Tests, Measures, Instruments & Surveys
Introduction
Psychological and educational testing and measuring instruments are an important part of research and clinical practice in the social sciences. There are thousands of testing and measuring instruments available today.
Finding the right psychological test or measure for your research needs can be a challenging task since there is no single source to consult and your source may only include a test description or review, not an actual copy of the test.
Another issue is whether you want to find information about a test -- psychometric information such as reliability, validity and norm development -- or whether you want to find the actual instrument used for a particular research project.
Availability of psychological tests and measures depends on whether they are published or unpublished, as defined below:
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Published tests are commercially available for purchase. These measurement instruments have established validity, reliabilility and norms and typically come with test manuals and testing protocols. In many cases only qualified or professionally trained individuals can purchase copies. Gleeson Library does not collect restricted tests.
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Unpublished tests are found in the scholarly literature of psychology and have typically been developed by university researchers or other professionals, government agencies, or nonprofit organizations. Copies of these tests may sometimes be found as appendices to journal articles, dissertations, books and other research reports. While access to these tests is not restricted, ethical conduct requires that these tests should be used only with the permission of the instrument's author. Gleeson Library does not collect unpublished tests.
Finding published tests
The following databases and print resources can assist with finding published tests.
- Mental Measurements Yearbook with Tests In Print
Mental Measurements Yearbook provides users with a comprehensive guide to over 2,000 contemporary testing instruments. Tests in Print serves as a comprehensive bibliography to all known commercially available tests that are currently in print in the English language.
- PsycTESTS
Provides access to psychological tests, measures, scales, surveys, and other assessments as well as descriptive information about the test and its development and administration.
- Finding Information about Psychological Tests
APA Science Directorate FAQ
APA neither sells nor endorses testing instruments, but does provide guidance in using available resources to find psychological tests.
- TestLink
The Educational Testing Service (ETS) Test Collection.
- Test Critiques (print)
Detailed critiques on the most frequently used psychological, educational, and business tests.
- Directory of Unpublished Experimental Mental Measures (print)
Provides researchers with ready access to information about recently developed or recently used experimental measurement scales.
- Measures for Clinical Practice 2013 (print)
Measures for Clinical Practice 2007 (print)
Provides actual measures for students and practitioners to use. Includes description, norms, scoring, reliability, validity, and references, in addition to the measures themselves.
PsycINFO
The APA PsycINFO database indexes tests that are used in psychological research studies as well as studies that have evaluated a specific test or group of tests on a specific topic.
For a basic introduction on how to search for tests see the short tutorial Searching PsycINFO's Tests and Measures Field
And here is a pdf document for you to print out APA tests and measures PsycINFO
In the PsycINFO database:
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Most students want to search for copies of tests. The term appended is used by PsycINFO to describe whether a copy of the test, survey, etc. is included in the article. The best way to search for copies of tests is to start by entering the term "appended" in the Tests & Measures field. Once you have your results, add keywords in the next search box, e.g. age or aging.
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If you know the name, you can search for studies that used a specific test or measure -- enter your test name using the Tests & Measures field (note: it is best to omit the scale, inventory, etc. part of a test name, e.g, use just "myers briggs type").
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You can also use the More pull-down menu to use the Tests & Measures Index to browse for your specific test. You will see an alphabetical list that can be rather laborious to scroll through.
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To search for studies that have evaluated a specific test:
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enter the name of the test in the first row of search boxes or enter a search term or phrase -- keep it simple like "age or aging"
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in the second row of search boxes enter "222*", changing the pull-down menu to the Classification field. This will find publications where measurement, test construction, and test validity are major aspects of a study.
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Search for tests on a specific topic -- enter subject keywords, e.g., "body image" to find studies on a topic. Review the records you find, looking specifically at the Test and Measures field to see what tests have been used. Again, this is a rather laborious approach.
You can also use the same strategies in the PsycNET database where you will find full-text journal articles as well as books and book chapters.
Alternatives
There are several other ways to find surveys, questionnaires, tests, scales and measures outside of the specialized databases.
The best option is to visit some academic web sites that provide copies of tests that are freely available for use by students or other scholars.
Here are a few that could be useful to students (all of these sites are freely available and can be retrieved through web searches):
1. Resources for Psychology and Social Psychology
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Alan Reifman, PhD, Professor, Human Development and Family Studies at Texas Tech University: Gateway to Alan Reifman's Academic Webpages and Blogs
Look specifically at:
Resources for Scholars and the Public
Surveys: **Questionnaire Instrument Compendium**, **Emerging Adulthood Questionnaire (IDEA)**
2. Psychological Tests
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Ron Okada, Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Faculty of Health, York University, Toronto, Ontario (word and pdf documents):
3. Psychological Research on the 'Net
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Links to known experiments on the internet that are psychologically related. They are organized by general topic area with the topic areas listed chronologically with the most recently added at the top. Maintained by John H. Krantz, Ph.D.
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Sponsored by the Hanover College Psychology Department
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Click on Resources to find links to a selection of web resources that are relevant to psychology students.
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4. Online Social Psychology Studies
Examples of how tests & measures are used
Australian Unity, in partnership with the Australian Centre on Quality of Life at Deakin University, regularly measures how satisfied Australians are with their own lives and with life in Australia. Using the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index, it investigates satisfaction with economic, environmental and social conditions in Australia, and gives insights into individual wellbeing.
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The Australian Unity Personal Wellbeing Index tool offers a simple test to those wanting to measure their wellbeing. Using markers including satisfaction with health, personal relationships, standard of living and sense of community, the tool computes an individual’s wellbeing score, and advises if it is in the normal range for Australians.
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There is an archive of previous Wellbeing reports
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A dissertation using the Australian Unity Personal Wellbeing Index:
Bittar, R. (2009). Subjective Wellbeing Maintenance - Investigating Depression as Suppressed Homeostatically Protected Mood. (large pdf; may take a few moments to download)
Two pdf documents pertaining to Acceptance and Commitment Therapy that include measures:
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Measures Package. Measures of potential relevance to ACT.
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy Measures Package with full credits
More information about Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): can be found on the Empirical Research page.