Psychologist versus Test
The Battle of the Century
Why use tests? In our course textbook, Mastering Modern Psychological Testing: Theory and Methods, Reynolds and Livingston bring up a point that the reason we use tests is because "people are not very good at judging other people objectively, and most non-test assessment procedures involve subjective judgment" (21). The reason people are not very good at judging other people, they argue, is because we tend to make bad impressions of others. An example was given to describe this argument: when you meet someone new, let's say a physically attractive man or woman who is sitting next to you in Psychological Tests, you will show a tendency to judge them as outstanding on that one trait (physical attractiveness) and this will color your impression of them. Reynolds and Livingston theorize that this person's attractive physique will bias your opinion of him/her and you will make the assumption that this individual is smart, outgoing funny, [insert more flattering adjectives here]. However, if you asked them to fill out the MMPI-2 right then and there and you got back the results, you might see that this person is the opposite of all that you assumed!
Coming closer to home, the authors mention the possibility of the fallibility of judgments made by psychologists when it comes to making judgments about their patients. This is why Reynolds and Livingston support using tests for making judgments, since tests diminish the possibility of getting biased results due to our poor people-judging skills.
However, my question is: If we can make bad judgments about other people, is it not possible that other people can make bad judgments about themselves? What if you have been having the worst four months of your life. Your grades are plummeting, yesterday your rent was due three months ago, tension is rising between you and your significant other, and your friends just don't seem to care about or understand what is going on in your life currently. You are asked to take a test called "How Negative Are You?" If I were taking that test, my results would show that I am pretty darned negative. Now imagine you were asked to take that test when you had the four best months of your life. How different would your results turn out?
The idea I am trying to get across here is that sometimes situational factors influence our judgments about ourselves, causing us to over-analyze our feelings and you will rate yourself as more negative than you usually are.
My take home point is that we should be careful about how much we commend psychological tests. Yes, I agree, they are one of the greatest pioneering instruments created in our time, and that they do provide some sort of objectivity. But your own judgment about yourself is not free from perception bias and these tests will reflect this perception of yourself. Here's a food for thought: we have already been replaced by computers – now will psychologists be replaced by psychological tests?
