self-report questionnaire
Quick Summary
Self-report questionnaires in psychology are tools used to measure personality characteristics, feelings, motivations, and attitudes. They are designed to provide quantitative, numerical indexes of individual traits, similar to intelligence tests. These instruments restrict the types of responses a subject can make, often using true-false answers or rating scales, which makes them convenient to administer and score objectively.12
Self-report tests have several applications:
* Clinical settings: Used for diagnosis, determining treatment needs, and planning therapy.12
* Employee selection: Aid in choosing suitable candidates for jobs.12
* Psychological research: Help researchers study behaviors, such as test anxiety.12
A prominent example is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI), which uses true-false items to assess various clinical scales and includes control scales to detect response biases like social desirability or carelessness. While valuable, assessment specialists recognize that self-reports are samples of behavior and their validity in predicting everyday activities must be empirically established.231
Ask Britannica AI about this topic
Britannica doesn't have a full article on this topic, so we've curated a list of our relevant coverage.