Running head: PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT TESTS

Personality Assessment Tests

Student’s Name

Institution Name
PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT TESTS

Personality Assessment Tests

Personality assessment tests are a proficiency in the field of psychology that deal with

the administration, scoring and interpretation of empirically-backed means of evaluating a

person’s personality traits with a view to improving clinical diagnosis procedures, designing

better psychological interventions and boosting the accurateness of behavioral prediction in

different settings and contexts. This project tasked me with taking two psychological

assessment tests (The Big Five Project Personality Test and The Jung Typology Test) and

then writing a follow-up report.

Tests

i. The Big Five Project Personality Test (Five-Factor Test)

According to the web page, the Five-Factor test was designed by Robert McCrae,

Paul Costa, Warren Newman, and Lewis Goldberg in the 1970s. They all came to the

conclusion that the majority of man’s personality traits can be narrowed down to 5 wide

aspects of personality, irrespective of the cultural or ethnic background. These 5 aspects were

arrived at after posing hundreds of questions to thousands of people and then evaluating their

responses using statistical methods. The 5 aspects were developed following the statistical

evaluation of the data they had obtained, and they are: being open to new experience, being

conscientious, being extraverted, being agreeable, and being neurotic (The Big Five Project ,

2017).

The textbook states that the Five-Factor Model was the brainchild of Paul Costa and

Robert McCrae, who designed it from factor analyses that were arrived at by theorists who

believed that basic traits are the basis of a person’s personality. In factor analysis, the

relationships between several variables help in the identification of closely-related groups of

variables. When measurements of several variables are highly correlated with one another,

then one can assume that one factor is affecting all of them. The book indicates that factor
PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT TESTS

analysis is used to find these hidden factors. According to the book, the 5 factors are

extraversion, neuroticism, openness to experience, agreeableness, and conscientiousness

(Weiten, 2016).

Both the web page and the book are in agreement in stating the 5 factors. They are

also similar in the idea that the majority of a person’s traits have common, unifying factors.

The key difference between the two arises from the fact that the web page states that the test

was developed by Robert McCrae, Paul Costa, Warren Newman, and Lewis Goldberg,

whereas the book states that it was the brainchild of only Robert McCrae and Paul Costa.

ii. The Jung Typology Test

This test is based on the personality type theory that was developed by Isabel Briggs

Myers and Carl Jung. After one has answered some questions, he or she is given a 4-letter

formula that describes the strong points of their personality type. The theory on which this

test is based on indicates that individuals can be described using their choice of general

attitude. Someone can either be extraverted (E) or introverted (I); sensing (S) or intuitive (N);

thinking (T) or (feeling (F); judging (J) or perceiving (P) (Humanmetrics, Inc., 2017).

The book states that the Jung Analytical Psychology theory recognized 4 distinct

functions used by an individual to engage with the world around him. The theory states that

the 4 functions are thinking, sensation, intuition, and feeling. For every function, Jung

designed it to have opposing attitudes (Weiten, 2016).

The two sources are similar in their statement that an individual’s personality can be

described using an attitude chosen that best reflects one of the 4 given personality types.

Results

The Big-Five results indicated that my personality is one that paints me as one who is

keen on trying out new things, organized, dependable, good-natured, helpful and anxious. It

also stated that I am not mostly social with other people.

The Jung Typology Test results showed my personality as being introverted, that my

thoughts drive my perception of the world, that my actions are dictated by my emotions, and

that I am organized, and that I plan everything I do ahead of time.

The two tests agree on the fact that I am introverted, organized, and that my emotions

motivate my actions. These results were however inaccurate. That the tests incorrectly

predicted my personality indicate that I do not fit in with the generalizations used to by the

tests to describe personalities.

Critique

Self-reporting inventories used by most psychologists to get information from

individuals. The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) is one of the most

widely used of these tests to test for underlying disorders. High scores on one of the test’s 10

subscales the test would suggest the presence of a disorder, such as depression. Using this

approach is flawed since the baseline used to create the subscales was done by professionals

who have significantly more education compared to the rest of the general public (Weiten,

2016). This will introduce a bias into the results that might lead to the suggestion that one has

a disorder when it is not true. The link between having a disorder can sometimes be linked to

one’s personality. This link is complicated that it cannot be easily predicted by a test like the

MMPI.

Best Theory

Maslow's Theory of self-actualization is the best theory discussed in the book. The

theory dictates that there is a universal system that manifests itself in various ways, and at

various times in each person. The theory’s Hierarchy of Human Needs explains human

motivation. It posits that when one of a person’s needs is satisfied, the other needs in the

hierarchy become stronger.

References

Humanmetrics, Inc. (2017, 4 27). Personality Type Explained. Retrieved from

Humanmetrics.com: http://www.humanmetrics.com/personality/type

The Big Five Project. (2017, 4 27). PERSONALITY TEST. Retrieved from THE BIG FIVE

PROJECT: http://www.outofservice.com/bigfive/info/

Weiten, W. (2016). Psychology: Themes and Variations. Boston: Cengage Learning.