Personality Assessments

Reading Chapter 12 this week was a good help into better understanding the assessment that I am going to be presenting on for class.  I chose a personality inventory because I find personalities to be extremely fascinating.  Part of what drew me into psychology and the school counseling field is gaining a better understanding of a person, what drives them to behave certain ways.  Everyone is so unique and your personality can influence everything you do in life and how you react to it.

The testing instrument that I have chosen to present on is the Piers-Harris Children's Self-Concept Scale, Second Edition.  I am really glad I got the opportunity to look into this instrument because I believe that self-concept is a very crucial part to understanding a person and helping them to  better themselves.  The idea of self-concept is a person's perception of who they are, how they function and their abilities.  As a school counselor this can tell us a lot about an individual and how we could better help them.  It will be more difficult to work with someone who has a negative self-concept so that would be an important place to start.  What I really like about tests such as the Piers-Harris 2 is that you can learn so much about yourself by taking it.  Drummond and Jones (2010) pointed out that personality inventories are used to identify structures and features of someone's personality but also bring them greater self-knowledge and self-understanding.

The other part of this chapter that I found to be very interesting was the projective instruments and techniques.  I have always thought that these were powerful and helpful ways to understand someone and their environment.  In particular the projective drawings can provide a great deal of information about a person just by asking them to draw a picture and have them explain it.  Although the interpretation is not consistent it still provides additional information to complete the puzzle.  I look forward to learning more about these assessments in class tonight!

Drummond, R. J. and Jones, K. (2010). Assessment procedures for counselors and helping professionals. Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.