question_answer

What are the methods used for Psychological assessment?                (CBSE 2011 outside Delhi, CBSE 2014)

Answer:

Ans.     Several methods are used for psychological assessment. Some of them are:

(i) Psychological Tests: There are objective and standardized measure of an individual's mental and/or behavioural characteristics.

1. These objective tests have been developed to measure all the dimensions of psychological attributes, e.g., intelligence, aptitude etc.

2. Psychological tests are widely used for clinical diagnosis, guidance, personnel selection, etc.

3. Projective tests have also been developed for assessment of personality.

(ii) Interview: Interview is purposeful conversation seeking information from a person on a one-to-one, one-to-many, many-to-many or many-to-one basis.

1. It may be structured or unstructured.

(iii) Case-Study:

1. Case studies are an in-depth study of the individual in terms of is/her psychological attributes, and physical environment.

2. These are based on data generated by different methods, e.g., interview, observation, questionnaire, psychological tests, etc.

3. Case study is reconstruction of the past.

(iv) Observation: Observation involves implying systematic, organized and objective procedures to record behavioural phenomena occurring naturally in real time.

1. The major problems with observational methods are that the observer has little control over the situation and the reports may suffer from subjective interpretations of the observer.

2. It is very time consuming and requires profession expertise.

(v) Self-report: Self-report is a method in which a person provides factual information about himself/herself and/or opinion, beliefs etc. that he/she holds. This information can be obtained by an interview schedule, questionnaire, a psychological test etc.