Guilford Zimmerman Temperament Survey
RATIONALE
Numerous series of Guilford personality inventories have been persistent to get them helpful. Substantiation studies from various sources have provided objective evidence to support their assurance in the instrument and this increasing predisposition to administer the personal inventories in combination with others in order to acquire comprehensive images of individual personalities. The time required for administration and scoring of these three inventories has caught the attention for the need of single inventory which would supply in the same way complete coverage in a more reasonable and efficient approach. Inter correspondence studies of the 13 traits scores have specified that some practical considerations and exceptions could well be endured. through this deliberations in mind, a new inventory was created with the its main objectives: single booklet of items and answer sheet, efficient scoring method, scope of traits proven to have the most usefulness and exceptionality, consideration and exclusions of traits score where inter correspondence are satisfactorily high.
HISTORICAL FOUNDATIONS
Guilford graduated from the University of Nebraska before studying under Edward Titchener at Cornell. In 1938 Guilford became the 3rd President of the Psychometric Society, following in the footsteps of its founder Louis Leon Thurstone and of EL Thorndike who held the position in 1937. Guilford held a number of posts at Nebraska and briefly at the University of Southern California. In 1941 he entered the U.S. Army as a Lieutenant Colonel and served as Director of Psychological Research Unit No. 3 at Santa Ana Army Air Base. There he worked on the selection and ranking of aircrew trainees as the Army Air Force investigated why a sizable proportion of trainees was not graduating. Promoted to Chief of the Psychological Research Unit at the U.S. Army Air Forces Training Command Headquarters in Fort Worth, Guilford oversaw the "Stanines Project," which identified eight specific intellectual abilities crucial to flying a plane. (Stanines , now a common term in educational psychology, was coined during Guilford's project). Over the course of World War II, Guilford's use of these eight factors in the
development of the two-day Classification Test Battery was significant in increasing graduation rates for aircrew trainees. Discharged as a full Colonel after the War, Guilford joined the Education faculty at the University of Southern California and continued to research the factors of intelligence. He published widely on what he ultimately named the Structure of Intellect theory, and his post-War research identified a total of 90 discrete intellectual abilities and 30 behavioral abilities. Guilford's 20 years of research at Southern California were funded by the National Science Foundation, the Office of Education of the former Health, Education and Welfare Department, and the Office of Naval Research. Although Guilford's subjects were recruits at the Air Force Training Command at Randolph Air Force Base, San Antonio, the Office of Naval Research managed this research. Guilford's post-War research led to the development of classification testing that, modified in different ways, entered into the various personnel assessments administered by all branches of the U.S. Armed Services. Thus, in a generic manner, all U.S. Military qualifying exams of the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s may be said to have descended from Guilford's research.
Since the year of publication of GZTS is more than 60 years, we do then recommend to revise this test so that it will fit better to those people who will undertake this test.
ADMINISTRATION, SCORING, AND INTERPRETATION
The GTZS was not developed to measure clinical symptoms or psychopathology, therefore, norms were derived from a general adult sample. A criticism of the GZTS is that the 10 scales can be summarized in terms of four broader, second-order traits, namely:
Social Activity, Introversion-Extraversion, Emotional Stability, and Paranoid
Disposition. The scoring of the Guilford-Zimmerman Temperament Survey is understandable. The explanation for it was only brief but it explained well on what to do. In interpreting the test, the manual was helpful because it explained each trait that was used. It said all the important things that we need to know about the result of the test. However, we suggest that they could have mentioned something on how to administer the test. It was fine if the one administering the test had a lot of experience but if the
person administering is in its first time then they might have a problem. This may cause the test to be invalidated because of the things that had been done wrong.
RELIABILITY MEASURES UNDERTAKEN Reliability is the consistency of a test. Definitely it is a major factor that helps the test to measure close to accurate. As the table indicates, the test is highly reliable. The test re-tests reliability shows a good score considering that individuals vary on a certain extent.
Table 1 Reliability of GZTS scale
Scale
Internal consistency
SE
Test re-test reliability
G
.79
2.5
.67
R
.80
2.2
.74
A
.82
2.5
.53
S
.87
2.4
.71
E
.84
2.4
.71
O
.75
2.6
.64
F
.75
2.5
.65
T
.80
2.2
.58
P
.80
2.2
.64
M
.82
2.3
.80
Source: Guilford et al. (1976)
We will notice on the table above that, test re-test reliability column has a slightly scattered scores. That type of reliability should have a short interval. When an interval is long, the test may encounter problems and difficulties during the said interval. The test re-test reliability should only exceed from six months. I suggest that aside from using test re-test type of reliability, they can also use the alternate form of reliability. In alternate form, same persons can be tested with one form occasionally and another equivalent test form on the second. This will help to avoid encountering
difficult problems. Meanwhile, the standard error of the test is certainly small enough to make the set suitable for teenagers
VALIDATION UNDERTAKEN
According to research, GZTS lacks validity data. Little work has been done on refining this test during recent years. It needs to be refined since Guilford factors do not have clear homogeneous factors. Some of the Guilford factors appeared to be identical to those of Cattell. Aside from this, the scales used in this test like neuroticism , social adaptation, energy, introversion, and masculinity resembles to some extent in the big 5 factors (Perry, 1952). Lowell (1945) reported intercorrelations of the 13 earlier scales that ranged from -.23 to .74. Of these intercorrelations, 62 were significant (p<.01). The Guilford- Zimmerman manual reports intercorrelations of the 10 traits as high as .61 with many around .40.
As you can see in the first paragraph, there is a problem with regards to the correlations. The correlations in each scale tend to be too small, thus, fails to clarify the validity of these scales. In addition, the other reason why there is a failure in the validity of these scales is because the factors are not simply clear. It resembles too many tests that make the validity of the test questionable — whether it really measures what it purports to measure. Notice also that it was mentioned above that little work has been done on refining this test. It would be better if this test would use a more recently constructed and better standardized test. In totality, we conclude that it would not be seem sensible to use this test as a factorial account of personality since the factors/ scales are not sufficiently apparent.
USEFULENESS OF THE TEST
The Guilford-Zimmerman Temperament Survey is useful for career planning, counseling and research. It is helpful for organizational psychologists, personnel professionals, clinical psychologists, and counseling professionals in mental health
facilities, businesses, and educational settings because it measures attributes related to personality and character that might help predict successful performance in various occupations. Also, it identifies students who may have trouble adjusting to school and the types of problems that may occur. Assessing temperamental trends that may be the source of problems and conflicts in marriage or other relationships is another useful factor of GTZS. In addition, it provides objective personality information to complement other data that may assist with personnel selection, placement, and development.
STRENGTHS AND DOWNSIDES OF THE TEST Advantages
1. GZTS measures personality alone and it is an advantage to this type of test for it focuses more on the personality of an individual and leaves other aspects of his being assessed by other types of tests.
2. GZTS measures an individual's potential for learning as well as an individual's learning disabilities that no other test could evaluate, for other
tests only measure the emotional and psychological aspects of an individual.
3. GZTS measures an individual's temperament unlike other tests that assess an individual's personality by the way they answer a question (Myers Briggs Personality Test) and measures the personality and emotional traits of an individual by relating to a situation given to them (Hogan Personality Inventory).
4. GZTS determines how an individual could relate in his workplace to conflict and personal relationships unlike other test types that only evaluates an individual’s capacity to weigh and carry situations based on the tests done to
him.
Disadvantages
1. GZTS measures personality alone which obviously tells us that it doesn’t evaluate other aspects of an individual’s personality which are also helpful for
that certain individual being assessed.
2. GZTS measures only an individual's potential for learning as well as an individual's learning disabilities. It is beyond the duty of this type of test to predict an individual’s behavioral tendencies with respect to reasoning a nd
emotions, such as extroversion, sensitivity, attention span and openness to change (16 Personality Factors test).
3. GZTS offers a very limited service to an individual’s assessment of personality.
It
couldn’t
evaluate
other
aspects
of
an
individual
like
Agreeableness, Introversion or Extraversion, Dependence or Independence, Openness to Experiences, Methodology, and Industry (Six Factor Personality Questionnaire).
