Increasing the Flexibility of Implicit Personality Assessment: An Examination of a Universal Assessment Procedure of the Self

Abstract

The current studies systematically examined a new version of the Questionnaire-Based Implicit Association Test (qIAT), which minimizes the differences between direct and indirect modes of assessment. Studies 1a (N = 276) and 1 b (N = 238) tested a method that enables an indirect assessment of questionnaires that include only non-reversed items. Studies 2a (N = 255) and 2 b (N = 284) tested a task that substitutes the problematic construct-related category labels with generic, universal categories. These studies, which focused on extraversion, supported the feasibility, reliability and validity of this procedure. Studies 3a-3c (N = 159, 154 and 151, respectively) supported the internal consistency, test-retest reliability and convergent validity of these methods, assessing three well-researched, semantically complex personality scales: Aggressive Humor Style, Need for Closure and Anxiety Sensitivity. Studies 4a (N = 195) and 4 b (N = 283) supported the implicitness of the qIAT, as most respondents were not aware of this task’s purpose. In Study 4c (N = 598), participants who reported using antidepressants had lower self-esteem qIAT scores compared to a control group, thus supporting the criterion validity of this task. Taken together, findings suggest that the new qIAT substantially increases the scope of indirect personality assessment.

Open Scholarship

This article has earned the Center for Open Science badges for Open Data and Open Materials through Open Practices Disclosure. The data and materials are openly accessible at https://osf.io/xz5wp/. To obtain the author's disclosure form, please contact the Editor.

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Gidi Aviram for his helpful comments.

Conflicts of interests

The authors have no conflicts of interest to report.

Data availability

Measures, raw data, data processing code, processed data and analysis syntax of all present studies are openly available at https://osf.io/xz5wp/

Notes

1 Measures, raw data, data processing code, processed data and analysis syntax of all present studies are openly available at https://osf.io/xz5wp/

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported by the Israeli Science Foundation Grant 886/18 to Iftah Yovel.