TABLE OF CONTENTS Are there any difficulties involved in using personality tests?
You may have thought of some of the following difficulties:
The good tests have a commercial price to pay, either through an annual licence to use them or to pay for the interpretation or both. The cost of giving a test to 10 candidates works can cost over 200.
There are tests on the market which appear cheap but they do not have the validity and reliability required. Steve Blinkhorn, Chairman of Psychometric Research and Development, calls this the 'great underworld of psychometrics: shoddy personality tests and 10-minute quickies that tell you 'everything you need to know' (Smethurst, 2003).
The risk of stereotyping candidates is all too easy. With the belief that personality is set in stone at the age of 30, some candidates may be labelled as unsuitable because they ticked a few wrong boxes. David Leeds, Head of Human Resources at Investac, avoids personality tests for fears of stifling variety. 'We are anxious not to stereotype or characterise people by putting them into different personality labels' (Butcher, 2004).
Tests are sometimes regarded as the clinching factor in selection. Peter Saville has gone on the record to say that nobody should be selected just because of the personality test results; they must be used as an aid to selection (Money Programme, BBC television, 23 November 1996).
Tests are often used wrongly, attempting to measure the unmeasurable or drawing inferences from results which...
