A personality inventory for induction screening

Review: Screening for vulnerability to psychological disorders in the military: an historical survey

“…Tests on 15,000 recruits con rmed the design of four scales, which differentiated between those with leadership potential and those with poor adjustment qualities: delinquency, neurosis, fake bad (malingering) and femininity. 52 Although the authors concluded that they could detect "the major types of emotional abnormalities", the FOI was not designed to predict how soldiers might perform in combat. A follow-up study of 134 naval recruits enlisted between 1960 and 1961, who had been rejected on psychological grounds but had been purposely allowed to graduate from training, found that two years later 97 (72.4%) were still on active duty.…”

Antecedent probability and the efficiency of psychometric signs, patterns, or cutting scores.

“…When we "rule out" tumor by the test, we are correct 96% of the time, an improvement of only 6% in the confidence attachable to a negative finding over the confidence yielded by the base rates. 4 Now, picking up the successivehurdles argument, suppose a major decision (e.g., exploratory surgery) is allowed to rest upon a second test 4 Improvements are expressed throughout this article as absolute increments in percentage of hits, because: (a) This avoids the complete arbitrariness involved in choosing between original hit rate and miss rate as starting denominator; and (6) for the clinician, the person is the most meaningful unit of gain, rather than a proportion of a proportion (especially when the reference proportion is very small). which is infallible but for practically insuperable reasons of staff, time, etc., cannot be routinely given.…”

“…When we "rule out" tumor by the test, we are correct 96% of the time, an improvement of only 6% in the confidence attachable to a negative finding over the confidence yielded by the base rates. 4 Now, picking up the successivehurdles argument, suppose a major decision (e.g., exploratory surgery) is allowed to rest upon a second test which is infallible but for practically insuperable reasons of staff, time, etc., cannot be routinely given. We administer Test 2 only to "positives" on (screening) Test 1.…”

Structured personality tests.

“…In spite of the attempts to utilize the MMPI in a highly objective fashion, some workers (58) report that they can predict traits more accurately by scanning clusters of scores on the MMPI than by using a rigorous objective method for the same purpose. Brief screening procedures (19,28,31,76) for psychopathological patients have been developed from the MMPI score patterning, and the test is frequently used for such screening. The experience of clinicians and investigators is contradictory insofar as the value of such scales is concerned.…”

“…Such instruments may not aid in individual diagnosis, or in gaining an understanding of personality, but they certainly fulfill the important requirements of expediency. The Fort Ord Inventory (31) has been recently developed for use at Army induction stations. It is believed by its authors that whereas the P.I.…”