Psychological Scales and

Implications
• The goal of assessment is to help counsellors to develop
an understanding of the client or an individual.

• By using assessment and appraisal procedures, you will be able

to gain understanding of the individual and in turn foster
individual’s understanding himself or herself.

• The selection of any tool whether quantitative or

qualitative depends on the type of information the
counsellor is interested in gathering.

• Psychological tests are designed to assess the characteristics of

people such as their abilities, attitudes, motivations,
interests, needs and values and so on.
 The Importance of Testing
– (a) Describe current functioning, including cognitive abilities,
severity of disturbance, and capacity for independent living;

– (b) Confirm, refute, or modify the impressions formed by

clinicians through their less structured interactions with
patients;

– (c) Identify therapeutic needs, highlight issues likely to emerge

in treatment, recommend forms of intervention, and offer
guidance about likely outcomes;

– (d) Aid in the differential diagnosis of emotional, behavioral,

and cognitive disorders;
– (e) Monitor treatment over time to evaluate the success of
interventions or to identify new issues that may require
attention as original concerns are resolved;

– (f) Manage risk, including minimization of potential legal

liabilities and identification of untoward treatment reactions;
and

– (g) Provide skilled, empathic assessment feedback as a

therapeutic intervention in itself.
 Characteristics of a good
psychological test
1. Reliability

2. Validity

3. Objectivity/Un-biasness

4. Standardization

5. Norm

6. Culture-Fair/Culture-Free

7. Language Usage in the Test

8. Usability or Practicability
 Test Development

– A test is a measurement device or technique used to quantify

behavior or helps to understand and predict future behavior. A

psychological test is a set of items that are constructed or

designed to meet a specific purpose or need to assess or

measure a hypothesized aspect of behavior in individuals.

The construction of a test consists of six
intertwined stages;

– Operationalizing the concept or defining the test

– Selecting a scaling method

– Generating the items

– Testing the items

– Revising the test

– Publishing the test.

 Operationalizing the concept or defining the test:
Operationalization is a substantial aspect of quantitative
research and is generally referred to as the process of defining
how to quantify a concept that itself is not directly measurable.
 Selecting a scaling method: The immediate purpose of
psychological testing is to assign numbers to responses on a test so
that the examinee can be judged to have more or less of the
characteristics measured. The rules by which numbers are
assigned to responses define the scaling method. Test developers
select a scaling method that is optimally suited to the manner in
which they have conceptualized the traits measured by their tests.
There are several scaling methods used in the construction of test,
such as; expert ranking, method of equal appearing intervals,
method of absolute scaling, Likert scale, Guttman scale, method of
empirical keying, and rational scale construction (internal
consistency) etc.
– Generating the items: In generating the item some

topics like Initial question in test construction, table of

specifications, and item formats (multiple-choice

methodology, matching questions, short-answer

objective items, true-false questions, forced choice

methodology) should be concerned.

Testing the items/Item Analysis: Determine which

items should be retained, which item needs revision, and which

item should be thrown out from the list.

 Test revision: Many items are dropped, others refined, and

new items added. This revised test is likely to contain more

discriminating items with higher reliability and greater

predictive accuracy- but these improvements are known to be

true only for the first tryout sample.

– Publishing the test: The test development is
meaningless unless it is brought to the knowledge of
others. Therefore after the test is fully developed and
validated, it is required to be published. Publication
must oversee the production of the testing materials,
publishing a technical manual, and producing a user’s
manual.
Types of Psychological Test

• Psychological tests are also classified into

– Individual and group tests,
– Verbal tests and non-verbal tests/ performance
tests.
 Types of Psychological tests

 Intelligence Test

 Interest Inventories

 Aptitude Test

 Achievement Test

 Attitude Scale

 Personality Test
 INTELLIGENCE

• Intelligence has been one of the most popular

psychological terms used in identifying

individual differences.

• It has helped to explain that people differ from each

other in their ability to understand complex

ideas or to learn from experience.

• Theories by Binet, Weschler, Spearman and
Thurston are based on the psychometric
approach where intelligence is considered as an
aggregate of abilities.

• It is expressed in terms of a single index of abilities

• Howard Gardener’s theory of multiple

intelligences puts forth that intelligence is not a
single entity and there exists multiple intelligences.
 Types of intelligences proposed by
Gardener are briefly discussed below

1. Linguistic Intelligence: The capacity to use language

fluently and flexibly, to express one’s thinking and understanding
others. Used in reading a book, writing a paper, a novel or a poem;
and understanding spoken words. Poets and writers exhibit this
ability.

2. Logical Mathematical Intelligence: Thinking logically,

critically, using abstract reasoning to manipulate symbols and
solve mathematical problems.
3. Spatial Intelligence: Abilities involved in forming, using and
transforming mental images. Used in getting from one place to
another, in reading a map, and is packing suitcase in the trunk of a
car so that they all fit into a compact space. Pilots, sailors, interior
decorators, surgeons, fashion designers generally exhibit this
ability.

4. Musical Intelligence: Capacity to produce, create and

manipulate musical patterns. Used in singing a song, composing
a sonata, playing a trumpet or even appreciating the structure of
a piece of music.
5. Bodily-Kinesthetic Intelligence: Ability to use one„s body
and muscle structure in a coordinated planned way. Used in
dancing, playing basket ball, running a mile or throwing a
javelin. Athletes, dancers, actors, gymnasts, sports person,
surgeon exhibit this more than others.

6. Interpersonal Intelligence: Used in relating to other people,

such as when we try to understand another person's behaviour,
motives or emotions, counselors, psychologists, politicians, social
workers, religious leaders are shown to be high on this ability.
7. Intrapersonal Intelligence: Knowledge of one's internal strengths
and limitations and using that knowledge to relate to others.

8. Naturalistic Intelligence: Complete awareness to our relationship

with the natural world, useful in recognizing the beauty of different
species of flora and fauna and making a distinction in the natural world.

9. Existential Intelligence: Can be defined as the ability to be sensitive to,

or have the capacity for, conceptualizing or tackling deeper or larger
questions about human existence, such as the meaning of life, why are we
born, why do you die, what is consciousness or how did we get here.
 Emotional Intelligence

• Jumping to conclusions without adequate reflection can lead

to erroneous thinking.

• The notion of emotional intelligence broadens the concept of

intelligence and involves
– i) Perceiving or sensing emotions,
– ii) Using emotion to assist thoughts,
– iii) Understanding emotions, and
– iv) Managing emotions.
Interest Inventories

• In order to help individuals make vocational and &

educational choices, the counsellor needs to know
his/her interest for activities.

• The study of interest would help you as counsellor to

better understand the students in terms of his/her likes
and dislikes.
 Aptitude Tests:
• Aptitude is thought of as a natural tendency, special ability, or capacity
or cluster of abilities.

• Often these natural abilities are looked at in relationship to a

person’s readiness to learn or their suitability for a particular career.
– – For example, in order to be successful architect, one must possess
the cluster of abilities such as a keen sense of observation, a sense of
aesthetic visual memory, abstract reasoning, and an ability to sketch free
hand.

• Aptitude may be defined as a trait that characterizes an

– individual’s ability to perform in an area or to acquire the
learning necessary for performance in a given area.
Achievement Tests:

• Achievement is what one successfully accomplishes in an area of study / activity / domain.

– In the case of students, it may be conceptualized as successful learning of the

– assigned educational material.

– Such learning is usually demonstrated to teachers and others either through a

– verbal presentation or a written examination.

– An achievement test measures knowledge and skills attained by the student in

– a particular area, usually acquired after classroom teaching or training.

• Achievement test scores are often used to determine the level of instruction for which a individual is prepared, to indicate subjective strengths and weakness.

• Toindicate the relative standing of the individual in a group.

• Achievement test data, in combination with other data, is used to help

– guidance counsellors plan student's future programmes.

 Types of achievement tests

• Formative and Summative Tests:

– Formative tests are used to measure progress made in
knowledge and skills before and during instruction.
Summative achievement tests are given at the end of course
instruction, so as to assess the outcome of the instruction.

• Prognostic tests:
– Readiness or prognostic tests are used to predict how well an
individual is

– expected to profit from training.

• Diagnostic Test:
– Diagnostic achievement tests provide information on
performance of the students in different subjects and
indicate their strengths and weakness in reading,
arithmetic and language usage.

– Achievement test can be either criterion referenced (CRT) or

norm referenced
– (NRT).

– Norm Referenced Tests (NRTs) are designed to highlight

achievement
– differences

– Criterion-reference tests (CRTs) determine the strengths of the

test taker
Attitude Scale
• Attitudes are expressions of how much we like or dislike various
things.

• We tend to approach and seek out to be associated with things we

like, we avoid, shun or reject things we do not like.

• Attitude represent our evaluations and performance towards a

wide variety of objects, events, persons, and situations.

• The defining characteristics of attitudes are that they

express evaluations along the lines of liking-disliking, pro-
anti, favoring – disfavoring or positive–negative.
Types of Attitude Scales:

• The method of equal appearing intervals

• The method of summative ratings

• The attitude scales which are developed using these scaling

techniques consists of a number of carefully edited and selected
items called statements

• The method of equal appearing intervals was originally

developed by Thurstone and Chave.

– – Unfavorable, Neutral, Favorable(-1,0,1 or -2,-1,0,1,2)

• In the method of summated ratings developed by Likert.

• the item score is obtained by assigning arbitrary weights of 5, 4, 3,

2 and 1 for Strongly Agree (SA), Agree (A), Undecided (U),
Disagree (D) and Strongly Disagree (SD) for the statements
favoring a point of view.

• On the other hand, the scoring weights of 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 are

used for the respective responses for statements opposing this
point of view.
• In addition to the above two scales, there some more
techniques, such as, Error Choice Technique, Free
Response Technique, Paired Comparisons, Opinion
Polling or Surveying, etc. are used for testing attitude.
 Personality Test

– Personality refers to a unique combination of

characteristics of an individual, which pre- disposes

the person to behave in a particular and consistent way

 Techniques of Testing Personality

– A number of techniques 5. Rating Scales

are used for testing 6. Situational Tests or Behavioural
personality. The Tests
techniques are:
7. Projective Techniques
1. Interview
8. Anecdotal Records
2. Observation
3. Self-report Measures 9. Autobiography
10. The Daily Diary
4. Checklists
Self-Report Measures

• Self-report measures are personality scales that ask individuals to

answer
– a series of questions/statements about their characteristic
behaviour.

• When you respond to a self-report personality inventory, you endorse

– statements as true or false as applied to you.
– •
• You indicate how often you behave in a particular way or you rate yourself
– with respect to certain qualities.

• The logic underlying this approach is simple. Who know you better
than you do ?

• A variety of personal characteristics can be measured through self-

report
– inventories.
Projective Technique
• Projective techniques focus on a composite picture of the
personality as a whole.

• This method is called the projective techniques because the

individual is

– stimulated to project his personality into the test exercises.

• The stimuli used in projective techniques attempt to arouse

responses that are a projection of the inner self or motives and
personality traits that are usually hidden and often even
unsuspected by the individual himself.
• The subject may be asked to respond to series of picture,
words, inkblots or

– similarly ambiguous stimuli.

• The interpretation of responses requires a long period of

training and should be done only by those who are
specially qualified.

• The most popularly known projective technique is the Rorschach

Inkblots Test and Thematic Apperception Test (TA).
 Applications of Psychological Tests

 Clinical Assessment: focuses on the prevention, diagnosis,

and treatment of abnormal behavior. Clinical psychologists
receive training in psychological assessment and
psychotherapy and are employed in hospitals, public, and
private mental health centers, independent practice, and
academia.

 Counseling Assessment: Measures of social and academic

skills or abilities and measures of personality, interest,
attitudes, and values are among the many types of tests that a
counsellor might administer to a client.
Neuropsychological Assessment: Neuropsychological
assessment may be defined as the evaluation of brain and nervous
system functioning as it relates to behavior.

 Assessment, Careers, and Business: In business, tests are

used in many ways, perhaps most notably in decision-making
about the careers of personnel. A wide range of achievement,
aptitude, interest, motivation and other tests may be employed in
the decision to hire as well as in related decisions regarding
promotions, transfer, job satisfaction, and eligibility for further
training