University of Oregon
Spring 2005
Psychology 623: PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT
Instructor: Gerard Saucier, PhD
Office: 312 Straub
e-mail: gsaucier@oregon.uoregon.edu
Phone: 346-4927
Office Hours: Mondays and Wednesdays, 10:30-11:30 am each day
Readings: See class schedule; all readings will be made available by the instructor
The purpose of this graduate course is to give students a useful introduction to basic measurement issues in personality assessment, with 'personality' defined broadly. Among the concepts emphasized are reliability, validity, response bias, factor structure, content comprehensiveness, cross-cultural generalizability, and key components of item response theory. Measurement issues will be explored broadly, and then in their applications to particular models and measures, including those in which the student has special experience or interest. Indeed, the course will employ measures with which the students are familiar as prime examples, and is designed not only to review the present state of personality assessment but also to help (present or future) researchers who will be faced with the task of creating a measure of some construct, or evaluating an existing measure with respect to its measurement properties.
This is primarily a course about concepts, not about statistics. However, it is assumed that students are familiar with basic statistical techniques of correlation and regression. Those who doubt their facility with these techniques should consult the instructor for suggested readings.
Reading assignments are substantial. Readings for each week are, in many cases, ordered from simple to advanced.
Requirements of the course
1. Discussion questions based on readings for the current week. You are responsible for turning in sets of discussion questions based on the readings by two hours before the beginning of six different class meetings (of the nine after the first session). Late discussion questions don't confer credit. Discussion questions are turned in via e-mail to gsaucier@darkwing. You can choose the dates of your discussion questions. Discussion questions, to be worthwhile and to count, should (a) be indicative of having done the reading and (b) be instances of some degree of critical or insightful thinking. Should you ever develop a "block" about coming up with some, you might consider questions of the following form: Why is this issue important? How are you defining ? Aren't you assuming ? Isn't it debatable whether ? Does the evidence really support the notion that _____? Aren't you leaving out _____? Isn't there a limitation with regard to _____ (e.g., caused by using that methodology)? Responses to selected discussion questions turned will be a part of the class sessions, starting with week 2. Discussions in the class sessions are a very important part of this course.
2. Question based on week 1 readings. Every student is to submit a single discussion question (or question asking for clarification) regarding the week 1 readings, and to do so by Friday of week 1 (i.e., April 1) at 5 pm. The purpose of this assignment is to stimulate students to read week 1 readings early in the course, and to answer questions about this basic material at an early stage of the course.
3. A final paper/project. Students will be asked to identify a personality-related model or measure and discuss basic measurement issues with respect to it. A set of generic questions that should be addressed in the final paper will be made available by week 6. The model or measure chosen may be one with which the student has experience, or one in which the student has a particular interest. Selected research-literature references are likely to be useful in the final paper, although none is strictly required. The final paper is due at the beginning of the final-exam time for the course (Monday, June 6, 1 pm).
4. A brief presentation based on the final paper (or at least on your early drafts of this paper) during weeks 9 or 10. Your presentation should be focused on questions, difficulties, puzzles, or dilemmas you are experiencing with respect to the content of your final paper (after providing a bit of background). It is not really important to create an impressive presentation performance, but rather the brief presentation is primarily an opportunity to get some feedback from the instructors and other class members on the issues involved. These presentations will be allotted about 10 minutes each although discussion of a presentation may go on considerably longer if issues of interest to many students arise.
The final grade is based on: 30% for turning in six sets of discussion questions, 5% for turning in a week 1 readings' question, 5% for a generally acceptable level of in-class contribution, 10% for the brief presentation, and 50% for the final paper.
Bringing in your own data: The instructor uses real data for numerous examples in the course, and it may be particularly edifying for you to be able to see your own data, involving variables of special interest to you, applied in relation to important psychometric principles. If you have some data (even if incomplete, and it does not matter if you think it is not "personality" data) that you would like to see used for examples in this course, submit in SPSS file format to the instructor, who guarantees that it will be used only for educational purposes and only in this class.
Course Calendar and Readings
March 29
* Introduction to the course, to psychological measurement in general, and to scaling, transformation, and norms in particular
Readings for this session (to be completed by April 1): Tyler (1963), ch. 1; Murphy & Davidshofer (MD) chapter 5, pp. 86-107
April 5
* Validity and cross-cultural generalizability
Readings for this session: Cronbach (1990) chapter 5;Messick (1988); Borsboom, Mellenbergh, & Heerden (2004)
April 12
* Theory of measurement error; reliability assessment; conventional test construction
Readings for this session: Cronbach (1990) ch. 6; Kline (1998) pp. 25-38; Schmitt (1996); Clark & Watson (1995)
April 19
* Factor analysis and important applications in personality measurement and in test construction; illustration with lexically derived factorial models for personality assessment (e.g., the Big Five)
Readings for this session: Goldberg and Velicer (in press); Kline (1998) ch. 3 (pp. 51-69); Wiggins (1973) pp. 328-335; Saucier and Goldberg (2002)
April 26
* Problems and limitations in classical test theory; item response theory
Readings for this session: MD pp. 192-203; McKinley (1989); Embretson & Reise (2000), ch. 2, pp. 13-39; Zickar (2001); Nunnally & Bernstein (NB), ch. 8, pp. 326-332
May 3
* Halo effects, response biases, and response styles; integrity assessment; assessing measurement invariance and unidimensionality
Readings for this session: Edwards (1953); Paulhus (1991); MD pp. 446-449; Wiggins (1973) pp. 415-425; NB chapter 9 pp. 373-386; Steenkamp & Baumgartner (1998)
May 10
* Normal-range personality scales and inventories: comparative validity and comparisons across time
Readings for this session: Lanyon & Goodstein (1997) pp. 29-87; Martin & Friedman (2000); Goldberg (in press)
May 17
* Comparability and generalizability of personality measures across culture
Readings for this session: LeVine (1982) pp. 43-59; Rogler (1999); Leone et al. (2001); Saucier & Simonds (in press)
May 24
* Projective or 'operant' approaches; is implicit motive research subject to the same critiques as projective tests?
Readings for this session: MD pp. 392-401; Lilienfeld, Wood, & Garb (2000); Hibbard (2003); Woike & McAdams (2005) pp. 171-183
May 31
* Assessing other "units of personality" including psychpathology and other constructs
Readings for this session: Allport (1958); Clark and Livesley (1996); Krueger (1999); other readings TBA
Final paper is due at the beginning of final exam date/time (1 pm, Mon. June 6)- there is no final examination for this course
Readings above are drawn from the following sources:
Borsboom, D., Mellenbergh, G. J., & van Heerden, J. (2004). The concept of validity. Psychological Review, 111, 1061-1071.
Clark, L. A., Livesley, W. J., Schroeder, M. L., & Irish, S. L. (1996). Convergence of two systems for assessing specific traits of personality disorder. Psychological Assessment, 8, 294-303.
Clark, L. A., & Watson, D. (1995). Constructing validity: Basic issues in objective scale development. Psychological Assessment, 7, 309-319.
Cronbach, L. J. (1990). Essentials of psychological testing (5th ed.). New York: Harper/Collins.
Edwards, A. L. (1953). The relationship between the judged desirability of a trait and the probability that the trait will be endorsed. Journal of Applied Psychology, 37, 90-93.
Embretson, S. E., & Reise, S. P. (2000). Item response theory for psychologists. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.
Goldberg, L. R. (in press). The comparative validity of adult personality inventories: Applications of a consumer testing framework. In S. R. Briggs, J. M. Cheek, & E. M. Donahue (Eds.), Handbook of Adult Personality Inventories. New York: Plenum.
Goldberg, L. R., & Velicer, W. F. (in press). Principles of exploratory factor analysis. In S. Strack (Ed.), Differentiating normal and abnormal personality: Second edition. New York: Springer.
Hibbard, S. (2003). A critique of Lilienfeld et al.'s (2000) "The scientific status of projective techniques." Journal of Personality Assessment, 80, 260-271.
Kline, P. (1998). The new psychometrics: Science, psychology, and measurement. London: Routledge.
Krueger, R. F. (1999). The structure of common mental disorders. Archives of General Psychiatry, 56, 921-926.
Lanyon, R. I.,, & Goodstein, L. D. (1997). Personality assessment (3rd ed.). New York: Wiley.
Leone, L., Perugini, M., Bagozzi, R. P., Pierro, A., & Mannetti, L. (2001). Construct validity and generalizability of the Carver-White behavioural inhibition system / behavioural activation system scales. European Journal of Personality, 15, 373-390.
LeVine, R. A. (1982). Culture, behavior, and personality. New York: Aldine.
Lilienfeld, S. O., Wood, J. M., & Garb, H. N. (2000). The scientific status of projective techniques. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 1, 27-66.
Martin, L. R., & Friedman, H. S. (2000). Comparing personality scales across time: An illustrative study of validity and consistency in life-span archival data. Journal of Personality, 68, 85-110.
McKinley, R. L. (1989). An introduction to item response theory. Measurement and Evaluation in Counseling and Development, 22, 37-57.
Messick, S. (1988). The once and future issues of validity: Assessing the meaning and consequences of measurement. In H. Wainer & H. I. Braun (1988), Test validity (pp. 33-45). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
Murphy, K. R., & Davidshofer, C. O. (2001). Psychological testing: Principles and applications (5th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Nunnally, J. C., & Bernstein, I. H. (1994). Psychometric theory (3rd ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill.
Paulhus, D. L. (1991). Measurement and control of response bias. In Robinson, J. P., Shaver, P. R., Wrightsman, L. S. (Eds.) Measures of personality and social psychological attitudes (pp. 17-59). San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
Rogler, L. H. (1999). Methodological sources of cultural insensitivity in mental health research. American Psychologist, 54, 424-433.
Saucier, G. & Goldberg, L. R. (2002). Assessing the Big Five: Applications of 10 psychometric criteria to the development of marker scales. In B. De Raad & M. Perugini (Eds.), Big Five assessment (pp. 29-58). Goettingen, Germany: Hogrefe & Huber.
Saucier, G., & Simonds, J. (in press). The structure of personality and temperament. In D. K. Mroczek & T. D. Little (Eds.), Handbook of personality development.
Schmitt, N. (1996). Uses and abuses of coefficient Alpha. Psychological Assessment, 8, 350-353.
Steenkamp, J. E. M., & Baumgartner, H. (1998). Assessing measurement invariance in cross-national consumer research. Journal of Consumer Research, 25, 78-90.
Tyler, L. E. (1963). Tests and measurements. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
Wiggins, J. S. (1973). Personality and prediction: Principles of personality assessment. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley.
Woike, B. A., & McAdams, D. P. (2005). Motives. In V. A. Derlega, B. A. Winstead, & W. H. Jones (Eds.)., Personality: Contemporary theory and research (3rd ed.) (pp. 156-189).
Zickar, M. J. (2001). Conquering the next frontier: Modeling personality data with item response theory. In B. W. Roberts & R. Hogan (Eds.), Personality psychology in the workplace (pp. 141-160). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.