psych 2

• Tests and testing programs first came into being in China


  2200 B.C.E
• Imperial examination


  In dynasties with state-sponsored examinations for official positions, the privileges of making the grade varied
• Ancient Greco-Roman Writings were indicative of attempts to categorize people in terms of personality types
• CHRISTIAN VON WOLFF (1732, 1734) had anticipated psychology as a science and psychological measurement as a specialty within that science
• CHARLES DARWIN argued that chance variation in species would be selected or rejected by nature according to adaptivity and survival value


  1859
• History records that it was Darwin who spurred scientific interest in individual differences
• FRANCIS GALTON


  • Researched on Heredity (sweet peas) and pioneered the use of a statistical concept central to psychological experimentation and testing: the coefficient of correlation
  • Developed the product-moment correlation technique
  • Aspired to classify people "according to their natural gifts" and to ascertain their "deviation from an average"
  • Credited with devising or contributing to the development of many contemporary tools of psychological assessment, including questionnaires, rating scales, and self-report inventories
  • Established the Anthropometric Laboratory
• WILHELM MAX WUNDT


  • Focused on how people were similar, not different
  • Viewed individual differences as a frustrating source of error in experimentation, and he attempted to control all extraneous variables in an effort to reduce error to a minimum
• James McKeen Cattell


  • Credited with coining the term "mental test" in 1890 publication
  • Dealt with individual differences—specifically, individual differences in reaction time
  • Instrumental in founding the Psychological Corporation in 1921
• CHARLES SPEARMAN was credited with originating the concept of test reliability as well as building the mathematical framework for the statistical technique of factor analysis
• VINCTOR HENRI was the Frenchman who collaborated with Alfred Binet on papers suggesting how mental tests could be used to measure higher mental processes
• Psychiatrist EMIL KRAEPELIN was an early experimenter with the word association technique as a formal test
• LIGHTNER WITMER


  • Received his Ph.D. from Leipzig and went on to succeed Cattell as director of the psychology laboratory at the University of Pennsylvania
  • Cited as the "little-known founder of clinical psychology, owing at least in part to his being challenged to treat a "chronic bad speller" in March of 1896
  • Founded the first psychological clinic in the United States at the University of Pennsylvania
  • Founded the journal Psychological Clinic in 1907, with the first article entitled "Clinical Psychology"
• As early as 1895, Alfred Binet (1857–1911) and his colleague Victor Henri published several articles in which they argued for the measurement of abilities such as memory and social comprehension
• BINET TEST


  A 30-item "measuring scale of intelligence" designed by ALFRED BINET and collaborator THEODORE SIMON to help identify Paris schoolchildren with intellectual disability
• Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS)


  A test designed by DAVID WECHSLER to measure adult intelligence, where intelligence is "the aggregate or global capacity of the individual to act purposefully, to think rationally, and to deal effectively with his environment"
• Group intelligence tests came into being in the United States in response to the military's need for an efficient method of screening the intellectual ability of World War I recruits
• By the late 1930s, approximately 4,000 different psychological tests were in print and "clinical psychology" was synonymous with "mental testing"
• Committee on Emotional Fitness chaired by psychologist ROBERT S. WOODWORTH


  • Assigned the task of developing a measure of adjustment and emotional stability that could be administered quickly and efficiently to groups of recruits
  • Developed the Personal Data Sheet, the first widely used self-report measure of personality
  • Developed the Woodworth Psychoneurotic Inventory, the first widely used self-report measure of personality
• Self-report


  A process whereby assessees themselves supply assessment-related information by responding to questions, keeping a diary, or self-monitoring thoughts or behaviors
• Projective test


  A test in which an individual is assumed to "project" onto some ambiguous stimulus his or her own unique needs, fears, hopes, and motivation
• The Rorschach, a series of inkblots developed by the Swiss psychiatrist HERMANN RORSCHACH, is perhaps the best known of all projective tests
• The use of pictures as projective stimuli was popularized in the late 1930s by HENRY A. MURRAY, CHRISTIANA D. MORGAN, and their colleagues at the Harvard Psychological Clinic
• Culture


  The socially transmitted behavior patterns, beliefs, and products of work of a particular population, community, or group of people
• Culture-specific tests or tests designed for use with people from one culture but not from another, soon began to appear on the scene
• The 1937 revision of the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC), first published in 1949, contained no racially, ethnically, socioeconomically, or culturally diverse children in their development
• Verbal Communication


  Language, the means by which information is communicated, is a key yet sometimes overlooked variable in the assessment process
• Nonverbal communication and behavior


  In psychoanalysis, a theory of personality and psychological treatment developed by Sigmund Freud, symbolic significance is assigned to many nonverbal acts
• Individualist culture


  Typically associated with the dominant culture in countries such as the United States and Great Britain, is characterized by value being placed on traits such as self-reliance, autonomy, independence, uniqueness, and competitiveness
• Collectivist culture


  Typically associated with the dominant culture in many countries throughout Asia, Latin America and Africa, value is placed on traits such as conformity, cooperation, interdependence, and striving toward group goals
• Conflict arises when groups systematically differ in terms of scores on a particular test
• Vocational assessment - test users are sensitive to legal and ethical mandates concerning the use of tests with regard to hiring, firing, and related decision making
• Affirmative action


  Voluntary and mandatory efforts undertaken by federal, state, and local governments, private employers, and schools to combat discrimination and to promote equal opportunity for all in education and employment
• Laws


  Rules that individuals must obey for the good of the society as a whole or rules thought to be for the good of society as a whole
• Ethics


  A body of principles of right, proper, or good conduct
• Code of professional ethics


  Recognized and accepted by members of a profession, it defines the standard of care expected of members of that profession
• Standard of care


  The level at which the average, reasonable, and prudent professional would provide diagnostic or therapeutic services under the same or similar conditions
• The Common Core State Standards was the product of a state-led effort to bring greater interstate uniformity to what constituted proficiency in various academic subjects
• Minimum Competency Testing Programs were formal testing programs designed to be used in decisions regarding various aspects of students' education
• Truth-in-testing legislation was passed at the state level beginning in the 1980s, with the primary objective of giving testtakers a way to learn the criteria by which they are being judged