Standardized and Career Tests

The only tests I have taken in my life are standardized school tests and a career test. I have found that neither fully measures what people want it to measure. In the career test I took, I thought that it missed questions about one of the most important aspects of choosing a career, your personality. I am both apt at and interested in the sciences, which is why I considered med school at one point and which is partly why I am studying psychology. However, when I came to university and saw how different and hard the workload is from high school, I knew I was not the kind of person who could study that many years, at that pace, with that much workload. They say that self-control is, besides intelligence, what determines whether you succeed at a goal or not. And thus, intelligence and interest are not the only factors one needs when choosing a career. However, these tests generally don’t account for whether your personality is in accordance with your interests or not. There are some jobs that require extrovertedness or introvertedness. If you want to do research in psychology, it might be better suited for you if you are an introvert. Otherwise, you might not be happy. You might be interested in business and be very good in your classes, but might not succeed out there if extrovertedness is a necessary personality trait for the job and you do not fit the profile.

I felt very similar with all the standardized tests I have received, as I didn’t feel like it measured intelligence. I took the SAT, as my first plan was to go to us to study. Most schools first look at GPA and SAT scores, then cut off people under a certain score and don’t even look at the rest of their applications. Intelligence is a complex concept, as we know. Test scores are not the only measure. However in all our lives, we are told that that is what shows who is smart and who is not. I personally still feel ‘less’ than my friends when I get a lower score, even though I know and don’t believe that that is the only measure of intelligence. Neither of these tests measure completely what we believe they should measure. However, when we don’t have any other options and we have to rely on these tests for an answer were looking for, we might put too much faith in them and take them as the sole answer to something. We might end up following a career we are not suited for because at the time of the test we had no other ideas in mind. On the other hand, we might think that a score on a test tells everything about our intelligence and see ourselves less than we actually are and this might decrease our self-esteem. We might get stuck in the same circle with the self-fulfilling prophecy and actually start performing bad because of the level that test made us believe we are at.