DIRECTIONS: READ THE FOLLOWING STUDENT POST AND RESPOND. CITE REFERENCES USING APA FORMAT.

Validity Scales in Personality Tests

A validity scale in a test of personality according to Cohen, Swerdlik, and Sturman (2012) measures of how the test taker's responses were produced. They account for errors that may be accidental due to misunderstandings and carelessness, or purposeful errors used to deceive or skew responses in a different direction.

This differs from validity in psychometrics because that type of validity refers to the actual test content and whether or not the test is an actual measure of what it intends to measure (Cohen, Swerdlik, &Sturman, 2012). Two examples of validity scales are the F scale which detects a test taker's answers that are untrue to their self, and the Cannot Say scale that counts the number of items a test taker does not answer for reasons such as lack of relevance, inexperience, defensiveness, etc. (Cohen, Swerdlik, &Sturman, 2012).

AERA Standards

Standard 10.10 in the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing (2014) states that individuals being tested should not be allowed to have any influence on the results of the assessment due to the natural vested interested in the outcomes. In personality tests, the test taker can manipulatively answer questions in a way that might produce a different outcome, either one they do or do not want to portray depending on the circumstances.

Based on this standard, I see personality tests not to be used on a clinical level as well as validity scales because these scales try their best to take in account for this type of error, but it can never be sure the answers are an accurate depiction of the test taker's personality.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Validity Scales

One advantage of using validity scales is the ability to detect if the test taker is responding truthfully to each answer. A major disadvantage is the accuracy of the validity scales, because they are meant to determine an intention which is a private event only observed by the test taker themselves.

This type of validity can never truly be certain. It is for this reason that I don't see validity scales useful or even able to produce true data. There is no real way to ever know if a test taker's responses on a personality test were true for them, because even if they were asked after the test, they still may produce bias or unreliable responses about their answers.

Reference

Cohen, Ronald J., Mark Swerdlik, Edward Sturman. Psychological Testing and Assessment: An Introduction to Tests and Measurement, 8th Edition. McGraw-Hill Learning Solutions, 07/2012. VitalBook file.

Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing. (2014). Washington, DC: American Educational Research Association.