The MMPI-2

            The MMPI-2 stands for the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. The first and original MMPI was published in 1940 by Starke R. Hathaway and J. C. McKinley at the University of Minnesota, but the MMPI-2, which is the revised version of the personality test was published in 1989. This revision fixed concerns about accuracy/ validity and removed sexist and racist questions in the original test. It is currently the most-used test, even though a shorter MMPI-2-RF was released in 2008 as well as the MMPI-A, which is designed specifically for teenagers. This is because of its large pre-existing research base and its familiarity with psychologists. 

            Because it is copyrighted by the University of Minnesota and clinicians must pay to administer it, you can’t find the test online- or at least, a legitimate one- as a trained psychologist must give and assess the results of the test. Before taking the test, clinical interviews are often necessary to provide context for the patient’s possible psychological problems. Although it can be taken on the computer, it upholds its validity and ensures that the results are interpreted with the person’s specific psychological profile in mind. 

What does it test?

            This is a very extensive one-to-two hour 567 true/false test that is designed to test 10 clinical scales ranging from 0-9 and validity scales that will assess the accuracy and truthfulness of the person’s responses. The results are the based on and compared to a large sample population. If there are any extremes in a person’s answers, there may be a psychological issue present. Each of the 10 clinical scales represent different psychological conditions like depression (scale 2), paranoia (scale 6), and social introversion (scale 0).

www.northtree.gr, 2012.

            Above is an example of MMPI-2 results used in a training for the administering the test by the North Tree Education and Consulting program. Many MMPI-2 results will look like this, with abbreviations for the 10 clinical scales at the bottom as well as how far the test-taker deviates from the sample population.

Because the MMPI-2 has had some controversial use as a screening instrument for jobs as well legal cases outside of clinical psychology, validity scales are important to ensure honest answers. The first validity scale is the L Scale or the Lie scale. It detects when a patient purposely attempts to make themselves appear as positive as possible. The F scale tests for atypical ways of doing the test, like randomly filling it out. There are 60 randomly placed F scale items throughout the test, and if there are too many answered incorrectly, the test will be invalidated. Other important scales are the TRIN Scale and VRIN Scale, which detect inconsistent responses. As you can see from all of these validity tests, even thought the MMPI-2 is not perfect, it is an extremely useful and fairly accurate personality test.