PSYCHOMETRIC

ASSESSMENT
RASHMI.S
 PSYCHOMETRIC TEST
• Devise that is used to find out about individual differences: personal characteristics,

underlying actions, possible future behaviour, how ‘good’ you are at something

compared with other groups of people.

• Good - kind of information -provide to the person or about the person, skillfully

interpretation of results, integration into the data – worthy action decisions. 

• Psychometric tests are designed to provide a consistent and effective measure of

people's traits, abilities, skills, and interests.

• The ability to measure these characteristics enhances decision making during

recruitment and selection, individual and team development, organizational change and

career directions.

• Psychometric tests can be used to predict job performance, resolve conflict, improve

communication, make career decisions and to identify training needs, so on and so forth.
 PSYCHOMETRICS AND
HISTORY
Psychometrics – design and measurement of human characteristics.
•

• 1884 – Sir Francis Galton – England – human personality – group able traits

• World War 1 – John Otis & Robert Yerkes – Cognitive tests – Army Alpha & Beta
tests.

• Woodward test – emotional stability – screening –army personnel.

• 1930’s & 1940’s -Bernreuter Personality inventory, Minnesota Multiphasic

Personality Inventory (MMPI), Thematic Apperception Test, Rorschach inkblot test
, Cattell's 16 PF questionnaire, MBTI, Guilford –Zimmerman Temparament
Surveys.
 ROLE S OF
PSYCHOMETRIC
ASSESSMENT
• Roles:

• Individual assessments for selection or development purposes 

• Bespoke assessment centre design and implementation 

• Managment and career development programmes 

• Indivdual coaching and mentoring 

• Psychometrics - produce in-depth psycholgical profiles of

individuals covering both personality and intellectual ability

 PSYCHOMETRIC TESTS
• Started out to different between the fast &
slow learners in children –Binets Intelligence
Test.
• 3 kinds of tests
• 1. Ability
• 2. Aptitude
• 3. Personality test
• Ability + Aptitude = Skill test
 ABILITY TEST
• Measures the ability of a person to grasp a new skill needed for a new job. It

also lets the employers know the following:

a)  What a particular employee is capable to learn

b)   What he will be able to learn in the future. 

The broad skills that are checked by this test are:

•    Verbal Test

•   Numerical Reasoning Test

• Spatial ability scales

• combined together as a test battery.

• They can then be scored and interpreted individually as a specific ability or

aptitude measure, or together as part of a general ability measure. 

 APTIUDE TEST
• Ability test – general ability test ; Aptitude – Specific abilities test.

• Aptitude tests are mostly job specific and therefore the names of these tests

are almost always similar to the job titles.

• These tests can either be general or specific. For example, a General Ability

Test is a combintion of four tests:

•    Numerical ability

•    Verbal ability

•    Spatial ability

•    Non-verbal ability

However, these tests are also used for finding specific abilities and also

general abilities. If you are applying for a job interview, the aptitude test will

be taken to see your mental reasoning ability.

 PERSONALITY TEST
• Personality : those relatively stable and enduring aspects of an individual which

distinguishes them from other people, making them unique, but which at the same

time permit a comparison between individuals.

• Personality tests  -measure less quantifiable characteristics - reveal your

motivation, attitude & work style.

• Employers may look for people with certain characteristics for particular jobs. For a

retail sales role, for example, the company may want someone who is very sociable,

organised and creative.

• A personality test enables employers to see whether you match their ideal profile.
• This is another important part of the psychometric assessment.

• A questionnaire with multiple choice answers is provided to the people. They need to
choose possible right answers. Here you would not get any right or wrong answer.

• On the basis of these answers the personality of the individual is judged.

• Another tool used for personality test is Emotional Intelligence - an individual

possesses good emotional competency. If you are asked to go for Emotional
Intelligence Test then after that you would know the following:

a)    What emotions are most common in you and how can you manage them
b)    How can you use feelings to guide your actions as well as your thought process
c)    How can you use your emotions to motivate yourself as well as others
 PSYCHOMETRIC TEST –
CONSTRUCTION ,
RELIABILITY & ABILITY
• Psychological test – objective & standardized measure of a sample of

behaviour.

• tests – objective – free of subjective judgement of examiner .

• Mandatorily accompanied by a test manual – Scrutinized carefully by

examiner – before administering test on others.

• Manual – gives confidence on reliability & validity of tests.

• Reliability – accuracy / consistency of same results from the person

when administered an equivalent test. Relatively high degree of

accuracy in test – necessary – judgments about test takers.

• Validity -the measure of the purpose or truthfulness of
the test. It provides a direct check on how well the test
fulfills its function. The construction and use of test
imply that the instrument has been evaluated against
criteria regarded by experts as the best evidence of the
traits to be measured by the test.

• Manual – includes norms - an average, common,

standard performance under experimental conditions.

• Form of age, grade, percentile rank,, stanine scores.

• The norms should be meaningful with regard to

purposes for which the test is intended and to the group
of persons with whom it is to be used.
 TYPES OF TESTS
• 1. Individual – 5 factor Vs Group tests – spatial ability.
2. Paper-pencil Vs Performance tests – car driving –license. 
3. Language – verbal reasoning Vs Non language tests –abstract /
spatial
4. Speed – numerical … Vs Power Tests – IQ test.
5. Tests measuring different traits – 5 factor, 16pf…
 ESSENTIALS FOR THE
EXAMINER
• Advance preparation – test time, candidates ready , answer sheets

ready…

• Maintain a good rapport – put candidate at psychological ease –

remove blocks of test anxiety & dishonesty in test by test takers –

make them understand the importance.

• Statistical Knowledge – necessity – central tendency measures,

effects of regression, dispersion… - thoroughly knowledgeable

• Must have training – study & carefully interpret results – subtleties &

confidential – behaviour of individual & reports – maintained at all

times.
 PERSONALITY THEORIES
• Understanding personality - key to unlocking elusive human qualities.

• 1. leadership,

• 2. charisma, and 

• 3. empathy,

• purpose is self-development, helping others, or any other field relating to

people and how we behave.

•  Understanding of personality typology, personality traits, thinking styles

and learning styles theories is a very useful way to improve one’s knowledge
of motivation and behaviour of self and others, in the workplace and beyond.

• Personality theory and tests are useful also for management, recruitment,
selection, training and teaching
• Different personality / motivational models – provide diff perspectives – necessary for

a test administrator- better appreciation – motivation & behaviour.

• Personality Models through the Ages:

• The Four Temperaments/Four Humours

• Carl Jung's Psychological Types

• Myers Briggs® personality types theory (MBTI® model)

• Keirsey's personality types theory (Temperament Sorter model)

• Hans Eysenck's personality types theory

• Katherine Benziger's Brain Type theory

• Belbin Team Roles and personality types theory

• The 'Big Five' Factors personality model

• FIRO-B® Personality Assessment model

• The Birkman Method®