Personality questionnaire

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Personality questionnaires are widely used psychological methods to assess personality traits . In contrast to many other questionnaires , they are standardized in their form, usually constructed according to the principles of test methodology and standardized on the basis of surveys that are representative of the population. In addition to the questionnaires ( clinical scales ) used in clinical psychology, personality questionnaires are among the most frequently used psychological tests .

history

As psychology and sociology evolved into empirical sciences, various written questionnaires and surveys were introduced. The psychologist Wilhelm Wundt , founder of the first university institute for this subject, rejected the questionnaire method that was just emerging, as the most careful and unreliable statements were given equal weight. Perhaps Wundt was thinking of innovations such as the public survey undertaken by Gustav Theodor Fechner in 1871 in the Dresden Museum or even the questionnaire for workers published by Karl Marx in 1880 with 100 questions about working conditions, wages, trade union, etc. a.

Oswald Külpe (1920), on the other hand , believed that a questionnaire could provide quite useful results if certain errors were avoided. An early example is a questionnaire on the inheritance of psychological dispositions by Gerardus Heymans and ED Wiersma (1906), in which response frequencies were evaluated as a percentage. A personality questionnaire constructed using test methods in the narrower sense can only be used if the selection, weighting and internal connection of the individual questions are statistically analyzed, as was only possible with the statistical method of correlation and item analysis . The first personality questionnaire is therefore W. Lankes (1915) publication of the Interrogatory on Perseveration Tendency (survey of the tendency to perseveration ), even before the better known Personal Data Survey by Robert S. Woodworth (1918), i. H. a questionnaire that was intended to replace a psychiatric-oriented interview in the selection of recruits. Lankes formed groups of items and used the correlations between these and a compilation of other perseveration tests for empirical item selection.

Milestones in method development were: Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (Starke R. Hathaway and J. Charnley McKinley, 1943), the questions of which were empirically selected based on a statistical comparison of the answers of numerous patients with different psychiatric diagnoses; Sixteen Personality Inventory 16 PF (Raymond B. Cattell), the scales of which were constructed using the statistical methodology of factor analysis ; Maudsley Personality Inventory ( Hans Jürgen Eysenck ) for the two basic traits introversion and extraversion as well as emotional stability- lability (neuroticism) (see Amelang et al., 2006).

definition

In contrast to simple lists of questions, the personality questionnaires are methodically developed and empirically verified procedures that form a subgroup of psychological examination procedures (psychological tests). Personality questionnaires are intended to capture the individual characteristics of fundamental and relatively long-lasting characteristics of personality. The forms contain questions or statements that are referred to as items (see questionnaire , questioning technique ). They are to be answered by choosing one of the given answer options. The items are added to a test value according to the answer key and compared with the test values ​​to be read off in tables (normal values) for the entire population or for specific groups. Items that relate to the same property concept form a scale. A questionnaire that records several characteristics is also known as a (personality) inventory.

construction

Property concept

The questionnaire construction is based on the concept of a certain personality trait , e.g. B. Aggression . The tendency to aggressive behavior can manifest itself in different situations and in different ways towards people, other living beings or objects, in open behavior, in verbal attacks, indirect actions or only in imaginations. These different aspects can be translated into everyday language, reasonable and relatively easy to answer questions or statements. The specialist literature on aggression provides suggestions for deriving suitable items, and the convincing items from already available questionnaires can also be taken into account and supplemented by other facets of aggressive tendencies. The pre-form of the questionnaire received, the item pool (collected elements), can be discussed with experts and checked for general comprehensibility. A larger survey in a group of people as different as possible in terms of age, gender and school education provides the basis of the actual test method construction, which is based on the quality criteria of psychodiagnostic procedures .

Item analysis

In the course of the item analysis , statistical parameters are calculated to check the suitability of each item with regard to the desired scale. The item difficulty describes the proportion of people who correctly answer the item in the sense of the property concept (affirm or deny). The selectivity index expresses how highly the item response correlates with the overall test value (i.e. the characteristic value), i.e. H. Distinguish between those with high and low test scores. The index of homogeneity (the internal consistency) describes how closely the item is related to other items, i.e. it covers similar psychological aspects. With a broad concept such as aggressiveness, it will be possible to distinguish between psychological dimensions (components), which accordingly require several scales that are partially independent in terms of content. Statistical methods of working out such dimensions or components are factor analysis or cluster analysis . The item analysis is u. This may be repeated on a revised version before the standardization is carried out on an even larger number of people, if possible by means of a population-representative survey (see representativeness). The development steps and results of the questionnaire construction are reported in detail in the test instructions (manual) so that the psychologists who want to use this test can assess its scientific quality. Even after the test has been published, further steps to review and continuously monitor the quality of the personality questionnaire can be expected.

Scale construction

The construction follows the general quality criteria of psychodiagnostic methods : the validity of the content of a test value, the formal reliability, the temporal constancy (stability), the internal consistency, the ability to generalize (generalizability) and the objectivity. Secondly, it depends, among other things, on usefulness, test economy, test fairness, transparency, incorruptibility, reasonableness, scope of standardization (see quality assurance in psychological diagnostics ). In the course of time, various statistically based concepts or measurement models have been proposed as the standard method of test construction: item selection according to selectivity or according to empirical criteria prediction, factor analysis, probabilistic test theory or item response theory. Obviously, every concept has advantages and disadvantages, which lie in the respective requirements and specific application difficulties.

Test methodology guidelines were developed by the German and international commissions of the specialist psychological societies: on quality criteria and quality assurance, professional application, adaptation of tests in other languages, computer and internet-based testing (see directory).

Differences to intelligence and performance tests

The self-reports and self-assessments form a fundamentally different level of data than the objectively recorded behavior in an intelligence test or other performance test, but both are constructed in very similar ways. There are important differences with regard to the homogeneity of the items. If in an intelligence test, for. For example, when it comes to assigning symbols or solving arithmetic tasks that are becoming more difficult, a high degree of homogeneity can be maintained for the many similar operations. In contrast, personality traits are generally understood as very multi-faceted traits (dispositions, behavioral tendencies) that manifest themselves differently in individual experience and behavior depending on the time and situation. Therefore, many questions relate to situations and time periods and require a comprehensive self-assessment in the answer. A schematic item analysis that only shows the homogeneity (internal consistency) of personality questionnaires, i.e. H. attempting to increase the similarity of the items on a scale is inappropriate, as important psychological aspects could be lost here.

Areas of application and examples

In psychological methodology today - apart from the area of intelligence and performance tests - questionnaires in the form of standardized scales and inventories generally dominate. This applies to clinical and health psychology, industrial and organizational psychology and educational psychology as well as to differential psychology or social psychology. In principle, test values ​​from personality questionnaires - as in the vast majority of other psychological procedures - are influenced by the test situation, test motivation, school education and other conditions and therefore suggest a thorough weighting and interpretation in the individual diagnostic case - unless only a simple survey or an initial screening of a large number of people is intended. The test instructions (manuals) of the personality questionnaire contain a detailed report on how the questionnaire was psychologically developed, constructed, standardized in a representative manner and checked for its empirical validity.

The publishers usually limit the sale of personality tests to qualified specialists and institutions so that a psychologically competent evaluation and interpretation is ensured. Special manuals and directories on websites provide an overview of tried and tested questionnaires.

Examples of common German personality questionnaires are:

Criticism of personality questionnaires

subjectivity

In terms of content, questionnaire items relate to one's own experiences and habits, to well-being, wishes and intentions, as well as to biographical facts. Mainly, it is about self-descriptions of how a person felt and behaved in the past or how he or she will feel and behave in the future (see self-concept ). Although the self-assessments can be questioned by third parties or recognized as inaccurate in detail, they remain subjective and irrefutable in central areas. The proportion of possibly objectifiable aspects of a typical personality questionnaire is low. The extent to which the actual behavior agrees with these statements cannot be reliably predicted. There are often major inconsistencies. Personality psychology and social psychology have dealt extensively with this problem of attitude and behavior . Method-conscious examiners will endeavor, if possible, to obtain additional information in order to secure the information from the questionnaire ( multimodal diagnostics ).

Judgment formation

Even the answer to a typical questionnaire item (e.g. "I often feel tense") requires a difficult judgment, because the aspects of the tension experienced (mental, emotional, physical), situations and frequencies have to be considered become. All items require a review and a summary of the psychological aspects over an unspecified period of time. This multi-layered judgment process includes: memories of one's own habits, global assessments of how one behaves in general, a direct or indirect comparison with others. Therefore, the test values ​​obtained are influenced by memory delusions, a cognitive scheme and social stereotypes , ideas of everyday psychology , intentions of self-expression and response tendencies .

Lack of training

Questionnaires are “subjective procedures” and there is usually no methodical training for the required description of internal states (introspection) and self-observation of behavior. Personality questionnaires require that “the person concerned knows himself at all and is able to observe himself.” What is required are: insight into their own cognitive processes, willingness to reveal their real self-image and the existence of suitable assessment criteria based on social comparison processes (Rost, 2004 ). How these individual abilities can be empirically determined remains open.

Measurement

There are fundamental doubts about the measurability of personality traits (see psychometry , scaling ). Self-assessments do not provide any measurement data in the narrower sense, but are subjective estimation methods with an unknown scale level in peculiar pseudo-numerical reference systems , presumably different from individual to individual . The equality of the scale intervals is not given and consequently the item values ​​can only be added to a test value with great methodological reservations. There are, however, great differences of opinion in the specialist literature about the consequences of this fact. Can the theoretical measurement assumptions of the intelligence tests and the scientific behavior analysis be transferred to introspections and self-assessments?

Response tendencies

Methodologically, several sources of error can be distinguished: questions that can be misunderstood and lead to uncertain answers; Omitting individual answers because the questions are experienced as unclear or intrusive; certain response tendencies , intentional falsification and unintentional bias. A frequent objection is that personality questionnaires are hardly suitable in application and selection situations, because applicants are motivated to make a good impression, i.e. H. to respond in a socially desirable manner. This assumption is supported by psychological studies in which the participants should imagine an application situation (see Amelang and Schmidt-Atzert, 2006). It is not easy to investigate whether this tendency towards social desirability also asserts itself in real application situations or whether moral concerns and worries about possible discovery counteract this. - In principle, the questionnaire method depends on the respondents being motivated to answer openly.

Dominance of the questionnaire methodology

Self-assessments and verbal information about one's own behavior (reported behavior) are not actual behavioral data. If questionnaires are used almost exclusively in many areas today, this psychology is reduced to "Psychology as the science of self-report and finger movements" (ie ticking items) - according to Baumeister, Vohs and Funder (2007) in their criticism . You notice a persistent undesirable development. Since the cognitive turnaround in the 1980s, self-assessments of internal states have increasingly replaced behavior analysis instead of adequately supplementing it. Questionnaires are more convenient to use than behavioral observations, but the typical deficiencies cannot be overlooked: memory delusions, distortion due to response tendencies, judgment processes and significant deviations between self-assessments and actual behavior.

Few basic properties?

Some test authors claim to have found the basic characteristics of personality through factor analysis . A decision on this problem could only be made if the universe of possible items were represented. With regard to personality, however, it is by no means possible to define which psychological aspects belong or do not. Most of the inventories lack important areas such as individual values and goals in life, personality-determining, ideological and religious convictions, typical life issues, but also basic moods and recurring physical well-being (see the topics in the manual published by Weber and Rammsayer). In addition, a convincing demarcation from the formative motivation and the willingness to act is impossible. The expansion of the item pool into the border area of ​​deviant behavior and psychopathology would also have a significant influence on the number and definition of the factors found and possible scales.

The claims made by Paul T. Costa and Robert R. McCrae about the so-called Big Five in the personality inventory NEO-FFI and NEO-PI-R explain too little the role of the preliminary decisions about the item pool. To want to establish a certain number of basic dimensions is even more dubious here than assertions about a fixed number of factors of intelligence . Instead of the controversies about 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 or more personality factors, it is more important to justify the selection of personality concepts in terms of content with regard to the questions in typical fields of application.

Cultural Psychological Differences?

Already between the European countries or cultures there seem to be considerable differences in the meaning of some questionnaire contents, as shown by attempts at translation. The criticism of simply adopting foreign-language personality questionnaires arose from these experiences. Instead of a literal translation, a psychologically analogous translation is required today. In addition, it must be checked whether the personality traits selected for a questionnaire define a certain image of man or contain cultural prejudices. If a questionnaire developed in the USA is claimed to have global validity for the five basic characteristics of the NEO-FFI (McCrae & Costa, 1997), characteristics essential for other cultures might be overlooked. The one-sidedness of such research has only gradually been recognized. Since the statistical surveys have so far mostly been carried out on occasional samples of certain groups of people such as college students, there are strong doubts about superficial intercultural projects.

Personality questionnaires on the internet?

The internet presentation of personality questionnaires can be criticized for methodological and no less for professional ethical reasons. In contrast to intelligence and performance tests, personality questionnaires and clinical scales have to take into account the general framework, the purpose of the test, test motivation and expectations, and if possible also the response tendencies and the psychological situation of the respondents. It should therefore be ensured that each individual test interpretation is only carried out by a psychologist who is qualified in test psychology and psychodiagnostics. Since both prerequisites are generally not met on the Internet, the schematic evaluation and feedback of the test values ​​from personality questionnaires and clinical scales is highly problematic.

Summary

Personality questionnaires are indispensable because they provide information about a person's self-image with regard to selected personality traits. Due to the construction and standardization, the individual test values ​​can be compared with the average values ​​of the population and significant deviations can be recognized. The methodological criticism of personality questionnaires contradicts their widespread use. But the self-assessments are the easiest to access, standardized, simple, and economically obtainable, they have a valid content. Won't the respondents know themselves best? Those who do without these self-assessments lose a lot of information that can only be replaced to a limited extent, even through a long interview. As a rule, however, the questionnaires should only be part of a broader, multimodal diagnosis in order to avoid blatant misjudgments.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Wilhelm Wundt: Fundamentals of Physiological Psychology . Volume 1–3 (5th ed.). Engelmann, Leipzig 1902–1903, p. 275.
  2. ↑ On the question of authenticity of Holbein's Madonna: Discussion and Acts. Breitkopf & Härtel, Leipzig 1871.
  3. ^ In: La Revue socialiste, April 20, 1880, see Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels - Werke. (Karl) Dietz Verlag, Berlin. 4th edition 1973, volume 19. Unchanged reprint of the 1st edition 1962, Berlin / GDR, pp. 230–237. Questionnaire for workers
  4. ^ Oswald Külpe: Lectures on psychology (edited by Karl Bühler). Leipzig: Hirzel, Leipzig 1920, pp. 56–57
  5. ↑ Gerardus Heymans, ED Wiersma: Contributions to a special psychology on the basis of a mass investigation . In: Journal for Psychology and Physiology of the Sensory Organs, 1906, Volume 42, 81–127.
  6. ^ W. Lankes: Perseveration . In: British Journal of Psychology , 1915, Volume 7, 387-419.
  7. ^ Robert S. Woodworth : Personal Data Sheet . Chicago: Stoelting, Chicago 1918.
  8. ↑ Manfred Amelang, Schmidt-Atzert, 2006, p. 241.
  9. ^ Roy F. Baumeister, Kathleen D. Vohs, David G. Funder: Psychology as the science of self-report and finger movements. Whatever happened to actual behavior? In: Perspectives on Psychological Science , 2007, Volume 2, 396-403.
  10. ↑ Peter Borkenau, Fritz Ostendorf: NEO five-factor inventory according to Costa and McCrae. Manual instruction. Göttingen: Hogrefe, Göttingen 1993.
  11. ↑ Technical Standards for Translating and Adapting Tests and Establishing Test Score Equivalence (accessed on February 11, 2010) Archived copy ( memento of the original from September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ; International Test Commission (2008). Guidelines on adapting tests (April 21, 2000 version). (Accessed February 11, 2010). http://www.intestcom.org/Guidelines/test+adaptation.php @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.testpublishers.org
  12. ^ Anthony J. Marsella, Joan Dubanoski, Winter C. Hamada, Heather Morse: The Measurement of Personality across Cultures. Historical, Conceptual, and Methodological Issues and Considerations. In: American Behavioral Scientist, 2000, Volume 44, 41-62.
  13. ^ Robert R. McCrae, A. Terraccino and 78 members of the Personality Profiles of Cultures Project: Universal features of personality traits from the observer's perspective: Data from 50 cultures. In: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology , 2005, Volume 88, 547-561.
  14. ↑ International Test Commission (2008). Guidelines on Computer-Based and Internet Delivered Testing . (Accessed February 11, 2010) Archived copy ( Memento of the original from October 22, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. . @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.intestcom.org

literature

  • Manfred Amelang, Dieter Bartussek, Gerhard Stemmler, Dirk Hagemann: Differential Psychology and Personality Research. 6th edition Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-17-018640-X .
  • Manfred Amelang, Lothar Schmidt-Atzert: Psychological diagnostics and intervention . 4th edition Springer, Berlin 2006, ISBN 978-3-540-28507-6 .
  • Jens B. Asendorpf: Psychology of Personality. 5th edition Springer, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-540-71684-6 .
  • Jürgen Bortz , Nicola Döring: Research methods and evaluation . 4th edition. Springer, Heidelberg 2006. ISBN 3-540-41940-3 .
  • Jochen Fahrenberg, Rainer Hampel, Herbert Selg: Freiburg personality inventory FPI-R. 8th edition Hogrefe, Göttingen 2010.
  • Hermann-Josef Fisseni: textbook of psychological diagnostics: with information on intervention. 3rd edition Hogrefe, Göttingen 2004, ISBN 3-8017-1756-9 .
  • Werner Herkner: textbook social psychology . 5th edition Huber, Bern 1996, ISBN 3-456-81989-7 .
  • Gustav A. Lienert, Ulrich Raatz: Test setup and test analysis . 6th edition. Beltz PVU, Weinheim 1998, ISBN 3-621-27424-3 .
  • Robert R. McCrae: Trait Psychology and Culture: Exploring Intercultural Comparisons. In: Journal of Personality , 2001, Volume 69, 819-846.
  • Hans D. Mummendey : Psychology of self-expression. 2nd edition Hogrefe, Göttingen 1995, ISBN 3-8017-0709-1 .
  • Hans D. Mummendey, Ina Grau: The questionnaire method . 5th edition. Hogrefe, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-8017-1948-7 .
  • Beatrice Rammstedt: Questionnaire . In: Franz Petermann, Michael Eid (ed.): Manual of psychological diagnostics . Hogrefe, Göttingen 2006, ISBN 3-8017-1911-1 , pp. 109-134.
  • Jürgen Rost: Textbook Test Theory - Test Construction . 2nd edition Huber, Bern 2004, ISBN 3-456-83964-2 .
  • Hannelore Weber , Thomas Rammsayer (Hrsg.): Handbook of personality psychology and differential psychology . Hogrefe, Göttingen 2005, ISBN 3-8017-1855-7 .
Directories
Guidelines
  1. The ITC Guidelines on Adapting Tests
  2. The ITC Guidelines on Test Use
  3. The ITC Guidelines on Computer-Based and Internet-delivered Testing
  • Test evaluation system of the test board of trustees (accessed on February 11, 2010) [1]
  • Technical Standards for Translating and Adapting Tests and Establishing Test Score Equivalence (accessed February 11, 2010) http://www.testpublishers.org/journal1.htm

See also