Question

Locate a peer-reviewed article that describes a personality assessment. Summarize the assessment. Be sure to include basic information (e.g., number of items, purpose of assessment) and more advanced/interesting information (e.g., controversy surrounding its use, application to diverse/international populations).

Answer 1

Carver and White developed a personality assessment based on J. A. Gray’s model of personality, called the Reinforcemnt Sensitivity Theory, which held that two physiological motivational systems underlie human behaviour and emotion, namely, a behavioral inhibition system (BIS) and a behavioral activation system (BAS). The BIS is responsible for inducing behavioir to avoid aversive stimuli whereas the BAS is associated with approaching goal doreceted behaviour. researchers developed a 24 item self-report scale to assess the innate dispositional functioning of the BIS and the BAS. The responses are likert type wherein the respondent is required show their agreement with an item from a scale of 1 to 5.

A critique published in response to the scale has noted that it shows variation among different samples with respect to its psychometric properties, challenging its generalisability. It was also reported that items of the scale measuring BIS sensitivity did not adequately cover the breadth of the theoretical domain as stated in Gray’s model.

References:

Carver, C. S., & White, T. L. (1994). Behavioral inhibition, behavioral activation, and affective responses to impending reward and punishment: The BIS/BAS Scales. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 67(2), 319-333.

Norman G. Poythress, John F. Edens, Kristin Landfield, Scott O. Lilienfeld, Jennifer L. Skeem, and  Kevin S. Douglas. Pers Individ Dif. 2008 Sep; 45(4): 269–275.