Distinguish between the reliability and the validity of a newly developed personality test. Describe the ways in which one can establish the test's reliability, validity, and norms.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Students' answers may vary.

The answer should include the following elements:

Reliability refers to the consistency with which a test measures a construct such as intelligence. Validity refers to the degree that a test actually measures what it intends to measure. One way to establish reliability might be to give a sample the test twice, weeks or months apart. If the test is reliable, an individual's two scores should be very nearly identical. One could establish a new test's validity by showing that scores on the test correlate at least moderately with scores on measures of personality traits related to extraversion, such as sociability, impulsivity, sensation seeking, and so on. The validity of a new test might also be established by showing that scores on the new test correlate well with scores on more well-established tests of extraversion. The test should be normed using a sample representative of the intended respondents. If the test is intended to assess the extraversion of adults generally, a sample representative of the American population should be used. The average score of the sample should be determined, as should some notion of the typical variability of the scores around the mean.