Interpersonal violence and its relationship to some personality measures

One hundred and fifteen patients in a psychiatric hospital for criminal offenders volunteered to be tested with the overcontrolled hostility scale, the self focus sentence completion, and an emotional empathy measure. The subjects were divided into five groups on the basis of criminal offenses (murder, assault with a deadly weapon, rape, pedophilia, and nonviolent property offenses). It was also possible to divide the sample on the basis of diagnostic features (psychosis, personality disorder, and brain syndrome). The results failed to support the hypothesis that more violent (by nature of their offense) individuals would-as a group-score higher on the overcontrolled hostility scale than less aggressive counterparts. There was some evidence that psychotics showed more self focus at the expense of external focus. The empathy measure failed to reveal any meaningful differences. It is suggested that more validation data are called for to establish the generality of the overcontrolled hostility scale and that, in view of the therapeutic importance which empathy training may have for violent individuals, further effort should be expanded to find a generally valid empathy measure.     

Relation of an ability measure of emotional intelligence to personality

Is emotional intelligence simply a naive theory of personality, or is it a form of intelligence? If emotional intelligence is to be of value, it must measure something unique and distinct from standard personality traits. To explore this question, this study examined an ability test of emotional intelligence and its relationship to personality test variables to determine the extent to which these constructs overlap. A sample of 183 men and women took the Multifactor Emotional Intelligence Scale (Mayer, Caruso, & Salovey, 1999), an ability measure of emotional intelligence as well as measures of career interests, personality, and social behavior. Emotional intelligence was measured reliably and was relatively independent of traditionally defined personality traits, supporting the discriminant validity of the emotional intelligence construct.     

Using item-level covariance to detect response distortion on personality measures

The covariance index is a response validity scale created with the purpose of detecting intentional distortion in self-report measures. Based on evidence that strong response sets increase the covariance between responses, a method was developed to identify increased covariance at the individual level. Two studies were conducted to evaluate the validity of this new measure across laboratory and field settings. Results showed that individuals who scored higher on the covariance index in situations where strong response sets were present were those who had distorted responses the most and whose scores on personality measures had worse validity. In addition, the new validity scales improved identification of distorted responses beyond traditional social desirability scales.     

Relation of personality dimensions to social and intellectual factors in children

In the course of the Hungarian adaptation of the JEPQ, using 2185 children, aged 7–15, the relation of the personality dimensions E, N, P, L to academic achievement, school marks for ‘behaviour’ and ‘diligence’, IQ, size of settlement, education and occupation of father and mother was investigated. High academic achievement was found to be associated with E, Emotional Stability, low P and low L scores. High IQ and high marks for ‘behaviour’ and ‘diligence’ were found to correlate with Emotional Stability and low P. Children from smaller settlements and from lower-status background were more introverted, had higher P scores, were more labile, and had higher L score means, than those from larger settlements and high-status families.     

Relation of personality characteristics and color preferences

150 students responded to the Edwards Personal Preference Schedule and ranked color plates from the Luscher Color Test. Regression analysis yielded no relationship of predictive significance between the two sets of variables. An ancillary analysis using sets of random numbers in place of the color preference data yielded results basically similar to those produced in the earlier analysis. Males and females rank ordered the colors identically except for yellow, which was significantly more preferred by males than females.     

The international personality item pool and the future of public-domain personality measures

Seven experts on personality measurement here discuss the viability of public-domain personality measures, focusing on the International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) as a prototype. Since its inception in 1996, the use of items and scales from the IPIP has increased dramatically. Items from the IPIP have been translated from English into more than 25 other languages. Currently over 80 publications using IPIP scales are listed at the IPIP Web site (http://ipip.ori.org), and the rate of IPIP-related publications has been increasing rapidly. The growing popularity of the IPIP can be attributed to five factors: (1) It is cost free; (2) its items can be obtained instantaneously via the Internet; (3) it includes over 2000 items, all easily available for inspection; (4) scoring keys for IPIP scales are provided; and (5) its items can be presented in any order, interspersed with other items, reworded, translated into other languages, and administered on the World Wide Web without asking permission of anyone. The unrestricted availability of the IPIP raises concerns about possible misuse by unqualified persons, and the freedom of researchers to use the IPIP in idiosyncratic ways raises the possibility of fragmentation rather than scientific unification in personality research.     

Adolescent personality and two measures of response inconsistency

This study examined the relationship between the Response Inconsistency Scale (RINC) of the Adolescent Personality Questionnaire and the Variable Response Inconsistency Scale (VRIN) of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory for Adolescents (MMPI-A) in a group of 62 participants. RINC and VRIN were positively correlated .30 (p < .01). Additionally, both scales were correlated with five broad personality scales available from the Adolescent Personality Questionnaire. Scores on both inconsistency scales correlated negatively with those on Extraversion, Independence, and Self-control (but the latter two not significantly).     

Matching components of self-report and peer-nomination personality measures

Two common methods of measuring personality variables are examined with respect to the ways in which they control respondent biases. A form of the mental-test theory model is developed which makes explicit differences in score components that result from different methodological constraints imposed by the two methods. From the model, it is possible to specify the operations necessary to provide equivalent information from the two sets of data. Performance of these operations in an empirical test supports the model by producing generally higher correlations between the variables having score components which are more closely matched.     

Monitoring psychotherapy with performance-based measures of personality functioning

In this commentary, I review a meta-analysis and three original research reports concerning the Rorschach (Exner, 2003; Rorschach, 1921/1942) and the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT; Murray, 1943) assessment in psychological treatment planning and outcome evaluation. The information in these four articles bears witness to the potential utility of performance-based personality assessment measures for this purpose. The strengths and limitations of the articles suggest several guidelines for future research designed to examine this Rorschach and TAT application including an emphasis on effectiveness studies, longitudinal data, integrated independent variables, observable dependent variables, sophisticated data analysis combining nomothetic and idiographic presentation, and the incremental contribution of performance-based measures to psychotherapy-related personality assessment.     

Defensive style and performance on objective personality measures

Two studies on the relations between various styles of defense and the power or validity of self-reports on objective personality questionnaires. The power of individual items on the Rotter Internal-External Locus of Control scale to discriminate between subjects defined as internals or externals by a median-cut procedure using the total score was not affected by the presence Or absence of a projective defensive style. However, the presence of repressive tendencies did appear to restrict item power. Prediction from two achievement scales taken from Gough's California Psychological Inventory was not influenced by level of repression, was affected somewhat adversely by a projective style, and was most clearly contaminated by a rationalizing defense. It was proposed that the differential effects of defensive styles upon the validity of personality tests depended upon the convergence or divergence of the cognitive operations involved in the type of defense and in the type of personality measure.     

Deliberate faking on personality and emotional intelligence measures

This study examined the extent the Big Five personality traits and emotional intelligence can be faked. Using a student sample, the equivalence of measurement and theoretical structure of models in a faking and honest condition was tested. Comparisons of the models for the honest and faking groups showed the data fit better in the faking condition. These results suggest that faking does change the rank orders of high scoring participants. The personality dimensions most affected by faking were emotional stability and conscientiousness within the Big Five and the general mood and stress management dimensions of Bar-On's Emotional Quotient Inventory-Short Form (1997) measure of emotional intelligence.