Research and Course Guides: Psychology: Find tests & measures

Personality Measures

List of IPIP Scales

Looking for a questionnaire for a personality trait or other “individual difference” measure?

The International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) is an online collection of valid and reliable public domain tests. Look up a trait and then view a short list of items that have been shown to discriminate among levels of that construct. Add a Likert scale to the items and you have a questionnaire.

How to cite the IPIP? Answer is:

Name of Scale. Retrieved July 34, 2029, from International personality item pool: A scientific collaboratory for the development of advanced measures of personality traits and other individual differences: http://ipip.ori.org/

Finding Reviews of Tests

Mental Measurements Yearbook This link opens in a new window
A.k.a. “Buros”, this database provides a guide for evaluating over 2,500 testing instruments. Provides complete text of test reviews from 1985 9th edition through current edition.

Test Critiques
Cooper Library BF176 .T419
Volumes 1-11
These are still only available in print, but are a valuable collection of test reviews, if you have an older test or measure (1984-2005)

PsycTESTS

PsycTESTS This link opens in a new window
access to 5,000 psychological tests, measures, scales, and other assessments plus descriptive and administrative information

The full text of these tests and measures is often not included as a PDF in PsycTests.

If there is no PDF, look for a "Test Location" field which will tell you where to find a copy of the test in the journal article or book listed at the top of the record. (or there may just be a "Permissions" field that tells you to contact the author or publisher.

In order to best find your test topic, limit your search term to TI (Title) or SU (Subjects). This eliminates the tests where your topic is just one item in a questionnaire about something less relevant.

The correct APA Citation will be at the top of each test PDF. Example:

Stöber, J. (1999). Social Desirability Scale-17 [Database record]. Retrieved from PsycTESTS. doi: 10.1037/t03607-000

Finding tests and measures in dissertations

Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
index to 3.8 million dissertations and theses in all subject areas with 600,000+ in full text; 1861-present

The quickest and most successful path to finding copies of very specific surveys and questionnaires is in the appendices of dissertations.

Include the words "test," "survey," or "questionnaire" in your search. For example:

pets and therapy and college students and (test or survey or questionnaire)
instagram and self-esteem and (test or survey or questionnaire)

[Just copy, paste, substitute your variables for the ones that are in purple italics and you are good to go!]

It's recommended you use the drop-down menu to the right to limit your search terms to "Anywhere except full text – ALL"
This means that a survey/ questionnaire will have to be mentioned in the abstract /title of the dissertation (and not just somewhere in the full text) to be retrieved.
Choose a likely title, click on the PDF of the dissertation, and scroll all the way to the end to check the appendices for relevant tests and measures.