1. Personality Assessment I PSYC 4500: Introduction to Clinical Psychology Brett Deacon, Ph.D. October 10, 2013

2. Announcements Exam #2 is next Thursday, October 17th
Next response paper due October 24th
Time constraints and Chapter 7 (Intellectual Assessment)

3. Rorschach Inkblot Test
Consists of 10 cards
Administration takes about an hour
Administration instructions
Scoring is extremely labor-intensive

4. Ethics and Test Stimuli
APA Ethics Code: “Psychologists make reasonable efforts to maintain the integrity and security of test materials and other assessment techniques consistent with law and contractual obligations, and in a manner that permits adherence to this Ethics Code.”
But, see Wikipedia:

5. Simulated Rorschach Inkblot

6. Scoring the Rorschach Scoring: Frequency of response Form quality
Deviant verbalizations
Inappropriate combinations
Inappropriate logic
Location
Morbid content
Form quality
Movement
Color (B&W or color)
Shading
Texture
Pair and/or reflection
Ball et al. (1994) survey: average of 49 minutes to administer, 46 minutes to score, 50 minutes to interpret

7. Rorschach Inkblot Test
Extremely popular among clinicians
For most of 20th century interpretation was scored via different systems, or none at all
Have things changed?

8. Rorschach Inkblot Test
Exner’s Comprehensive System (CS)
Evaluating the Rorschach
Standardization (fidelity to CS?)
Norms (overpathologize healthy people)
Reliability (interrater, test-retest)
Validity (diagnosis, related measures)
Importance of incremental validity
Is the Rorschach a psychological test?

9. Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
Administration and Scoring

10. Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)
Evaluating the TAT
Standardization
Norms
Reliability
Validity
Is the TAT a psychological test?

11. Projective Drawings Examples: Draw-a-Person House-Tree-Person
Human Figure Drawings
Are human figure drawings psychological tests?

12. Projective Drawings Evaluating projective drawings Standardization
Norms
Reliability
Validity

13. Human Figure Drawings: A Case Example
Case: Alexis, age 11, participated in a court-ordered evaluation in the context of a custody dispute between her recently divorced parents. Her mother accused her father of sexually abusing Alexis, and based on the mother’s testimony the examining psychologist found this accusation to be credible. The psychologist administered the Draw-a-Person Test as part of a comprehensive evaluation intended to determine, among other things, the validity of the allegations against the father. The test requires the taker to draw a picture of a man, a woman, and themselves. Pictures here is Alexis’s self-portrait. The psychologist elected to score and interpret the Draw-a-Person test in a subjective manner using clinical judgment and experience as a guide.
Questions: What are the salient characteristics of this self-portrait? What does this drawing reveal? What aspects of the picture are relevant to the determination of whether or not Alexis has been sexually abused by her father? What aspects are relevant to Alexis’s overall mental health?

14. Projective Drawings
Without standardized guidelines for interpreting drawings, how are clinicians to score them? What problems can you foresee in how such drawings are interpreted?

15. Illusory Correlation
Definition: perception of a relationship between two variables when no such relationship exists
We see what we expect to see
Examples:
Stereotypes; people from group X have trait Y (e.g., people from small towns are nice)
The one day I forgot to put my lucky comb in my pocket, my mom got into a car accident
I had a panic attack one night after drinking wine, and so have stopped drinking wine

16. Illusory Correlation
Does it surprise you that people are prone to make illusory correlations?
Why do they occur?
Ease with which information comes to mind (availability heuristic)
Biases and preconceived notions
We count the hits and forget the misses (confirmation bias)

17. Illusory Correlation
What do illusory correlations have to do with assessment?
Projective vs. objective psychological tests

18. Illusory Correlation Danger of illusory correlations
Chapman & Chapman (1969)
Using the Rorschach for diagnosing Sexual Deviation, Homosexual Type (an actual mental disorder in DSM-I)
What Rorschach responses are indicative of male homosexuality?

19. Illusory Correlation
Actual, valid responses that distinguished homosexual and heterosexual groups of men:
Human, or humanized animal (“Woman dressed as a bat”)
Human or animal; contorted, monstrous, or threatening = =

20. Illusory Correlation
What clinicians reported as signs of homosexuality:
Human or animal anal content (44%)
Male or female genitalia (38%)
Feminine clothing (38%)
Humans with sex confused (28%)
Almost none of the clinicians reported the valid signs

21. Illusory Correlation
Undergraduate students more often selected the invalid, illusory correlates as indicating male homosexuality
This remained true even when it was suggested that the actually valid signs were more indicative of male homosexuality

22. Misuse of Personality Tests in Forensic Settings: Example #2
In a similar example with an older child, a 15-year-old boy's drawings of a person were interpreted as "rather primitive for an adolescent of his age and ... suggests that (the boy) has the psychological characteristics of a person who acts out their anger in sexualized ways."  But when we tested this boy, we discovered that he was blind in one eye, performed below what was expected for his age on the Porteus and the Bender, and had a performance IQ on the WISC-R of 67.  This is why his drawings were "primitive."  None of this had been assessed or discussed as a possibility.

23. Misuse of Personality Tests in Forensic Settings: Example #3
A seven-year-old girl was asked to draw a picture of her family doing something.  She drew a picture of herself and her sister with their hands up in the air with the father standing next to them and smiling.  The child told the psychologist that she and her sister were "cheering at a show."
The psychologist disregarded what the child told her about the drawing and claimed that this really signified a "helpless posture."  She saw it as significant that there were no fingers drawn on the hands and that the hands were large on the father.  She asserted that abused children put large hands on the drawings of their perpetrators.  She also claimed that the thick lines in the crotch in the picture of the father meant an emphasis on genitals, was probably a penis, and showed anxiety about the father.  She therefore concluded that the girl, who denied the allegations of sexual abuse by the father, had most likely been sexually abused by him and should "be protected from further abuse by him."

24. Illusory Correlation in the Courtroom http://www. deltabravo
This was a day care case with allegations of ritualistic satanic abuse complete with costumes, masks, dead animals, sacrificed babies, blood, feces, skeletons, and monsters.  These bizarre allegations surfaced during therapy.  The therapist who saw two of the children depended heavily upon the children's drawings in forming conclusions about ritualistic, satanic abuse.
The case file included a large stack of drawings over a two-year period — probably over 500 from the two girls.  These drawings are typical of the types of scribbles and rudimentary figures drawn by three- and four-year-olds.  These had been saved because they were considered significant.  In her deposition the psychologist was asked about the drawings in detail. What she believed was significant included:

25. Illusory Correlation in the Courtroom http://www. deltabravo
Shapes that are untypical for three- and four-year-old children
Shapes that are phallic symbols
Jiggly lines that indicate anxiety
Straight mouths that mean people can't say anything
Jagged mouths that mean anxiety
A mouth that is open and oval shaped
Darkened eyes
Eyeballs that are scribbled around
Eyes that are two different colors
Drawing something and then covering it up
Drawings something and not talking about it

26. Illusory Correlation in the Courtroom http://www. deltabravo
Colors are very important and significant:
Black means the child is frightened or distressed; black is a morbid color
Red means angry, unless the child is drawing a pretty red flower, when it is healthy
If every thing is the picture is red or red and black, this is very suspicious.
Blue, brown, and orange mean fear, anger, and depression
Pink, red, and green are healthy colors
There is no empirical evidence to support any of these theories.  Also, these were not House-Tree-Person drawings or Kinetic Family Drawings but were simply drawings done in therapy sessions or at home and brought to the therapist by the parent.  There was no effort to standardize the administration.

27. Illusory Correlation
How high is the danger that tests results will be biased due to illusory correlations?
How can this possibility be mitigated?

28. Most Commonly Used Tests in *Child Custody Evaluations*
Ackerman & Ackerman (1997) - survey of 201 psychologists from 39 states
1. Intelligence tests 2. TAT
3. Bricklin Perceptual Scales 4. Sentence Completion
5. Achievement Test 6. Rorschach
7. Projective Drawings 8. MMPI-A
9. House-Tree-Person 10. Kinetic Family Drawing

29. What is Intelligence? Important elements:
Adaptation to one’s environment
Abstract thinking or reasoning
Problem-solving ability
Capacity to acquire knowledge
Memory

30. What is Intelligence?
Cattell and Horn’s Fluid and Crystallized Intelligence
Fluid intelligence – native abilities, biologically determined
Crystallized intelligence – acquired skill and knowledge

31. What is Intelligence? What about… Athletic ability? Musical ability?
Social skills?
Artistic ability?

32. Theories of Intelligence
Multiple Intelligences
Gardner – linguistic, musical, logical-mathematical, spatial, bodily-kinesthetic, personal intelligences
Sternberg – analytic, practical, and creative
Jones – attention to detail, interpersonal perceptiveness, skill in using tools

33. Critical Analysis of Multiple Intelligences
Intelligences vs. abilities?
"To date there have been no published studies that offer evidence of the validity of the multiple intelligences. In 1994 Sternberg reported finding no empirical studies. In 2000 Allix reported finding no empirical validating studies, and at that time Gardner and Connell conceded that there was "little hard evidence for MI theory" (2000, p. 292). In 2004 Sternberg and Grigerenko stated that there were no validating studies for multiple intelligences, and in 2004 Gardner asserted that he would be "delighted were such evidence to accrue" (p. 214), and he admitted that "MI theory has few enthusiasts among psychometricians or others of a traditional psychological background" because they require "psychometric or experimental evidence that allows one to prove the existence of the several intelligences" (2004, p. 214)." (Waterhouse, 2006a, p. 208).

34. Intelligence Tests Wechsler Scales
Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale – III (WAIS-III) – ages 16+
Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children – III (WISC-III) – ages 6-16
Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence - Revised (WPPSI-R) – ages 3 to 7 years, 3 months
Critical analysis

35. Wechsler Scales Subtests of the Wechsler scales Sample items
But first, a note on “test security”…

36. Ethics and Test Stimuli
APA Ethics Code: “Psychologists make reasonable efforts to maintain the integrity and security of test materials and other assessment techniques consistent with law and contractual obligations, and in a manner that permits adherence to this Ethics Code.”

41. Calculating IQ Scores Wechsler scales IQ scores range from 40-160
Use the deviation method, which compares an individual’s score to the distribution of others at the same age level using the normal curve
Outdated method of IQ = mental age
IQ = mental age/chronological age
A 4-year-old who scores at the level of the average 8-year-old would have an IQ of?

42. Wechsler Scales Organization of the Wechsler scales
Full-scale IQ (M = 100, SD = 15)
Verbal IQ (M = 100, SD = 15)
Performance IQ (M = 100, SD = 15)
Subtest scores (M = 10, SD = 3)

43. Interpreting Scores IQ Score Classification
130 and above Very Superior
Superior
High Average
Average
Low Average
Borderline
69 and below Extremely Low

44. Interpreting Scores 70
100
130

45. What Does Intelligence Predict?
Correlation with school performance = .50
Correlation with total years of education = .55
Higher job status and job performance
Correlation is not evidence of causation
High intelligence leads to academic success
Academic success causes high intelligence test scores
Another variable (e.g., SES, motivation) causes high both academic success and high IQ test performance

46. Heritability of Intelligence
Correlation in IQ between MZ (identical) twins = .86
Correlation in IQ between DZ (fraternal) twins = .60
Correlation in IQ between MZ twins raised apart = .68 to .78
Correlation in IQ between DZ twins raised apart = .24
Heritability of IQ increases substantially with age
Why might heritability of IQ be controversial?

47. Controversies in Intelligence Testing
Racial differences in IQ (primarily black-white)
Average group-level IQ difference is points (and predictive validity is similar)
Explanations
Poverty/SES?
Cultural bias in test items?
Genetics?
Stereotype threat?

48. Stereotype Threat
Stereotype threat occurs when a person, who belongs to a group that has a negative stereotype attached to it, subconsciously conforms to the negative stereotype by performing a task to a lesser degree than they would otherwise
Stereotype threat creates anxiety owing to concerns that one will conform to the negative stereotype
This anxiety interferes with task performance, thus fulfilling the stereotype

49. Stereotype Threat Examples of stereotype threat:
Race and IQ test performance
Race and athletic performance
Gender and math performance
Gender and chess performance
Stereotype threat can help to explain racial differences in IQ tests

50. Exam Review Chapter 5: Issues in Assessment
Issues in prediction (e.g., factors that affect predictive accuracy)
Clinical judgment, experience, and the illusion of learning

51. Exam Review Chapter 6: Clinical Interviewing
Types of interviews (e.g., intake, mental status exam)
Verbal communication strategies
Nonverbal communication strategies
Listening skills
Structured and unstructured diagnostic interviews

52. Exam Review Hunsley, Lee, & Wood (2003) article When is a test a test?
Standardization, reliability, validity, & norms
Evaluation of specific tests

53. Exam Review Chapter 7: Cognitive Assessment What is intelligence?
Theories of intelligence
Wechsler intelligence tests
Controversies in intellectual assessment

54. Exam Review Chapter 8: Personality Assessment
Projective vs. objective assessment
Projective tests (primarily Rorschach Inkblot Test, also TAT and drawings)
MMPI-2