Personality test interpretation by digital computer.

Abstract

In this study a set of decision rules was devised for interpreting profile patterns of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) of maladjusted and adjusted college students. The procedure used was that of computer programming of the "maladjusted" versus "adjusted" decisions of an expert test interpreter. The interpreter's decision-making processes were tape-recorded while he was thinking aloud during the sorting of the profiles of 126 college students. The programmed decision rules, which were based on the interpreter's protocol and which were improved upon by a process of trial-and-error statistical checking, yielded a greater hit percentage than the decisions of the original interpreter. In its final form, the set of objective configural inventory rules identified correctly large numbers of maladjusted college students in two cross-validation samples.