A scale of neuroticism: An adaptation of the minnesota multiphasic personality inventory

Abstract

APPLICATIONTheoretically, it seems that the catescale technique is applicable wherever rating scales or tests are applicable. There are two instances where the catescale might well permit new and radical solutions t o old, tough problems.First, the critical evaluation of malingering and falsification. This problem has plagued clinical psychologists recently and psychiatrists, physicians, insurance companies and administrators for a long time. Present methods of detecting malingering in regard t o the sensorium are rather adequate. They are very inadequate, however, in cases of backache, headache, visceral pains and also in determining the genuineness of fears, dissociated states, psychotic episodes, compulsive behavior, etc. The evaluation of the last three types of behavior is relevant to legal questions concerning the state of an individual at the time he committed a crime. Because categories can be scaled where no apparent phenomenal order exists, catescales should be most difficult to falsify.Second, the catescale technique suggests a scientific and systematic method for constructing certain types of data-gathering instruments. The author knows,of no major theoretical contribution t o the construction of case histories, information files, interview forms, etc. The catescale technique indicates a new procedure for the construction, organization, and evaluation of case histories, biographical data sheets, interview forms, questionnaires, job analyses, job descriptions and other analytic, multivariate data-gathering instruments of psychosocial phenomena.

Item subtlety in personality inventory scales.

“…Supplemental analysis of the data reported by the few additional studies (Horlick, 1955;Manson, 1949;Winne, 1951) that have involved a study of the validity of individual items within published scales has produced consistent results. Based on the Wiener (1948) classification, in each case relatively more of the "obvious" than "subtle" items discriminated.…”

Anxiety and stress in learning: the role of intraserial duplication.

“…The procedure in the present experiment was identical with that reported in Deese, Lazarus, and Keenan (1) with two exceptions. In the first place, the Taylor Anxiety Scale (4) was employed in the present study while Winne's Neuroticism Inventory (6) was used in the earlier experiment. It has been pointed out, however, that both inventories are highly correlated, and when the earlier data are reanalyzed for anxiety rather than neuroticism, the results are substantially the same.…”

Anxiety, anxiety reduction, and stress in learning.

“…The Johns Hopkins University. The selections were based on a personality questionnaire consisting of 30 items which were culled from the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory by Winne (8). These items had been chosen on the basis of the fact that they differentiated significantly between a neurotic and normal population, and the test was consequently called a "neuroticistn inventory."…”