Chapter 2 Flashcards
What are self-reports (S-data)?
The information a person reveals about themselves. They can be obtained via interviews, periodic reports an dquestionnaires. They can be unstructured (open-ended) and structured (closed-ended). While they can show what a person feels and thinks, they can be limited by the willingness and ability of respondents, lack of honesty and lack of self-knowledge.
What is an Observer-report (O-Data)?
The information people who observe a person obtain about them. There can be 2 types of observers, professionals and close friends/family. While they can allow access to information not in other measures, multiple social personalities can be assessed, and allow multiple observers to get a better picture, they can lead to bias in both the close friends/family and in selection bias.
What is test data (t-data)?
They are standardised tests, where participants are placed in a standardised testing situation and examined to see if people react differently to the same thing. While there are advantages, t-data can be limited if the participant is aware of what trait is being measured and then alter their responses, participants may not define the testing situation the same as the experimenter and that the experimenter may influence behaviour by their own attitude.
What is an actigraph?
A device used to assess personality differences in activity or energy level. Its a self-winding watch which can be strapped to limbs which registers a person’s activity.
What is physiological data?
Data coming from instrumental measurements of the body. Arousal, reactivity and speed of registering new information can talk about personality.
What are projective techniques?
They are another form of T-data where the person is given a standard stimulus and asked what he or she sees, such as the famous inkblots.
What is life-outcome data (L-data)?
The information that can be gleaned from the events, activities and outcomes in a person’s life that are available to public scrutiny.
What are the three broad issues of personality assessment?
- Using two or more data sources within a single personality study, what are the links among the various sources of personality data?
- The fallibility of personality measurement and how the use of multiple data sources can correct some of the problems associated with single data source
- The use of several single observations as opposed to a single observation in order to better measure a personality trait. This is called aggregation.
What is aggregation?
Aggregation is the process of adding up, or averaging, several single observations, resulting in a better (i.e. more reliable) measure of a personality trait than a single observation of behaviour.
What is reliability?
The degree to which an obtained measure represents the true level of the trait being measured.
How do you estimate reliability?
- Repeated measurement - repeating a measurement over time (test-retest reliabiliy), internal consistency reliability,
What are the two views of social-desirability?
One view is that it represents distortion or error and should be eliminated or minimized. The other view is that social desirability is a valid part of other desirable personality traits, such as happiness, conscientiousness or agreeableness.
How do you minimise socially desirable responding?
One can pose questions that respondents may experience as threatening in a less threatening or less confronting way.
What is validity?
The extent to which a test measures what it claims to measure
What is predictive validity?
Refers to whether the test predicts criteria external to the test < the outcomes
