems related to the child. The MMPI/MMPI-2 is the most
frequently administered psychological test in assessing parents. Personality assessments of
parents entangled in custody disputes are among the most difficult that psychologists face. In
fact, most licensing boards and professional insurance companies will tell you that those
psychologists that embark on this specialty, have the most complaints and lawsuits filed against
them.
 One of the problems that face the psychologist completing a custody evaluation is that men
and women in custody disputes tend to be very self-protective and assert their lack of problems,
while at the same time tending to provide extremely negative and acrimonious information about
their spouse. It is important not to just accept these self-protective responses and claims about
others without carefully exploring and evaluating the charges.

As stated earlier, it would be nice to have a clean assessment that allows the attorneys to
clearly see which client is better fit to be the "perfect" parent and which client may be guilty of
abusive behavior. It isn't so simple, although some research does suggest that some
MMPI/MMPI-2 scale scores are statistically associated with higher risk for child abuse. Other
research studies have focused on how abuse (e.g., incest) affects the personality and
development of the victim/survivor. The MMPI can also be used to help assess the credibility of a
parent's self-report, possible psychopathology, problems with alcohol or drugs, and
characteristics that seem to be associated with safe, appropriate, and effective parenting.

REPORTED CASES INVOLVING THE MMPI IN DOMESTIC RELATIONS

CASES

The MMPI has been cited in a large number of cases involving the issues of custody
evaluation, limitations and termination of parental rights and adoption. Generally, the goal in
custody evaluations is to establish the arrangements that are in the children's best interests.
Litigation often involves acrimonious dissolution proceedings where allegations of neglect, abuse
and molestation are alleged against one or both parents. MMPI-based assessment of parents is
invaluable in identifying psychological and behavioral problems which often provide the basis of
an order which provides or denies custody to one parent or the other.

The MMPI is the most widely used standardized test of personality and is likely the most widely
cited personality assessment instrument in litigation. Federal courts have affirmed the MMPI as a
scientifically valid and accepted procedure for personality assessment. Regents of the University
of Minnesota v. Applied Innovations, Inc., 685 F Supp 698 (DC Minn 1987) and Applied
Innovations, Inc. v. Regents of the University of Minnesota, 876 F2d 626 (8th Cir 1989).

Examples of reported cases where the MMPI was admitted to support a custody evaluation
include D.J. v. State Department of Human Resources, 578 So2d 1351 (Ala Civ App 1991) (the
MMPI was accepted as evidence of a mother's mental state); In Re Rodrigo S., San Francisco
Department of Social Services v. Joan R., 225 Cal App3d 1179, 276 Cal Rptr 183 (Cal App 1 dist
1990) (the MMPI was accepted in a father's evaluation); Gootee v. Lightner, 224 Cal App3d 587,
274 Cal Rptr 697 (Cal App 4 Dist 1990) (MMPI-based testing was appropriately used to evaluate
the family in the custody dispute); and Utz v. Keinzle, 574 So2d 1288 (La App 3 Cir 1991) (the
MMPI was used in a custody dispute to evaluate two sets of parents).

MMPI testing was also used to determine whether parental rights should be terminated in State
ex rel. LEAS in Interest of O'Neal. 303 NW2d 414 (Iowa 1981) and to decide when parental rights
should be given to potential adoptive parents in Commonwealth v. Jarboe, 464 SW2d 287 (Ky
1971).

PREPARATION BY THE ATTORNEY

The fundamental principal for attorneys in preparing and confronting expert testimony using
MMPI results is adequate preparation. It requires a commitment to the integrity of the case at
issue. They attorney must prepare in such a way that he understands the evidence and
arguments to be asserted on behalf of the client but also anticipates the opposition's
assumptions, approach and documentation.

Preparation starts with extensive background research and discovery. After carefully obtaining
the client's version of events and supporting documentation, the attorney needs to make sure that
he is adequately familiar with the MMPI as a standardized psychological test, with its legal history
and context and with fundamental technical knowledge about evaluating, administering, scoring
and interpreting psychological tests.

The attorney must be familiar with the MMPI items as well as the rationale behind the test, and
its nature, reliability an limitations. Most competent psychologists believe that taken alone and
out of context of the test (e.g., the MMPI scales), a response to a single MMPI item may be of
questionable validity. The response to the item remains to the attorney, however, a statement by
the individual who took the MMPI. That statement may support or contradict other testimony
given at deposition or trial.

The lawyer, or his expert, should conduct a review of the literature to locate MMPI articles
relevant to the case at hand. Retaining the right expert early in the case should make the task of
background research much easier. Expert testimony often significantly influences the outcome of
closely contested custody and domestic violence cases.

Once the expert is retained to evaluate MMPI results, the attorney should not automatically
assume that the expert should be called to testify. Fundamental queries need to be made,
including the following:

1. Will the MMPI results help the trier of fact understand facts or theories at issue in the
case?

2. Are the MMPI results consistent with the attorney's theory of the case?

3. If the MMPI results are inconsistent, is there a reason for the inconsistency?

4. Will the MMPI results confuse the trier of fact?

Once the attorney has a fundamental understanding of the client's version of events, all
supportive documentation that the client is able to supply, the nature and function of the MMPI as
it is relevant to the case, the relevant diagnostic frameworks and categories and the expert's
opinions and role, all remaining available information concerning the case that is the subject of
the litigation should be obtained.

The attorney must then obtain all documents in any way related to the adverse expert's
evaluation in which the MMPI was used. The subpoena
duces tecum should include all, but not be limited to, the following specifically enumerated
materials:

1. The expert's entire original file pertaining to the psychological exam or evaluation and any
psychological testing, including but not limited to, testing materials and results of the MMPI or any
version of the MMPI.
2. All notes of conversations with any person, including the client or any person consulted in
connection with this case or the exam or evaluation of the client and any psychological testing,
including but not limited to, the MMPI or any version of the MMPI.
 3. All scorings, computerized scorings, and hand scorings of any and all psychological tests
or assessment instruments, including but not limited to, the MMPI or any version of the MMPI.

4. All psychological testing documents, including the original completed examinations (the
actual answer form), score sheets, and notes written by the client or anyone else in connection
with the testing.

5. All MMPI testing documents for the client including the original completed examination,
score sheets and notes.

6. All documents that were reviewed in connection with the expert's exam or evaluation of the
client or any aspect of the case entitled Doe v. Doe.

7. All reports and drafts of reports prepared in connection with the expert's exam or
evaluation of the client or your evaluation of the case entitled Doe v. Doe.

8. All documents, including computer-scored or computer-generated information, that you

reviewed or wrote or that you discussed with any person in connection with you exam or
evaluation of the client or the evaluation of her MMPI testing, regardless of whether these
documents are still in the expert's possession.

9. The original file folders in which any information regarding the client is or has been stored.

10. All calendars that refer to appointments with the client or any person with whom the
expert discussed the evaluation of the case Doe v. Doe.

11. All billing statements and payment records.

12. All correspondence with any person in any way relating to the case Doe v. Doe.

13. All video and audio tape recordings of or pertaining to the client.

14. The expert's curriculum vitae, including a list of all articles, papers, chapters, books or
other documents he has written or published, a list of all articles, papers, chapters, books or other
documents, materials, or sources of information that he relied on in forming expert opinions
regarding the matters at issue; transcripts from all institutions of higher learning attended by the
expert; a list of all legal cases in which the expert has been endorsed in the last 5 years; a list of
all attorneys and their addresses for each case in which the expert has been endorsed; and in
some cases, a copy of the expert's dissertation or thesis.

15. The originals of all correspondence, notes of conversations and documents between and
among the expert witness, attorneys (who retained the expert), representatives and consultants
of the attorneys in any way related to the case.

The original file and folder is requested because short scribbled notes or notes on the reverse
sides of documents can provide a wealth of information that might be missed when copies are
requested.

Needless to say, it is essential that the adverse witness who will be testifying concerning the
MMPI be deposed. The objective is threefold: (1) to learn from the expert so that the attorney
can better understand his own client and case; (2) to assess whether the opposing expert's
testimony might be beneficial to one's own case; and (3) to determine how, if possible, the
attorney can damage or destroy the credibility of the opponent's expert witness. It is a very rare
occasion that the expert witness should be questioned for the first time in the courtroom during
trial. Pretrial depositions of opposing experts should be the standard operating procedure.

DIRECT EXAMINATION

Witnesses should be called and testimony elicited in such a way that adds support, clarity,
detail, significance and immediacy to the basic story that the lawyer is attempting to communicate
to the trier of fact. Providing testimony in narrative style by the experienced mental health
witness is one way of making the story more vivid. In fact, research has indicated that there is
generally a great difference in the way testimony in narrative style is received as opposed to
fragmented style. If those hearing testimony believe that its style is determined by the lawyer,
they may believe that use of a narrative style indicates the lawyer's faith in the witness'
competence. Similarly, when witness uses a fragmented style, presumable under the direction of
the lawyer, the lawyer may be thought to consider the witness incompetent.

The attorney may want to address the following points for presenting the MMPI-2 in court in
direct examination:

1. Describe the MMPI in terms of being an objective, paper and pencil personality scale that
has been widely researched and validated.

2. Describe how widely used the MMPI is in clinical assessment, and cite references to
support its broad use.

3. Provide a rationale for the original development of the MMPI as an objective means of
classifying psychological problems.

4. Explain the empirical scale construction approach.

5. Describe and illustrate how the MMPI was validated, and explain the correlate base for the
clinical scales.

6. Illustrate how the MMPI is used in personality description and clinical assessment.

7. If pertinent to the case, describe the MMPI revision (and MMPI-2/MMPI-A).

8. Describe and illustrate how the clinical scales of the revised versions (MMPI-2/MMPI-A)
are composed of the same items and possess the same psychometric properties as the original
version of the scales. Traditional scale reliabilities and validities have been assured in the revised
version.

9. Describe how the credibility and validity of a particular MMPI profile can be determined?

10. Describe what the MMPI/MMPI-2/MMPI-A measures for the particular client?

11. Establish that the results of the MMPI were only one factor that the clinician used in
coming to a conclusion about the client. The MMPI is only a tool and the results should rarely, if
ever, be used as the sole reason for arriving at an opinion or conclusion.
 12. Establish that the MMPI does not focus on cultural differentiations, and simply seeks an
assessment of a test taker's personality.

13. Establish how the MMPI-2 illustrates how the test taker meshes with the demographics of
the national norm.

14. Describe how the test was scored (by computer, by hand, by some third party, etc.).

15. Establish the expert's observation and opinion about the test taker's behavior and actions
derived from the test taker's T scores.

CROSS EXAMINATION

Few aspects of legal proceedings require more extensive, detailed preparation for the attorney
than discovery through deposition and
subsequent cross examination. Although on occasion it is strategically useful to jump from one
topic to another (in order to determine how different aspects of the testimony fit together) and to
return to a topic repeatedly (to assess the degree to which an expert's testimony on a specific
topic is consistent during the long course of deposition and cross examination), it is crucial that
the attorney have a well-organized outline to ensure that all relevant questions are asked.

The major difference between questions asked during the trial of your own witness on direct
examination and that asked in cross examination of the opposing expert is the manner in which
the questions are asked. Direct examination questions are usually phrased in an open-ended
manner, whereas cross-examination questions during the trial are generally closed-ended,
requiring a short, specific answer, often a "yes" or "no" to which the examiner knows the answer.
The examiner must be prepared to impeach or contradict the expert if the answer is anything
other than what is anticipated.

There is no special or best style of cross examination, but the attorney must be organized and
prepared to take the expert in the direction that careful preparation lets the attorney know he can
accomplish.

One of the most difficult tasks facing the attorney in a case involving the MMPI is deposing and
cross examining the expert witness. The attorney himself must attempt to become as
knowledgeable as the expert witness about the MMPI as an instrument, about its use in the case
at hand, and about the complex and detailed framework or psychological theory, research and
practice with which the MMPI results and other evidence in the case will be understood.
Questions put to the adverse expert (at deposition and if pertinent at trial) testifying in a case
involving the MMPI fall into twelve basic categories. They are as follows:

1. Compliance with the subpoena.

a. Determine whether any of the documents were altered, recopied, erased, written over,
enhanced, edited or added to since originally
created.

b. Determine whether any documents are missing--such as the computer printout which
was copied over and substituted by a
hand-copied replica.
 c. Determine whether any of the documents been lost, stolen, misplaced, destroyed or
thrown away?

d. Determine whether the expert has any policies for keeping or eliminating documents,
the rationale for such policies and how monitored and implemented.

2. Education and Training.

a. Does the expert meet the criteria or recognized formal training for the title they refer to
themselves? The "expert" may have a psychological degree but lack a doctorate in psychology--
possessing a doctoral degree in some unrelated field as Dr. Laura does on national radio.

b. Which of the degrees or internships is relevant to the expertise and testimony which is
being provided?

c. Which of the training programs and internships were fully accredited the full time the
expert was in attendance?

d. What is the name, title and other vital information of the directors of each graduate
training program and internship?

e. Did the expert fail to successfully complete a doctoral degree, clinical practicum, field
placement, internship or similar program?

f. What specific courses and training in psychological testing and assessment did the
expert take and successfully pass?

g. How many hours in each course, workshop or training program were devoted
specifically to the MMPI?

3. Illegal, unethical or unprofessional behavior.

a. Has anyone ever filed a complaint against the expert with a licensing board in any
jurisdiction and the details of such complaints?

b. What complaints were filed against the expert with any ethics committee, professional
standards review committee, peer review board or other organization?

c. Has there ever been a malpractice or criminal action filed against the expert?

4. Occupational history.

a. What professional positions has the expert had since graduate school?

b. Are there positions omitted from the curriculum vitae but mentioned in the deposition
which might be because the expert was fired for cause or otherwise found to have committed acts
that might cast doubt on credibility or expertise.
 c. Are there gaps when the expert moved from one level to a seemingly lower level (e.g.,
from full-time, untenured professor at a major university to full-time, untenured position at an
unaccredited university within the same city)?

d. Which of the positions involved the administering, scoring or interpreting the MMPI?

5. Research and publication history.

a. Has the expert conducted any research or published any books, chapters, articles or
other documents that involved the MMPI?

b. Is the expert's testimony in the current case consistent with what the expert has
previously written?

c. Was the publisher of an authored document reputable?

6. Forensic history.
a. Has the expert previously testified as an expert witness regarding the MMPI in any
proceeding or setting?

b. Is the prior testimony consistent with the testimony offered by the adverse expert
witness in this case?

c. Does the expert's prior testimony suggest a bias or prejudice?

7. Knowledge of general issues of tests and psychometrics.

a. Does the expert have genuine expertise and understand the nature of testing as
opposed to following a "cookbook" method of test use or improvising opinions?

b. Was the standardized MMPI tests conducted under generally standardized conditions,
i.e., in all essential respects that might significantly affect test performance?

c. Is the expert aware of characteristics of the individual taking the test or the testing
circumstances which may significantly influence test results and interpretations?

d. Did the expert follow the standard procedures for administering the test and were
special individual characteristics or testing circumstances adequately taken into account and
discussed in the forensic report?

e. Is the expert able to distinguish retrospective accuracy from predictive accuracy? In

other words, is the expert confusing the directionality of the inference (e.g., the likelihood that
those who score positive on a hypothetical predictor variable will fall into a specific group versus
the likelihood that those in a specific group will score positive on the predictor variable). Cross
examination must carefully explore the degree to which testimony may be based on such
misunderstandings.
 f. How consistent or reliable are the test results? See if the test taker took the test on
more than one occasion and whether the results were identical. MMPI test results might be
different because of the time or conditions under which the test was administered.

g. What types of scales were involved in the various tests and methods of assessment that
the expert considered in selecting the instruments and diagnostic frameworks that the expert
used in the case at hand?

h. What is a T score, and what are its psychometric properties? Understanding the T
score is essential to understanding the MMPI.

8. Knowledge of the MMPI.

a. Ask the expert to describe the normative group for the original MMPI and for the MMPI-
2.

b. Inquiry whether the normative group for the MMPI-2 scored about half of one standard
deviation above the mean on the clinical scales of the original MMPI and whether that doesn't
illustrate that the group was not therefore not really normal? Knowledgable experts should be
able to explain that the difference seems largely the result of differences in instructional sets and
unanswered questions.

c. A series of questions can be asked if the expert's previous responses do not show a
basic familiarity with the MMPI. The quetions include the level a clinical score must be to be
considered significant, what scales indicate the degree to which a specific test protocol is valid
and what reading level is required for the MMPI-2.

9. Administration and scoring.

a. Who was responsible for administering the test?

b. Was the test administered in a setting close to that employed in normative studies?

c. What instructions were given to the test taker? The purpose of this question is to
determine whether the conditions adequately met the criteria for a standardized test. Did for
example, the person who administered the test include instructions regarding attempting to
answer all items which can affect the validity of the test.

d. How was the test taker's reading level assessed?

e. Was the test administration directly monitored? What degree did the test taker relied on
other sources or written material for filling out the test? To administer the MMPI without adequate
monitoring violates the published opinion of the APA's Committee on Professional Standards.

f. Was any phase of the assessment audiotaped, videotaped or otherwise recorded?

g. What conditions of test administration did the expert consider as potentially affecting the
validity of the MMPI?

h. Has anyone but the expert had access to the original completed response form?
 i. Has the original completed response form been altered in any way by anyone? Did
anyone except the test taker make marks on, erase or change the original form in any way?

j. Were any test data discarded, destroyed, recopied or lost? Are all of the documents
involved in the administration and taking of the test present in their original form?

k. Who scored the test? Was it hand scored or done by machine or computer?

l. Did the scoring differ in any way whatsoever from the scoring method set forth in the
MMPI manual? To the degree that the standardized methods for scoring are altered the test is no
longer standardized. The reliability, validity and interpretations that are associated with the
standardized test do not automatically transfer to methods of scoring that deviate from those
specified in the manual and the research literature.

m. What steps has the expert taken to ensure that the scoring of this test is accurate and
free from error?

n. Were there any changes made in the test format, mode of administration, instructions,
language or content?

10. Interpretation.

a. By what method were these interpretative statements derived from the MMPI scores
and profiles?

b. Did the expert have any reservations or qualifications regarding the validity of the
interpretations that he is presenting?

c. What other documents or sources of information does the expert consider important or
relevant to interpreting this MMPI profile?

11. The unexpected: Testimony regarding specific claims and issues.

a. No matter how thoroughly an attorney has prepared his side of the case and no matter
how favorable the opinions formed by the expert witness whom he has designated, the attorney is
likely, at least occasionally, to encounter one or more surprises from opposing experts.

b. There is no easy or magical way for an attorney to simply be sure whether such claims
are exceptionally well founded, entirely bogus or somewhere in between. Theories that have the
ring of authority, common sense and inevitability may be ludicrously fallaciious. Concepts that
seem bazarre, counterintuitive and just downright silly may, in fact, be valid.

c. To help attorneys untangle and examine overwhelmingly complex and intertwined issues
comprehensively, Pope, Butcher and Seelen, recommend using a systematic set of 16
fundamental questions about each relevant issue. The list of areas of inquiry that follow can be
used both as a "road map" to the extensive discussion and analysis that follows in the book and
also as an outline for deposition or cross-examination questioning:

1) the adequacy with which the expert portrays the studies,

information or publications;
 2) relevance;

3) internal consistency;

4) research foundation;

5) definition and consistent application of evaluative

criteria;

6) number of investigations;

7) sample size;

8) criteria for "success";

9) duration of study;

10) questionable applications;

11) level of effectiveness;

12) reliability and validity;

13) independent verification;

14) ethically questionable research practices;

15) publication in peer-reviewed academic, scientific

or professional journals; and

16) accounting for the base rate.

12. Options and alternatives.

a. In arriving at his diagnosis or other conclusions, what alternatives did the expert
consider? In some cases, the attorney may want to list possible alternatives and ask the expert
to explain why he did not arrive at each alternative diagnosis.

b. Is there any other source of information that the expert did not take into consideration
(e.g., because it was not available or because the expert chose not to administer a particular test)
that might be relevant or that might change his opinion? If the expert acknowledges such an
alternative conclusion, the attorney might want to ask the questions that follow.

c. How such a source of information might alter the expert's opinion?

d. Whether the expert is less certain of his opinion in the absence of this information?

e. Why the information was not obtained? In some instances, the attorney may discover
that the opposing attorney who retained the expert had possession of (or access to) such records
or information but did not make them available to the expert; if so, this situation and its
implications should be carefully explored.
 The list of questions set forth above is in no way intended to be exhaustive. It is merely an
outline of categories and types of questions that might lead to helpful testimony and evidence that
will aid in the attorney's attempt to discredit, damage or destroy the adverse expert's testimony
and the weight of his opinions and conclusions. The professional work that has been most useful
to these authors in preparing this paper is the book written by Pope, Butcher and Seelen entitled
The MMPI, MMPI-2, & MMPI-A in Court: A Practical Guide for Expert Witnesses and Attorneys.
This book is geared not only for seasoned attorneys and expert witnesses but also for
psychologists who have never set foot in a courtroom and attorneys who have never heard of the
MMPI.

General Information On The MMPI

By Cheryl L. Karp, Ph.D. and Leonard Karp, J.D.

INTRODUCTION:

The MMPI is the most frequently used clinical test. Therefore, it is employed quite often in court cases to
provide personality information on defendants or litigants in which psychological adjustment factors are
pertinent to resolution of the case. It is easy to administer and provides an objective measure of
personality. Since it is such a well-researched and highly reliable instrument, it is often used in custody
evaluations. It provides clear, valid descriptions of people's problems, symptoms, and characteristics in
broadly accepted clinical language. The profiles are easy to explain in court and appear to be relatively
easy for people to understand. However, with any psychological instrument, it is important to acquaint
yourself with the background of the test and to acquaint yourself with the assets and liabilities of any test
used to assess your client.

BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, or MMPI, was developed in the late 1930s by a
psychologist and a psychiatrist at the University of Minnesota. It was originally intended for use with an
adult population, but was then extended to include teenagers, mostly for teens in the middle years, about
15 and 16. It required at least a sixthgrade reading level, so it was definitely not applicable for average
children below the age of about 13 or for retarded persons. The MMPI was sometimes given to bright
children of 11 or 12 years, but then great caution was exercised in the interpretation of the results. When
the MMPI was completely revised in 1989 (see MMPI-2, next section), adolescent norms were not
developed. The new instrument was not intended to be used for adolescents. Therefore, the Minnesota
Multiphasic Personality Inventory-Adolescent (MMPI-A) was developed. Although the MMPI has undergone
a complete revision, resulting in the MMPI-2, the MMPI is discussed here since many psychologists still
report results from the MMPI and it forms the basis for the MMPI-2.

The MMPI has ten clinical scales and three validity scales plus a host of supplementary scales. The clinical
scales were originally intended to distinguish "pure" groups with psychiatric disorders. Therefore, the
actual names of the scales assert bold and, sometimes, exoticsounding psychiatric labels. For example,
Scale 1 is referred to as the hypochondriasis scale, Scale 8 is labeled the schizophrenia scale, Scale 9 is
labeled the hypomania scale, Scale 4 is the psychopathic deviate scale, and Scale 7 is the psychasthenia
scale. Other scales reflect more understandable symptoms such as Scale 2, depression; Scale 3, hysteria;
Scale 5, masculinity-femininity; Scale 6, paranoia; and Scale 0, social introversion.

Researchers quickly found out that the scales were not able to be "pure" measures of the psychiatric
diagnostic groups (in part this is due to the overlap in symptoms in some of the disorders). Thus, an
elevation on Scale 8 did not mean that the client was definitely schizophrenic. As a result, the numbers of
the subscales quickly replace the psychiatric labels in common usage. Thus, instead of talking about the
hypochondriasis scale, the clinician will talk about Scale 1.

Researchers also found out that it was common for people to score high on more than one scale at the
same time and that interpretations using two or more scales tended to be more sophisticated or refined,
more useful, and more accurate. Therefore, patterns of elevations were distinguished, and the numbers
were used as a shorthand to describe the elevations. Thus, a 24 meant that there were elevations above
the "normal" range on scales 2 and 4, and 2 was the higher elevation. When the elevations are noted
(either as done here or when presented as a graph), the result is called a "profile." Researchers literally
went out and gathered data on the personality characteristics of those who scored high on the 24 or any
other combination (sometimes relevant clustering involving three scales, such as a 468). The amount of
research is impressive.

As mentioned earlier, the MMPI is vulnerable to faking because of the transparency of some of the items.
The three validity scales are designed to help the psychologist identify abnormal response sets that might
suggest "faking good" or "faking bad." In spite of these special scales, it is easier for the client to slant
answers to give a favorable or unfavorable impression with the MMPI than with the Rorschach, for
example. On the other hand, it is much more difficult to consistently bias the MMPI than an instrument of
less complexity and more transparency, such as the Thematic Apperception Test (the TAT).

The nature of the instrument, with true and false answers and patterns readily identifiable, has prompted
the development of books to supply interpretations of the results. The information is given in the form of
descriptive statements that tend to be true of clients whose scores yield certain profiles. These books tend
to be called "cookbooks" by psychologists. Thus, if the result shows a 24 profile, one can look in any
number of "cookbooks" to find the personality descriptors attached to elevations on 2 and 4 alone and
then as a combined pattern.

In the hands of a skilled and experienced psychologist, the MMPI is a powerful instrument and allows for
powerful presentation in court. However, the MMPI must be interpreted in light of the biographical and
other information about the client. "Blind interpretations," where nothing is known of the client except
perhaps gender, may be useful for testing a psychologist's memory about the descriptive statements
attached to certain individual scale elevations or certain profiles. They are not useful, and may be
dangerous, in interpreting MMPI results for forensic work or any other professional psychology work. For
example, an elevation on Scale 8 (schizophrenia) may have a different interpretation if the client is in a
psychiatric hospital than if the person is a respected professor at a university, with no history of
psychiatric disorder, who is interested in yoga or some other occult or esoteric study.

The psychologist administering and interpreting the MMPI must pay attention to all relevant factors,
including age, sex, education, social class, religious background, place of residence, and other historical
data. This information must be integrated correctly with research data, such as is found in the
"cookbooks," in order for the interpretation to be valid.

Computer use has brought other problems to the area of MMPI interpretation. Computer programs have
been developed to allow computers to score the raw data (anywhere from 399 true and false answers for
the "abbreviated" MMPI form to almost 600 answers for the full MMPI form), produce the files in printed
graph form, and do the work of fetching interpretative information from "cookbooks." Undeniably, the
computers save valuable time for psychologists. Yet, their use with the MMPI has opened the way for some
serious problems.

This advanced technology lends an image of "truth" or "accuracy" to the printout results that may mislead
even psychologists. Also, this technology is more readily available to nonpsychologists than is wise.
Persons with no or minimal training in psychology and psychological testing may use a computer report to
make statements about a person's personality functioning that sound definitive or are presented as such.
Even generally competent and respectable practitioners in fields normally thought to be "allied to"
psychology, such as psychiatry or clinical social work, can make the grievous error of believing that they
have acted responsibly or done a good job when they make conclusions about a client based solely or
predominantly on the MMPI, using a computer to produce scores and interpretations. The MMPI needs to
be interpreted in light of many factors often not considered by the computer programs. Computer
programs frequently require only information about the client's sex, age, and achieved education level, not
other factors such as current life stressors or other life experiences or environmental factors.

Furthermore, when used as part of a testing battery, the MMPI results must be integrated with all the
testing and historical data and finally interpreted in light of all of the psychologist's psychological
knowledge. Doing this may alter the psychologist's original interpretation of the MMPI, as will be discussed
below in the section on the interpretation of the Rorschach. Nonpsychologists should not and usually
cannot administer a whole test battery and interpret it appropriately.
Secondly, many computer reports focus mainly on giving statements about the elevation of each individual
scale, with perhaps cursory statements about the highest two scales considered together. Unfortunately,
there is not a statement at the beginning of the computer printout explaining whether the statements are
from research with a normal or abnormal population. For example, an elevation on Scale 4 (the
psychopathic deviate scale) may yield statements about interesting personality qualities such as
"independence" or "anger." (one psychologist working with a codependency program was heard repeatedly
calling Scale 4 the "anger" scale, an interesting oversimplification.) Such singlescale interpretative
statements may be of help describing a normal person who is an independent thinker, who follows
society's mores and laws, but reserves the right to make his or her own moral judgments and may
lawfully and appropriately challenge authority. It does not begin to do justice to the "independence" from
society's norms seen in a person with a history of seriously breaking society's mores and rules, such as
the person expelled a number of times from school for various offenses or the person with a long history
of violence or trouble with the law.

Thus, one can have the undesirable result that a psychologist may erroneously (and incompetently) use
single statements from a computer to present someone accused of molestation in a rather favorable light,
ignoring the fact that the overall pattern of the 49, combined with a history of violence against others and
minor legal charges and convictions, demands a more serious and less favorable view of the client. On the
other hand, you can have a parent with an elevation on Scale 4 labeled a probable antisocial personality
(formerly known as psychopath or sociopath), while the elevation really suggests less sinister
characteristics.

Antisocial persons and persons recently traumatized in some manner in interpersonal interactions (e.g., a
rape victim or a man or woman recently divorced) may superficially share some characteristics reflected in
an elevation on Scale 4, which can confuse interpretation of MMPI results. An elevated Scale 4 may
suggest that the client does not allow himself or herself to become significantly close to others
emotionally, has a lot of anger, and may be likely to misrepresent or lie about circumstances. A closer look
at this is warranted.

A person with an antisocial personality disorder typically shows interpersonal distancing, that is, does not
allow himself or herself to become significantly close to others. The person recently traumatized may
likewise keep people from getting close. However, the similarity may end on the surface, because the
antisocial personality may be charming in person but unable to bond. The traumatized person may be less
charming in person and may be quite able to bond but fearful of doing so because of the trauma. Likewise,
persons with antisocial personality disorders usually have a more or less disguised well of anger, typically
feeling mistreated by society and entitled to act out against individuals or institutions. It is easy to see
that a rape victim might have a well of anger, sometimes directed against the perpetrator and sometimes
directed inwardly.

Persons with antisocial personality disorders typically lack guilt about their exploits; they simply hate
being caught. Rape victims typically experience inappropriate guilt and hate what has happened and what
they have "become." A convicted felon may have a 24 elevation, suggesting significant depression (the 2
is the "depression" scale), while sitting in a county jail on murder 1 charges or charges of domestic
violence. Persons with personality disorders often develop real and significant depressions when caught
and suffering the consequences of their misbehaving or criminal acts. Yet, a victim of domestic violence
might just as easily have a 24 elevation, but the interpretation of the two profiles would or could be very
different.

When it comes to the characteristic of lying and breaking society's mores and laws, the superficial
similarities are likely to end. Persons with antisocial personalities may, indeed, lie about the legal charges
confronting them and, for that matter, about many things. Like the antisocial personality, the rape victim
may be putting emotional distance between herself and others and also may have a lot of anger. However,
it does not follow, therefore, that, like the antisocial personality, the rape victim is also likely to lie and
misrepresent circumstances and is also likely to have broken society's laws in the past or likely to break
them in the future.

The best and most significant computer programs are extremely complicated and sophisticated. The good
programs integrate the elevations from all the scales to eliminate contradictions that one can find looking
only at individual scales (one scale may suggest that the person is depressed, while another scale may
suggest that the person is optimistic). The most commonly used computer services are probably the ones
from Minnesota (from the National Computer Service, with James Butcher, one of the experts in MMPI
work as developer and advisor) and the one from Los Angeles (developed by Alexander Caldwell, another
giant in the field of the MMPI).

The importance of having a skilled and competent psychologist to interpret testing results, including the
computerized MMPI, cannot be stressed enough. Here are some things to watch for in evaluating whether
a psychologist is adequately handling the MMPI:

1. Most psychologists trained in clinical psychology refer to the MMPI scale evaluations by numbers (24 or
468). If the psychologist mainly uses the scales' official names or stresses these official names, look
further; the psychologist's primary training may not have been in the field of clinical psychology.

2. If the psychologist does not readily integrate the MMPI scale information, but is content with mainly
singlescale descriptors, take care in using the psychologist. Not only may the psychologist be ineptly
interpreting the MMPI, but the psychologist's testimony would be very vulnerable to attack by a skillful
cross examination or on rebuttal by a competent psychologist.

3. If the psychologist does not integrate the MMPI data with historical information and other testing data,
and account for anomalies, then the work is not adequate.

4. To be most helpful, your psychologist consultant should be acquainted with the major developments in
MMPI interpretation. The psychologist should be acquainted with the work of the Minnesota group and the
Caldwell group and those associated with the work of those two groups. Caldwell has developed an
alternative way of looking at and interpreting the scales that helps one understand that the 24 of the rape
victim is different from the 24 of the convicted felon and helps one understand why that is so.

Custody evaluations or domestic violence litigation would be simpler and easier if there were MMPI
patterns or profiles reliably correlated with the "perfect parent" or conviction for domestic violence or,
better yet, highly correlated with admission of guilt in domestic violence cases. There are no such
"molester" or "domestic abuser" profiles identified yet, but there may be in the future.

There has been research seeking to identify profiles of molesters. The populations studied have mainly
been men in custody who are nonfamily molesters or are a mixed group of nonfamily molesters and incest
molesters. This population may be very different from the general population of domestic violence
abusers, molesters, or physical abusers of spouses or children. Furthermore, the number of people in the
group studied have been too small for much weight to be given to the conclusions in terms of generalizing
to other groups or the population at large. Some of the elevations seen on the profiles of the convicted
offenders are not surprising; for example, an elevation on Scale 4 is common. One would never be
surprised to see someone convicted (often of multiple offenses) scoring high on Scale 4 of the MMPI, but
that would be common for anyone in penal custody.

THE ADVENT OF THE MMPI-2:

The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), described above, has been in use now for over
50 years. In that time, no revisions in item content or wording were made. Over the last 10 years, there
have been increasing complaints that some of the items were out of date, sexist, awkward, or ambiguous.
In addition, two items which contained religious content specific to Christianity were found to be offensive
to other religious sectors.

According to James Butcher, one of the researchers responsible for the revision of the MMPI, the MMPI-2 is
a valid revision and expansion of the original MMPI. He asserts that continuity with the previous empirical
literature has been assured. The original validity and clinical scales have been kept virtually intact in the
MMPI-2. According to Butcher, however, new norms based on nationally representative samples provide a
sounder comparative base. Therefore, the information on the MMPI covered above is still accurate.

In addition to the original validity scales (LFK), there have been three new validity scales included in the
MMPI-2: FB, VRIN, and TRIN. FB refers to the F scale, only for the back side or the second half of the test.
VRIN is the variable response inconsistency scale which attempts to indicate a random response pattern or
an inconsistent pattern of responses. The TRIN refers to the true response inconsistencies scale and
indicates invalid profiles due to a true set or a false set. A true set is when a person answers true to two
inconsistent items such as most of the time I feel blue and I am happy most of the time. A false set would
be answering false to both items. The validity scales are extremely important in the interpretation of the
entire test since it indicates the degree to which a clinical profile is a valid picture of the person being
evaluated.

In the past, one of the complaints of the MMPI was the lack of uniformity in the T-score distributions of the
clinical scales, therefore, making it difficult to compare relative T-scores. During the restandardization, this
problem was corrected so that the 8 clinical scales (omitting scales 5 and 0) and the 15 new content
scales have uniform T-scores making it much easier to compare clinical and content scales. Scale 5
(masculinity/femininity scale) and Scale 0 (introversion scale) were not included since they are not
comparable measures of psychopathology and these scales differ in their distribution.
With the uniform T-scores, a T-score of 65 is at the 92nd percentile across the clinical scales and a T-score
of 70 is equal to a percentile rank of 96. A T-score of 65 has proven to be the best cutoff for critical items.
In general, it is hoped that the MMPI-2 will answer the problems raised with the original MMPI. Many
researchers are dubious of these new findings and still prefer the original version. However, the MMPI-2 is
the preferred test at the present time, although many computer test interpretations will include both
profiles.

OVERVIEW OF THE MMPI-2 SCALES:

The MMPI-2 contains seven validity scales and ten clinical scales that are nearly identical to the original
MMPI. Following is a description of the validity scales as well as the clinical scales for the MMPI-2.

Validity Scales:

The "Cannot Say" Scale ("? scale") - The "?" scale is simply the number of omitted items (including
items answered both true and false). The MMPI-2 manual suggests that protocols with 30 or more omitted
items should be considered invalid and not interpreted. Other experts suggest interpreting with great
caution protocols with more than 10 omitted items and not to interpret at all those with more than 30
omitted items.

L Scale - The L scale originally was constructed to detect a deliberate and rather unsophisticated attempt
on the part of the respondent to present him/herself in a favorable light. People who present high L scale
scores are not willing to admit even minor shortcomings, and are deliberately trying to present themselves
in a very favorable way. Better educated, brighter, more sophisticated people from higher social classes
tend to score lower on the L scale.

F Scale - The F Scale originally was developed to detect deviant or atypical ways of responding to test
items. Several of the F Scale items were deleted from the MMPI-2 because of objectionable content,
leaving the F Scale with 60 of the original 64 items in the revised instrument. The F Scale serves three
important functions:

1.It is an index of test-taking attitude and is useful in detecting deviant response sets (i.e. faking good or
faking bad).

2.If one can rule out profile invalidity, the F Scale is a good indicator of degree of psychopathology, with
higher scores suggesting greater psychopathology.

3.Scores on the F Scale can be used to generate inferences about other extratest characteristics and
behaviors.

K Scale - Compared to the L Scale, the K Scale was developed as a more subtle and more effective index
of attempts by examiners to deny psychopathology and to present themselves in a favorable light or,
conversely, to exaggerate psychopathology and to try to appear in a very unfavorable light. Some people
refer to this scale as the "defensiveness" indicator, as high scores on the K Scale are thought to be
associated with a defensive approach to the test, while low scores are thought to be indicative of an
unusually frank and self-critical approach.

Subsequent research on the K Scale has indicated that the K Scale is not only related to defensiveness,
but is also related to educational level and socioeconomic status, with better-educated and higher
socioeconomic-level subjects scoring higher on the scale. It is not unusual for college-educated persons
who are not being defensive to obtain T-scores on the K Scale in a range of 55 to 60, and persons with
even more formal education to obtain T-scores in a range of 60 to 70. Moderate elevations on the K Scale
sometimes reflect ego strength and psychological resources.

Back F (Fb) Scale - The Fb scale consists of 40 items on the MMPI-2 that no more than 10 percent of the
MMPI-2 normative sample answered in the deviant direction. It is analogous to the standard F scale
except that the items are placed in the last half of the test. An elevated Fb scale score could indicate that
the respondent stopped paying attention to the test items that occurred later in the booklet and shifted to
an essentially random pattern of responding.

VRIN Scale (Variable Response Inconsistency) - The VRIN scale was developed for the MMPI-2 as an
additional validity indicator. It provides an indication of the respondents' tendencies to respond
inconsistently to MMPI-2 items, and whose resulting protocols therefore should not be interpreted. It
consists of 67 pairs of items with either similar or opposite content. Each time a person answers items in a
pair inconsistently, one raw score point is added to the score ont he VRIN scale. It is suggested that a raw
score equal to or greater than 13 indicates inconsistent responding that probably invalidates the resulting
protocol, although this scale is still experimental.

TRIN Scale (True Response Inconsistency) - The TRIN scale was developed to identify persons who
respond inconsistently to items by giving true responses to items indiscriminately or by giving false
responses to items indiscriminately. The TRIN scale consists of 23 pairs of items that are opposite in
content. Two true responses to some item pairs or two false responses to other item pairs would indicate
inconsistent responding. The MMPI-2 manual suggests that as rough guidelines TRIN raw scores of 13 or
more or of 5 or less may be suggestive of indiscriminate responding that might invalidate the protocol,
however, this scale is still considered experimental.

Clinical Scales:

Scale 1: Hypochondriasis (Hs) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients who manifested
a pattern of symptoms associated with the label of hypochondriasis. A wide variety of vague and
nonspecific complaints about bodily functioning are tapped by the 32 items. All the items on this scale deal
with somatic concerns or with general physical competence. Scale 1 is designed to assess a neurotic
concern over bodily functioning. A person who is actually physically ill will obtain only a moderate
elevation on Scale 1. These people will endorse their legitimate physical complaints, but will not endorse
the entire gamut of vague physical complaints tapped by this scale. All but one of the original items were
retained on the MMPI-2.

Scale 2: Depression (D) - This scale was originally developed to assess symptomatic depression. The
primary characteristics of symptomatic depression are poor morale, lack of hope in the future, and a
general dissatisfaction with one's own life situation. Very elevated scores on this scale may suggest clinical
depression, while more moderate scores tend to indicate a general attitude or life-style characterized by
poor morale and lack of involvement. Of the original 60 items, 57 have been retained in MMPI-2.

Scale 3: Hysteria (Hy) - This scale was developed to identify patients who demonstrated hysterical
reactions to stress situations. All 60 original items have been retained in the MMPI-2. Items in Scale 3
consist of two general types: items reflecting specific somatic complaints and items that show that the
client considers himself or herself well socialized and adjusted. Such people generally maintain a facade of
superior adjustment and only when they are under stress does their proneness to develop conversion-type
symptoms as a means of resolving conflict and avoiding responsibility appear. Scale 3 scores are related to
intellectual ability, educational background, and social class. Brighter, better-educated persons of a higher
social class tend to score higher on the scale. In addition, high scores are much more common among
women than among men in both normal and psychiatric populations.

Scale 4: Psychopathic Deviate (Pd) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients diagnosed
as psychopathic personality, asocial or amoral type. General social maladjustment and the absence of
strongly pleasant experiences are assessed by the 50 items included in Scale 4. Scores on Scale 4 tend to
be related to age, with adolescents and college students often scoring in a T-score range of 55 to 60.
Black respondents have also been reported to score higher than white persons on Scale 4. Scale 4 can be
thought of as a measure of rebelliousness, with higher scores indicating rebellion and lower scores
indicating an acceptance of authority and the status quo. High scorers are very likely to be diagnosed as
having some form of personality disorder, but are unlikely to receive a psychotic diagnosis. Low scorers
are generally described as conventional, conforming, and submissive. All 50 items in the original scale
have been retained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 5: Masculinity-Femininity (Mf) - Scale 5 was originally developed by Hathaway and McKinley to
identify homosexual invert males. The test authors identified only a very small number of items that
differentiated homosexual from heterosexual males. Scores on this scale are related to intelligence,
education, and socioeconomic status. It is not uncommon for male college students and other college-
educated males to obtain T-scores in the 60 to 65 range. Scores that are markedly higher than expected
for males, based on the persons' intelligence, education, and social class should suggest the possibility of
sexual concerns and problems. High scores are very uncommon among females. When they are
encountered, they generally indicate rejection of the traditional female role. Of the 60 items in the original
scale 5, 56 have been maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 6: Paranoia (Pa) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients who were judged to
have paranoid symptoms such as ideas of reference, feelings of persecution, grandiose self-concepts,
suspiciousness, excessive sensitivity, and rigid opinions and attitudes. Persons who score high on this
scale usually have paranoid symptoms. All 40 items in the original scale have been maintained in the
MMPI-2.
Scale 7: Psychasthenia (Pt) - This scale was originally developed to measure the general symptomatic
pattern labeled psychasthenia. This diagnostic label is not commonly used today. Among currently popular
diagnostic categories, the obsessive-compulsive disorder probably is closest to the original psychasthenia
label. Psychasthenia was originally characterized by excessive doubts, compulsions, obsessions, and
unreasonable fears. The person suffering from psychasthenia had an inability to resist specific actions or
thoughts regardless of their maladaptive nature. In addition to obsessive-compulsive features, this scale
taps abnormal fears, self-criticism, difficulties in concentration, and guilt feelings. The anxiety assessed by
this scale is of a long-term nature or trait anxiety, although the scale is somewhat responsive to
situational stress as well. All 48 items from the original scale have been maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 8: Schizophrenia (Sc) - This scale was originally developed to identify patients diagnosed as
schizophrenic. All 78 items in the original scale have been maintained in the MMPI-2. The items in this
scale assess a wide variety of content areas, including bizarre thought processes and peculiar perceptions,
social alienation, poor familial relationships, difficulties in concentration and impulse control, lack of deep
interests, disturbing questions of self-worth and self-identity, and sexual difficulties. Misinterpretations of
reality, delusions, and hallucinations may be present. Ambivalent or constricted emotional responsiveness
is common. Behavior may be withdrawn, aggressive, or bizarre. Scale 8 is probably the single most
difficult scale to interpret in isolation because of the variety of factors that can result in an elevated score.
Scores on this scale are related to age and to race. Adolescents and college students often obtain T-scores
in a range of 50 to 60, perhaps reflecting the turmoil associated with that period in life. Black subjects,
particularly males, tend to score higher than white subjects, perhaps suggesting the alienation and social
estrangement felt by many blacks.

Scale 9: Hypomania (Ma) - This scale was originally developed to identify psychiatric patients
manifesting hypomanic symptoms. Hypomania is characterized by elevated mood, accelerated speech and
motor activity, irritability, flight of ideas, and brief periods of depression. Some of the 46 items deal
specifically with features of hypomanic disturbance, while others cover topics such as family relationships,
moral values and attitudes, and physical or bodily concerns. Scores on this scale are clearly related to age
and to race, with adolescents and college students typically obtaining scores in a T-score range of 55 to
60, while elderly persons often achieve scores below a T-score of 50. Black persons typically score higher
than white persons on the scale, often scoring in a T-score range of 55 to 65. All 46 items in the original
scale have been maintained in the MMPI-2.

Scale 0: Social Introversion (Si) - Scale ) was developed later than the other clinical scales, but it has
come to be treated as a standard clinical scale. This scale was originally designed to assess a person's
tendency to withdraw from social contacts and responsibilities. All but one of the 70 items in the original
scale have been maintained in the MMPI-2. The items on this scale are of two general types. One group of
items deals with social participation, while the other group deals with general neurotic maladjustment and
self-depreciation. High scorers are generally seen as socially introverted, while low scorers tend to be
sociable and extroverted. High scorers are very insecure and uncomfortable in social situations. They tend
to be shy, reserved, timid, and retiring, while low scorers tend to be outgoing, gregarious, friendly, and
talkative.

THE MMPI/MMPI-2 IN DOMESTIC RELATIONS CASES:

In a State Bar of Texas advanced Family Law course, David McClure made an interesting comment that
psychological testing in custody disputes date back to the Old Testament, when King Solomon attempted
to resolve a custody dispute of an infant. We are all familiar with his declaration that he would satisfy each
woman by splitting the child in half, giving one-half to each of the women. He granted custody of the child
to the woman who put the child's safety and welfare before her own needs. In today's world, King
Solomon would have appointed a psychologist to conduct a full psychological evaluation to determine
which mother had better parenting skills and perhaps which mother was determined to be the
"psychological parent."

The MMPI/MMPI-2 has been cited extensively in appellate cases involving custody evaluations as well as in
cases where one party is attempting to limit parental rights for the sake of the children's welfare. Since
the general goal in custody evaluations is to establish custody and visitation arrangements that are in the
best interests of the children involved, courts often turn to psychological assessment to help determine
which parent is best suited to be the primary custodial parent. MMPI-based assessment of parents can
provide valuable information in identifying not only psychological and behavioral problems that might
argue against a grant of custody but also characteristics that may suggest mature parenting abilities.

In providing expertise in forensic evaluations, psychologists are often asked to provide expert opinions
about the emotional health of the parents as well as assessing any possible developmental or adjustment
problems related to the child. The MMPI/MMPI-2 is the most frequently administered psychological test in
assessing parents. Personality assessments of parents entangled in custody disputes are among the most
difficult that psychologists face. In fact, most licensing boards and professional insurance companies will
tell you that those psychologists that embark on this specialty, have the most complaints and lawsuits filed
against them.

One of the problems that face the psychologist completing a custody evaluation is that men and women in
custody disputes tend to be very self-protective and assert their lack of problems, while at the same time
tending to provide extremely negative and acrimonious information about their spouse. It is important not
to just accept these self-protective responses and claims about others without carefully exploring and
evaluating the charges.

As stated earlier, it would be nice to have a clean assessment that allows the attorneys to clearly see
which client is better fit to be the "perfect" parent and which client may be guilty of abusive behavior. It
isn't so simple, although some research does suggest that some MMPI/MMPI-2 scale scores are
statistically associated with higher risk for child abuse. Other research studies have focused on how abuse
(e.g., incest) affects the personality and development of the victim/survivor. The MMPI can also be used to
help assess the credibility of a parent's self-report, possible psychopathology, problems with alcohol or
drugs, and characteristics that seem to be associated with safe, appropriate, and effective parenting.

REPORTED CASES INVOLVING THE MMPI IN DOMESTIC RELATIONS CASES:

The MMPI has been cited in a large number of cases involving the issues of custody evaluation, limitations
and termination of parental rights and adoption. Generally, the goal in custody evaluations is to establish
the arrangements that are in the children's best interests. Litigation often involves acrimonious dissolution
proceedings where allegations of neglect, abuse and molestation are alleged against one or both parents.
MMPI-based assessment of parents is invaluable in identifying psychological and behavioral problems
which often provide the basis of an order which provides or denies custody to one parent or the other.

The MMPI is the most widely used standardized test of personality and is likely the most widely cited
personality assessment instrument in litigation. Federal courts have affirmed the MMPI as a scientifically
valid and accepted procedure for personality assessment. Regents of the University of Minnesota v.
Applied Innovations, Inc., 685 F Supp 698 (DC Minn 1987) and Applied Innovations, Inc. v. Regents of the
University of Minnesota, 876 F2d 626 (8th Cir 1989).

Examples of reported cases where the MMPI was admitted to support a custody evaluation include D.J. v.
State Department of Human Resources, 578 So2d 1351 (Ala Civ App 1991) (the MMPI was accepted as
evidence of a mother's mental state); In Re Rodrigo S., San Francisco Department of Social Services v.
Joan R., 225 Cal App3d 1179, 276 Cal Rptr 183 (Cal App 1 dist 1990) (the MMPI was accepted in a
father's evaluation); Gootee v. Lightner, 224 Cal App3d 587, 274 Cal Rptr 697 (Cal App 4 Dist 1990)
(MMPI-based testing was appropriately used to evaluate the family in the custody dispute); and Utz v.
Keinzle, 574 So2d 1288 (La App 3 Cir 1991) (the MMPI was used in a custody dispute to evaluate two sets
of parents).

MMPI testing was also used to determine whether parental rights should be terminated in State ex rel.
LEAS in Interest of O'Neal. 303 NW2d 414 (Iowa 1981) and to decide when parental rights should be
given to potential adoptive parents in Commonwealth v. Jarboe, 464 SW2d 287 (Ky 1971).

PREPARATION BY THE ATTORNEY:

The fundamental principal for attorneys in preparing and confronting expert testimony using MMPI results
is adequate preparation. It requires a commitment to the integrity of the case at issue. They attorney
must prepare in such a way that he understands the evidence and arguments to be asserted on behalf of
the client but also anticipates the opposition's assumptions, approach and documentation.

Preparation starts with extensive background research and discovery. After carefully obtaining the client's
version of events and supporting documentation, the attorney needs to make sure that he is adequately
familiar with the MMPI as a standardized psychological test, with its legal history and context and with
fundamental technical knowledge about evaluating, administering, scoring and interpreting psychological
tests.

The attorney must be familiar with the MMPI items as well as the rationale behind the test, and its nature,
reliability an limitations. Most competent psychologists believe that taken alone and out of context of the
test (e.g., the MMPI scales), a response to a single MMPI item may be of questionable validity. The
response to the item remains to the attorney, however, a statement by the individual who took the MMPI.
That statement may support or contradict other testimony given at deposition or trial.

The lawyer, or his expert, should conduct a review of the literature to locate MMPI articles relevant to the
case at hand. Retaining the right expert early in the case should make the task of background research
much easier. Expert testimony often significantly influences the outcome of closely contested custody and
domestic violence cases.

Once the expert is retained to evaluate MMPI results, the attorney should not automatically assume that
the expert should be called to testify. Fundamental queries need to be made, including the following:

1.Will the MMPI results help the trier of fact understand facts or theories at issue in the case?

2.Are the MMPI results consistent with the attorney's theory of the case?

3.If the MMPI results are inconsistent, is there a reason for the inconsistency?

4.Will the MMPI results confuse the trier of fact?

Once the attorney has a fundamental understanding of the client's version of events, all supportive
documentation that the client is able to supply, the nature and function of the MMPI as it is relevant to the
case, the relevant diagnostic frameworks and categories and the expert's opinions and role, all remaining
available information concerning the case that is the subject of the litigation should be obtained.

The attorney must then obtain all documents in any way related to the adverse expert's evaluation in
which the MMPI was used. The subpoena duces tecum should include all, but not be limited to, the
following specifically enumerated materials:

A.The expert's entire original file pertaining to the psychological exam or evaluation and any psychological
testing, including but not limited to, testing materials and results of the MMPI or any version of the MMPI.

2.All notes of conversations with any person, including the client or any person consulted in connection
with this case or the exam or evaluation of the client and any psychological testing, including but not
limited to, the MMPI or any version of the MMPI.

3.All scorings, computerized scorings, and hand scorings of any and all psychological tests or assessment
instruments, including but not limited to, the MMPI or any version of the MMPI.

4.All psychological testing documents, including the original completed examinations (the actual answer
form), score sheets, and notes written by the client or anyone else in connection with the testing.

5.All MMPI testing documents for the client including the original completed examination, score sheets and
notes.

6.All documents that were reviewed in connection with the expert's exam or evaluation of the client or any
aspect of the case entitled Doe v. Doe.

7.All reports and drafts of reports prepared in connection with the expert's exam or evaluation of the client
or your evaluation of the case entitled Doe v. Doe.

8.All documents, including computer-scored or computer-generated information, that you reviewed or

wrote or that you discussed with any person in connection with you exam or evaluation of the client or the
evaluation of her MMPI testing, regardless of whether these documents are still in the expert's possession.

9.The original file folders in which any information regarding the client is or has been stored.

10.All calendars that refer to appointments with the client or any person with whom the expert discussed
the evaluation of the case Doe v. Doe.

11.All billing statements and payment records.

12.All correspondence with any person in any way relating to the case Doe v. Doe.

13.All video and audio tape recordings of or pertaining to the client.

14.The expert's curriculum vitae, including a list of all articles, papers, chapters, books or other
documents he has written or published, a list of all articles, papers, chapters, books or other documents,
materials, or sources of information that he relied on in forming expert opinions regarding the matters at
issue; transcripts from all institutions of higher learning attended by the expert; a list of all legal cases in
which the expert has been endorsed in the last 5 years; a list of all attorneys and their addresses for each
case in which the expert has been endorsed; and in some cases, a copy of the expert's dissertation or
thesis.

15.The originals of all correspondence, notes of conversations and documents between and among the
expert witness, attorneys (who retained the expert), representatives and consultants of the attorneys in
any way related to the case.

The original file and folder is requested because short scribbled notes or notes on the reverse sides of
documents can provide a wealth of information that might be missed when copies are requested.

Needless to say, it is essential that the adverse witness who will be testifying concerning the MMPI be
deposed. The objective is threefold: (1) to learn from the expert so that the attorney can better
understand his own client and case; (2) to assess whether the opposing expert's testimony might be
beneficial to one's own case; and (3) to determine how, if possible, the attorney can damage or destroy
the credibility of the opponent's expert witness. It is a very rare occasion that the expert witness should
be questioned for the first time in the courtroom during trial. Pretrial depositions of opposing experts
should be the standard operating procedure.

DIRECT EXAMINATION:

Witnesses should be called and testimony elicited in such a way that adds support, clarity, detail,
significance and immediacy to the basic story that the lawyer is attempting to communicate to the trier of
fact. Providing testimony in narrative style by the experienced mental health witness is one way of making
the story more vivid. In fact, research has indicated that there is generally a great difference in the way
testimony in narrative style is received as opposed to fragmented style. If those hearing testimony believe
that its style is determined by the lawyer, they may believe that use of a narrative style indicates the
lawyer's faith in the witness' competence. Similarly, when witness uses a fragmented style, presumable
under the direction of the lawyer, the lawyer may be thought to consider the witness incompetent.

The attorney may want to address the following points for presenting the MMPI-2 in court in direct
examination:

1.Describe the MMPI in terms of being an objective, paper and pencil personality scale that has been
widely researched and validated.

2.Describe how widely used the MMPI is in clinical assessment, and cite references to support its broad
use.

3.Provide a rationale for the original development of the MMPI as an objective means of classifying
psychological problems.

4.Explain the empirical scale construction approach.

5.Describe and illustrate how the MMPI was validated, and explain the correlate base for the clinical
scales.

6.Illustrate how the MMPI is used in personality description and clinical assessment.

7.If pertinent to the case, describe the MMPI revision (and MMPI-2/MMPI-A).

8.Describe and illustrate how the clinical scales of the revised versions (MMPI-2/MMPI-A) are composed of
the same items and possess the same psychometric properties as the original version of the scales.
Traditional scale reliabilities and validities have been assured in the revised version.

9.Describe how the credibility and validity of a particular MMPI profile can be determined?

10.Describe what the MMPI/MMPI-2/MMPI-A measures for the particular client?

11.Establish that the results of the MMPI were only one factor that the clinician used in coming to a
conclusion about the client. The MMPI is only a tool and the results should rarely, if ever, be used as the
sole reason for arriving at an opinion or conclusion.

12.Establish that the MMPI does not focus on cultural differentiations, and simply seeks an assessment of
a test taker's personality.

13.Establish how the MMPI-2 illustrates how the test taker meshes with the demographics of the national
norm.

14.Describe how the test was scored (by computer, by hand, by some third party, etc.).

15.Establish the expert's observation and opinion about the test taker's behavior and actions derived from
the test taker's T scores.

CROSS EXAMINATION:

Few aspects of legal proceedings require more extensive, detailed preparation for the attorney than
discovery through deposition and subsequent cross examination. Although on occasion it is strategically
useful to jump from one topic to another (in order to determine how different aspects of the testimony fit
together) and to return to a topic repeatedly (to assess the degree to which an expert's testimony on a
specific topic is consistent during the long course of deposition and cross examination), it is crucial that
the attorney have a well-organized outline to ensure that all relevant questions are asked.

The major difference between questions asked during the trial of your own witness on direct examination
and that asked in cross examination of the opposing expert is the manner in which the questions are
asked. Direct examination questions are usually phrased in an open-ended manner, whereas cross-
examination questions during the trial are generally closed-ended, requiring a short, specific answer, often
a "yes" or "no" to which the examiner knows the answer. The examiner must be prepared to impeach or
contradict the expert if the answer is anything other than what is anticipated.

There is no special or best style of cross examination, but the attorney must be organized and prepared to
take the expert in the direction that careful preparation lets the attorney know he can accomplish.

One of the most difficult tasks facing the attorney in a case involving the MMPI is deposing and cross
examining the expert witness. The attorney himself must attempt to become as knowledgeable as the
expert witness about the MMPI as an instrument, about its use in the case at hand, and about the complex
and detailed framework or psychological theory, research and practice with which the MMPI results and
other evidence in the case will be understood. Questions put to the adverse expert (at deposition and if
pertinent at trial) testifying in a case involving the MMPI fall into twelve basic categories. They are as
follows:

1.Compliance with the subpoena.

a.Determine whether any of the documents were altered, recopied, erased, written over, enhanced, edited
or added to since originally created.

b.Determine whether any documents are missing--such as the computer printout which was copied over
and substituted by a hand-copied replica.

c.Determine whether any of the documents been lost, stolen, misplaced, destroyed or thrown away?

d.Determine whether the expert has any policies for keeping or eliminating documents, the rationale for
such policies and how monitored and implemented.

2.Education and Training.

a.Does the expert meet the criteria or recognized formal training for the title they refer to themselves?
The "expert" may have a psychological degree but lack a doctorate in psychology--possessing a doctoral
degree in some unrelated field as Dr. Laura does on national radio.

b.Which of the degrees or internships is relevant to the expertise and testimony which is being provided?

c.Which of the training programs and internships were fully accredited the full time the expert was in
attendance?

d.What is the name, title and other vital information of the directors of each graduate training program
and internship?

e.Did the expert fail to successfully complete a doctoral degree, clinical practicum, field placement,
internship or similar program?

f.What specific courses and training in psychological testing and assessment did the expert take and
successfully pass?

g.How many hours in each course, workshop or training program were devoted specifically to the MMPI?

3.Illegal, unethical or unprofessional behavior.

a.Has anyone ever filed a complaint against the expert with a licensing board in any jurisdiction and the
details of such complaints?

b.What complaints were filed against the expert with any ethics committee, professional standards review
committee, peer review board or other organization?

c.Has there ever been a malpractice or criminal action filed against the expert?

4.Occupational history.

a.What professional positions has the expert had since graduate school?

b.Are there positions omitted from the curriculum vitae but mentioned in the deposition which might be
because the expert was fired for cause or otherwise found to have committed acts that might cast doubt
on credibility or expertise.

c.Are there gaps when the expert moved from one level to a seemingly lower level (e.g., from full-time,
untenured professor at a major university to full-time, untenured position at an unaccredited university
within the same city)?

d.Which of the positions involved the administering, scoring or interpreting the MMPI?

5.Research and publication history.

a.Has the expert conducted any research or published any books, chapters, articles or other documents
that involved the MMPI?

b.Is the expert's testimony in the current case consistent with what the expert has previously written?

c.Was the publisher of an authored document reputable?

6.Forensic history.

a.Has the expert previously testified as an expert witness regarding the MMPI in any proceeding or
setting?

b.Is the prior testimony consistent with the testimony offered by the adverse expert witness in this case?

c.Does the expert's prior testimony suggest a bias or prejudice?

7.Knowledge of general issues of tests and psychometrics.

a.Does the expert have genuine expertise and understand the nature of testing as opposed to following a
"cookbook" method of test use or improvising opinions?

b.Was the standardized MMPI tests conducted under generally standardized conditions, i.e., in all essential
respects that might significantly affect test performance?

c.Is the expert aware of characteristics of the individual taking the test or the testing circumstances which
may significantly influence test results and interpretations?
d.Did the expert follow the standard procedures for administering the test and were special individual
characteristics or testing circumstances adequately taken into account and discussed in the forensic
report?

e.Is the expert able to distinguish retrospective accuracy from predictive accuracy? In other words, is the
expert confusing the directionality of the inference (e.g., the likelihood that those who score positive on a
hypothetical predictor variable will fall into a specific group versus the likelihood that those in a specific
group will score positive on the predictor variable). Cross examination must carefully explore the degree
to which testimony may be based on such misunderstandings.

f.How consistent or reliable are the test results? See if the test taker took the test on more than one
occasion and whether the results were identical. MMPI test results might be different because of the time
or conditions under which the test was administered.

g.What types of scales were involved in the various tests and methods of assessment that the expert
considered in selecting the instruments and diagnostic frameworks that the expert used in the case at
hand?

h.What is a T score, and what are its psychometric properties? Understanding the T score is essential to
understanding the MMPI.

8.Knowledge of the MMPI.

a.Ask the expert to describe the normative group for the original MMPI and for the MMPI-2.

b.Inquiry whether the normative group for the MMPI-2 scored about half of one standard deviation above
the mean on the clinical scales of the original MMPI and whether that doesn't illustrate that the group was
not therefore not really normal? Knowledgable experts should be able to explain that the difference seems
largely the result of differences in instructional sets and unanswered questions.

c.A series of questions can be asked if the expert's previous responses do not show a basic familiarity with
the MMPI. The quetions include the level a clinical score must be to be considered significant, what scales
indicate the degree to which a specific test protocol is valid and what reading level is required for the
MMPI-2.

9.Administration and scoring.

a.Who was responsible for administering the test?

b.Was the test administered in a setting close to that employed in normative studies?

c.What instructions were given to the test taker? The purpose of this question is to determine whether the
conditions adequately met the criteria for a standardized test. Did for example, the person who
administered the test include instructions regarding attempting to answer all items which can affect the
validity of the test.

d.How was the test taker's reading level assessed?

e.Was the test administration directly monitored? What degree did the test taker relied on other sources
or written material for filling out the test? To administer the MMPI without adequate monitoring violates
the published opinion of the APA's Committee on Professional Standards.

f.Was any phase of the assessment audiotaped, videotaped or otherwise recorded?

g.What conditions of test administration did the expert consider as potentially affecting the validity of the
MMPI?

h.Has anyone but the expert had access to the original completed response form?

i.Has the original completed response form been altered in any way by anyone? Did anyone except the
test taker make marks on, erase or change the original form in any way?

j.Were any test data discarded, destroyed, recopied or lost? Are all of the documents involved in the
administration and taking of the test present in their original form?
k.Who scored the test? Was it hand scored or done by machine or computer?

l.Did the scoring differ in any way whatsoever from the scoring method set forth in the MMPI manual? To
the degree that the standardized methods for scoring are altered the test is no longer standardized. The
reliability, validity and interpretations that are associated with the standardized test do not automatically
transfer to methods of scoring that deviate from those specified in the manual and the research literature.

m.What steps has the expert taken to ensure that the scoring of this test is accurate and free from error?

n.Were there any changes made in the test format, mode of administration, instructions, language or
content?

10.Interpretation.

a.By what method were these interpretative statements derived from the MMPI scores and profiles?

b.Did the expert have any reservations or qualifications regarding the validity of the interpretations that
he is presenting?

c.What other documents or sources of information does the expert consider important or relevant to
interpreting this MMPI profile?

11.The unexpected: Testimony regarding specific claims and issues.

a.No matter how thoroughly an attorney has prepared his side of the case and no matter how favorable
the opinions formed by the expert witness whom he has designated, the attorney is likely, at least
occasionally, to encounter one or more surprises from opposing experts.

b.There is no easy or magical way for an attorney to simply be sure whether such claims are exceptionally
well founded, entirely bogus or somewhere in between. Theories that have the ring of authority, common
sense and inevitability may be ludicrously fallaciious. Concepts that seem bazarre, counterintuitive and
just downright silly may, in fact, be valid.

c.To help attorneys untangle and examine overwhelmingly complex and intertwined issues
comprehensively, Pope, Butcher and Seelen, recommend using a systematic set of 16 fundamental
questions about each relevant issue. The list of areas of inquiry that follow can be used both as a "road
map" to the extensive discussion and analysis that follows in the book and also as an outline for deposition
or cross-examination questioning:

1)the adequacy with which the expert portrays the studies, information or publications;

2)relevance;

3)internal consistency;

4)research foundation;

5)definition and consistent application of evaluative criteria;

6)number of investigations;

7)sample size;

8)criteria for "success";

9)duration of study;

10)questionable applications;

11)level of effectiveness;

12)reliability and validity;

13)independent verification;

14)ethically questionable research practices;

15)publication in peer-reviewed academic, scientific or professional journals; and

16)accounting for the base rate.

12.Options and alternatives.

a.In arriving at his diagnosis or other conclusions, what alternatives did the expert consider? In some
cases, the attorney may want to list possible alternatives and ask the expert to explain why he did not
arrive at each alternative diagnosis.

b.Is there any other source of information that the expert did not take into consideration (e.g., because it
was not available or because the expert chose not to administer a particular test) that might be relevant
or that might change his opinion? If the expert acknowledges such an alternative conclusion, the attorney
might want to ask the questions that follow.

c.How such a source of information might alter the expert's opinion?

d.Whether the expert is less certain of his opinion in the absence of this information?

e.Why the information was not obtained? In some instances, the attorney may discover that the opposing
attorney who retained the expert had possession of (or access to) such records or information but did not
make them available to the expert; if so, this situation and its implications should be carefully explored.

The list of questions set forth above is in no way intended to be exhaustive. It is merely an outline of
categories and types of questions that might lead to helpful testimony and evidence that will aid in the
attorney's attempt to discredit, damage or destroy the adverse expert's testimony and the weight of his
opinions and conclusions. The professional work that has been most useful to these authors in preparing
this paper is the book written by Pope, Butcher and Seelen entitled The MMPI, MMPI-2, & MMPI-A in
Court: A Practical Guide for Expert Witnesses and Attorneys. This book is geared not only for seasoned
attorneys and expert witnesses but also for psychologists who have never set foot in a courtroom and
attorneys who have never heard of the MMPI.