Assessing Normal and Abnormal Personality Functioning: Strengths and Weaknesses of Self-Report, Observer, and Performance-Based Methods

Abstract

Assessing personality characteristics; distinguishing the boundaries between normal and abnormal functioning; identifying impairment in the domains of work, interpersonal relationships, and emotional state due to maladaptive personality traits; and translating these findings into effective, appropriate treatment interventions is a complicated endeavor. Valid, reliable conclusions about an individual's personality functioning and adjustment cannot be reached unless one has accurate information about that person's patterns of behavior, cognitions, emotions, and interpersonal relationships. I discuss strengths and weaknesses of assessment approaches utilizing explicit assessment methods, such as self-report measures and clinical interviews; information obtained from knowledgeable observers; and performance-based, implicit assessment methods such as the Rorschach Comprehensive System (Exner, 2003). In contrast to explicit methods of assessment, implicit methods can provide salient information about a personality construct whether or not individuals have accurately conceptualized that construct, have weighed how the construct describes them, are self-aware, and are willing to openly provide information relevant to that construct. I propose that the accuracy of conclusions about an individual's personality style, problems in adjustment, and treatment needs may be improved if conclusion are based on a multimethod assessment approach that incorporates information gathered using explicit assessment methods, information provided by significant others, and data from performance-based or implicit measures of personality.

Play style: Showing your age

“…He asked participants to report on their play style and what factors of game play they valued. However, self-report measures are inherently unreliable [9]. Play style (as we define it) can be directly measured by tracking an individual's in-game behavior in terms of game play variables.…”

Associations between the Rorschach Ego Impairment Index and Measures on Intrapsychic and Interpersonal Functioning

“…Accordingly, the presence of personality disorder is known to affect an individual's interpersonal functioning and the manifestation of problems in many ways, as well as reducing the ability to recognize and verbalize psychological problems [4], thus possibly forming a potential source of bias in research focusing on associations between different types of assessment methods. Therefore, in order to eliminate the possible biasing effect of personality disorder, the associations need to be examined separately in participants with or without personality disorder.…”

“…The accuracy of the assessment of intrapsychic and interpersonal functioning is suggested to be improved when based on a multimethod assessment approach that incorporates information obtained from both explicit assessment methods, such as clinical interviews and self-report measures, and performance-based methods, such as the Rorschach method [4] [5]. For this reason, understanding of the associations between these complementary assessment methods is important.…”

Traduction et validation du Relationship Patterns Questionnaire (RPQ) et étude pilote de ses liens avec le Personality Organization Diagnostic Form (PODF) /

“…Toutefois, les critiques déplorent le fait qu'il tente de saisir les dimensions principalement inconscientes du modèle de Kernberg à l'aide d'un questionnaire auto-rapporté (Ganellen, 2007). Par ailleurs, l'IPO ne permet pas de procéder au diagnostic des OP du modèle de Kernberg (Smits et al, 2009) (Laverdière, 2004;Wilczek et al, 2000).…”