Psychological Assessment and Testing

Abstract

The field of psychological assessment is a multibillion-dollar business and probably touches more people than any other field of psychology. Various professionals, across different settings, administer psychological assessments and use the results to make important decisions about others. From childhood through adulthood, millions of individuals take and use psychological assessments to make important decisions about themselves and others. Given the wide-reaching use and effects of psychological assessments, effectively designing and teaching of psychological assessment courses is essential. For significant and valuable learning to occur, courses must be designed using a systematic and integrated competency-based approach, with purposeful and aligned course goals, outcomes, and learning objectives. Courses must be designed in a way that has personal meaning to students and extends beyond the classroom experience into the workforce. In this chapter, we present a systematic and integrated competency-based approach (based on Fink’s taxonomy of significant learning) for teaching courses related to psychological assessment. The approach helps those who design and teach psychological assessment sources achieve two major goals. The first goal is to provide students with learning opportunities to acquire the knowledge base needed to be informed consumers of psychological assessment. The second goal is to offer individuals who take workforce roles that involve identifying, administering, and/or interpreting psychological assessments with opportunities to acquire the knowledge base and professional skills needed to properly use psychological assessments to make good decisions.KeywordsPsychological assessmentPsychological testingTests and measurementsTeachingInstruction