This article was downloaded by: [Central Michigan University] On: 29 December 2014, At: 06:32 Publisher: Routledge Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Journal of Personality Assessment Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/hjpa20
Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population Christiane Brems & Mark E. Johnson Published online: 10 Jun 2010.
To cite this article: Christiane Brems & Mark E. Johnson (1991) Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population, Journal of Personality Assessment, 56:3, 536-544, DOI: 10.1207/s15327752jpa5603_14 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15327752jpa5603_14
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions
JOURNAL OF PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT, 1991, 56(3), 536-544 Copyright @ 1991, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population Christiane Brems and Mark E. Johnson Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
University of Alaska, Anchorage
This study explored the usefulness of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) Subtle-Obvious scales as profile validity indicators with a inpatient psychiatric population. Some 292 MMPI profiles were utilized and divided into overreporters, underreporters, and standard reporters, based on their Subtle-Obvious scale scores. Reporting style was shown to be unrelated to actual patient pathology because of the lack of relationship between reporting style and diagnostic categorization according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd ed., rev. [DSM-111-R]; American Psychiatric Association, 1987) Axis I and 11. Comparisons of MMPI profiles of the three groups revealed that overreporters endorsed more pathology on the MMPI clinical scales than did either underreporters or standard reporters. The same pattern of response style was demonstrated by subjects on another objective measure, the Beck Depression Inventory, whereas on a projective measure, the Rorschach Inkblot Test, there were no differences between groups. These findings suggest that clinicians may want to utilize the Subtle-Obvious scales to gain information about MMPI profile validity. Specifically, profiles of patients identified as overreporters should be interpreted with caution so as to not overstate their level of pathology.
Since their development by Weiner and Harmon (1946), the Subtle-Obvious scales for the MMPI clinical scales of Depression, Hysteria, Psychopathic Deviate, Paranoia, and Hypomania, have been widely used by clinicians who rely upon the MMPI as one of their assessment tools. This is evidenced by t h e inclusion of these scales in major MMPI scoring and interpretive programs that are o n the market today (e.g., Applied Innovations, 1986). Their frequent use occurs despite t h e fact that little research has been reported a n d that t h e
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES
557
meaning of the scales is not entirely clear due to the lack of systematic investigation. Research has focused primarily on content validation of the various scales as well as predictive power with regard to various personality traits or pathologies , & Hovanitz, 1979; (Burkhart, Gynther, & Fromuth, 1980; G ~ n t h e rBurkhart, Hovanitz & Gynther, 1980; Hovanitz, Gynther; & Marks, 1983; Hovanitz & Jordan-Brown, 1986).Although the results of these studies have been somewhat mixed, there has been a general tendency for obvious items to be better predictors than subtle items. All but one of these studies (Hovanitz &JordanBrown, 1986),however, utilized college students as subjects, making the findings somewhat limited in their generalizability. Greene (1980) suggested that the Subtle-Obvious scales might better be utilized as overall indicators of profile validity. This notion was addressed to somle extent by Burkhart, Christian, and Gynther (1978),who explored the relatiortship of the Subtle-Obvious scales with psychological mindedness. They found that highly psychologically minded subjects endorsed more subtle items whereas nonpsychologically minded subjects endorsed more obvious ones. Since this study, a number of researchers have addressed the issue of profile validity by asking college students to take the MMPI under various response sets to discover if Subtle-Obvious scale differences might be used to detect response sets (Burkhart et al., 1978; Grow, McVaugh, &Eno, 1980;Wasyliw, Grossman, Haywood, & Cavanaugh, 1988).Results of these studies were somewhat mixed: Grow et al. (1980) reported that faking good conditions could be predicted fairly well, but that other conditions could not be distinguished; Burkhart et al. (1978)reported that faking bad conditions increased the number of obvious item endorsements and decreased the number of subtle ones. Similarly, Wasyliw et a]. (1988) found that malingerers endorsed significantly more obvious than subtle items. The preceding overview and a more extensive literature review by Dubinsky, Gamble, and Rogers (1985)on the MMPI Subtle-Obvious scales pointed toward the need for continued research in the area, especially with regard to using these scales as validity indicators. This is an important research focus because, despite limited conclusiveness of the literature in the area, many clinicians use these scales in an attempt to obtain a better understanding of a client and of the validity of the MMPI profiles. Thus, this study was designed to explore the appropriateness of utilizing the Subtle-Obvious scales as validity indicators. This was done in several ways. Following a procedure outlined by Greene (1988), the sample was divided into underreporters, overreporters, and standard reporters. Diagnostic patterns were explored for these three groups, and their mean profiles were compared. Furthermore, external validity criteria (both objective and projective assessment data) were utilized to assess whether there was a difference among these three groups with regard to over- or underendorsement of pathology.
538
BREMS AND JOHNSON
METHOD
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
Subjects and Procedures This study utilized 292 MMPI Form-G profiles collected from psychiatric patients at an adult mental health inpatient unit. Of these patients, there were 206 women and 86 men; ages ranged from 18 to 71 years, with a mean of 34.62 and a standard deviation of 12.12. The racial composition of the patients was as follows: 8.2% African American, .7% Asian American, 1% Hispanic, 1.7% Native American, and 88.4% White. Based upon available DSM-111-R (American Psychiatric Association, 1987) diagnoses, subjects were categorized into six diagnostic groupings for the purposes of this study: three Axis I groupings of affective disorders (major depression, dysthymia), psychotic disorders (schizophrenia, delusional disorder), and adjustment disorders; and three Axis I1 clusters as suggested by DSM-111-R, namely, odd, eccentric behavior cluster, dramatic, emotional behavior cluster, and anxious, fearful behavior cluster. Diagnoses were determined by consensus of a multidisciplinary treatment team, consisting of a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a social worker, psychology interns, and psychiatry residents, and were based upon case history, clinical observation, and assessment results. Using a procedure described by Greene (1988), based on Subtle-Obvious scale scores, subjects were divided into three groups (overreporters, standard reporters, and underreporters). In this method, difference scores are calculated for each of the five pairs of subtle-obvious scores by subtracting the subtle score from the obvious score. For each subject, these difference scores are then summed to provide one total score. Across all subjects, quartiles are calculated and subjects categorized as follows: overreporters are those who score within the top quarcile of the distribution of these scores, underreporters in the bottom quartile, and standard reporters in the second or third quartiles. In Greene's (1988) study this resulted in cutoff criteria of a score lower than -8 for underreporters, a score between - 8 and 89 for standard reporters, and a score above 89 for overreporters. In the current sample, cutoffs were slightly different, pointing toward the importance of having cutoffs specific to the type of population from which a subject is drawn. Specifically, in this sample scores lower than 11.5 indicated underreporting, scores between 11.5 and 127.75 indicated standard reporting, and scores above 127.75 indicated overreporting. The difference between Greene's (1988)cutoffs and the current cutoffs appear to reflect the greater endorsed ~athologyin an inpatient versus an outpatient sample. The categorization process resulted in 73 overreporters, 73 underreporters, and 146 standard reporters for the current study.
Design and Statistical Analyses After grouping subjects according to reporting style, the following analyses were conducted. First, to determine if there were differences in reporting style based
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES
539
upon diagnostic categories, two chi-square statistics were calculated. Second, to determine if reporting style resulted in differential MMPI profiles, a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was calculated on the 3 validity and 10 clinical scales. Third, mean profiles for each group by gender were plotted and compared. Finally, to assess the relationship between reporting style and responses to objective and projective measures of psychopathology, two tests were conducted: a MANOVA calculated using reporting style and gender as independent variables and four Rorschach indices (schizophrenia, suicide potential, affective ratio, and depression) as dependent variables, and an ANOVA with reporting style and gender as independent variables and Beck Depression Inventory total score as dependent variable. For all of these analyses, alpha levels were set at .005 to control for Type I error due to the large number of analyses.
RESULTS Two chi-square statistics were computed to compare the different DSM-111-R diagnostic categories to determine if there was a relationship between diagnosis and reporting style. In both analyses, expected frequency for reporting style was set based upon the quartile method of differentiating reporting style. No significant findings were revealed for either the three Axis 1 or Axis I1 categories, x2(8, N = 213) = 8.57, p < .38 and x2(8, N = 148) = 6.59, p < .58, respectively. These results revealed that reporting style is not related to patient diagnosis. To compare the MMPI ~rofilesof the three reporting style groups, a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) MANOVA was calculated using the 3 validity and 10 clinical scales as dependent variables. Results indicated significant main effects for gender and reporting style, F(13, 274) = 13.66, P < .001; F(26, 548) = 24.21, p < .001, respectively. Univariate analyses for the gender main effect indicated that women's and men's scores significantly differed from one another only on MMPI Scale 5 (Masculinity/Femininity), F(l,284) = 112.24, p < .001, with men scoring higher (M = 63.64) than women (M = 48.06). For the reporting style effect, as shown in Table I,, univariate analyses revealed significant differences on 12 of the 13 MMPI validity and clinical scales, with the only exception being Scale 5. Post hoc analyses of the mean differences, using Scheffe's method with significance level set at .01, were conducted. Examining first the 3 validity scales, the underreporters had the highest mean L score, a score which differed significantly from the standard and overreporters, whose mean scores did not differ from one another. On the F and K scales, all three group means differed significantly from one another. The overreporters had the highest mean score on F, whereas the underreporters had the highest score on K. This pattern indicates that standard reporters produced the most
540
BREMS AND JOHNSON
TABLE 1 Mean T Scores, F and p for MMPI Validity Scales L, F, K, and MMPI Clinical Scales 1 to 0, by Reporting Style Reporting Style Scale
Under
Standard
Over
F(2, 286)
L F
56.12 57.58 61.27 60.71 64.97 66.10 71.81 51.66 62.44 62.93 64.84 57.89 52.63
50.14 66.03 49.35 67.21 79.47 70.75 76.45 52.23 70.61 74.58 77.48 61.98 62.91
47.96 88.29 42.67 77.85 84.89 74.12 83.62 54.47 85.33 85.01 99.68 67.60 72.88
21.28* 128.31* 136.14* 26.84* 39.77* 6.41** 10.33* 1.99 62.30* 47.22* 99.99* 8.85* 64.91*
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
K 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0
*p < .001. **p < .005.
valid protocols, whereas overreporters produced the most likely faked validity profiles. For the clinical scales, post hoc results revealed a consistent pattern across all nine significant findings. Specifically, these analyses revealed that all three groups had significantly different mean scores from each other, with the overreporters having the highest scores on the nine scales, the standard reporters having the second highest score, and the underreporters having the lowest score. No significant results were revealed for the Gender x Reporting Style interaction, F(26, 548) = .79, P < .76. Figures 1 and 2 provide the mean profiles for the patients, broken down by reporting style and gender. To assess whether differences in reporting style are related to responses to objective versus projective measures of psychopathology, the three groups were compared relative to Beck Depression Inventory total scores and Rorschach indices. Results of a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) analysis of variance (ANOVA) for the Beck Depression Inventory total score revealed a main effect for reporting style, F(2, 113) = 36.82, P < .001. Post hoc analyses, using Scheffe's procedure, revealed the same pattern as the MMPI clinical scales. That is, all three mean scores differed significantly from one another, with overreporters scoring the highest (M = 32.76), standard reporters scoring next highest (M = 20.42), and underreporters scoring the lowest (M = 10.97). No significant findings were revealed for the Gender x Reporting Style interaction or Gender main effect, F(2, 113) = 0.86, f~ < .43; F(l, 113) = 2.12, < .15, respectively. The results of a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) MANOVA, using the Rorschach indices of schizophrenia, suicide ~otential,affective ratio,
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES T d C
1
L
F
K
120 7
"5+ FEMALE
110
105
loo
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
95
-
Journal of Personality Assessment Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/hjpa20
Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population Christiane Brems & Mark E. Johnson Published online: 10 Jun 2010.
To cite this article: Christiane Brems & Mark E. Johnson (1991) Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population, Journal of Personality Assessment, 56:3, 536-544, DOI: 10.1207/s15327752jpa5603_14 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s15327752jpa5603_14
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE Taylor & Francis makes every effort to ensure the accuracy of all the information (the “Content”) contained in the publications on our platform. However, Taylor & Francis, our agents, and our licensors make no representations or warranties whatsoever as to the accuracy, completeness, or suitability for any purpose of the Content. Any opinions and views expressed in this publication are the opinions and views of the authors, and are not the views of or endorsed by Taylor & Francis. The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. Terms & Conditions of access and use can be found at http://www.tandfonline.com/page/terms-and-conditions
JOURNAL OF PERSONALITY ASSESSMENT, 1991, 56(3), 536-544 Copyright @ 1991, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.
Subtle-Obvious Scales of the MMPI: Indicators of Profile Validity in a Psychiatric Population Christiane Brems and Mark E. Johnson Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
University of Alaska, Anchorage
This study explored the usefulness of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) Subtle-Obvious scales as profile validity indicators with a inpatient psychiatric population. Some 292 MMPI profiles were utilized and divided into overreporters, underreporters, and standard reporters, based on their Subtle-Obvious scale scores. Reporting style was shown to be unrelated to actual patient pathology because of the lack of relationship between reporting style and diagnostic categorization according to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd ed., rev. [DSM-111-R]; American Psychiatric Association, 1987) Axis I and 11. Comparisons of MMPI profiles of the three groups revealed that overreporters endorsed more pathology on the MMPI clinical scales than did either underreporters or standard reporters. The same pattern of response style was demonstrated by subjects on another objective measure, the Beck Depression Inventory, whereas on a projective measure, the Rorschach Inkblot Test, there were no differences between groups. These findings suggest that clinicians may want to utilize the Subtle-Obvious scales to gain information about MMPI profile validity. Specifically, profiles of patients identified as overreporters should be interpreted with caution so as to not overstate their level of pathology.
Since their development by Weiner and Harmon (1946), the Subtle-Obvious scales for the MMPI clinical scales of Depression, Hysteria, Psychopathic Deviate, Paranoia, and Hypomania, have been widely used by clinicians who rely upon the MMPI as one of their assessment tools. This is evidenced by t h e inclusion of these scales in major MMPI scoring and interpretive programs that are o n the market today (e.g., Applied Innovations, 1986). Their frequent use occurs despite t h e fact that little research has been reported a n d that t h e
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES
557
meaning of the scales is not entirely clear due to the lack of systematic investigation. Research has focused primarily on content validation of the various scales as well as predictive power with regard to various personality traits or pathologies , & Hovanitz, 1979; (Burkhart, Gynther, & Fromuth, 1980; G ~ n t h e rBurkhart, Hovanitz & Gynther, 1980; Hovanitz, Gynther; & Marks, 1983; Hovanitz & Jordan-Brown, 1986).Although the results of these studies have been somewhat mixed, there has been a general tendency for obvious items to be better predictors than subtle items. All but one of these studies (Hovanitz &JordanBrown, 1986),however, utilized college students as subjects, making the findings somewhat limited in their generalizability. Greene (1980) suggested that the Subtle-Obvious scales might better be utilized as overall indicators of profile validity. This notion was addressed to somle extent by Burkhart, Christian, and Gynther (1978),who explored the relatiortship of the Subtle-Obvious scales with psychological mindedness. They found that highly psychologically minded subjects endorsed more subtle items whereas nonpsychologically minded subjects endorsed more obvious ones. Since this study, a number of researchers have addressed the issue of profile validity by asking college students to take the MMPI under various response sets to discover if Subtle-Obvious scale differences might be used to detect response sets (Burkhart et al., 1978; Grow, McVaugh, &Eno, 1980;Wasyliw, Grossman, Haywood, & Cavanaugh, 1988).Results of these studies were somewhat mixed: Grow et al. (1980) reported that faking good conditions could be predicted fairly well, but that other conditions could not be distinguished; Burkhart et al. (1978)reported that faking bad conditions increased the number of obvious item endorsements and decreased the number of subtle ones. Similarly, Wasyliw et a]. (1988) found that malingerers endorsed significantly more obvious than subtle items. The preceding overview and a more extensive literature review by Dubinsky, Gamble, and Rogers (1985)on the MMPI Subtle-Obvious scales pointed toward the need for continued research in the area, especially with regard to using these scales as validity indicators. This is an important research focus because, despite limited conclusiveness of the literature in the area, many clinicians use these scales in an attempt to obtain a better understanding of a client and of the validity of the MMPI profiles. Thus, this study was designed to explore the appropriateness of utilizing the Subtle-Obvious scales as validity indicators. This was done in several ways. Following a procedure outlined by Greene (1988), the sample was divided into underreporters, overreporters, and standard reporters. Diagnostic patterns were explored for these three groups, and their mean profiles were compared. Furthermore, external validity criteria (both objective and projective assessment data) were utilized to assess whether there was a difference among these three groups with regard to over- or underendorsement of pathology.
538
BREMS AND JOHNSON
METHOD
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
Subjects and Procedures This study utilized 292 MMPI Form-G profiles collected from psychiatric patients at an adult mental health inpatient unit. Of these patients, there were 206 women and 86 men; ages ranged from 18 to 71 years, with a mean of 34.62 and a standard deviation of 12.12. The racial composition of the patients was as follows: 8.2% African American, .7% Asian American, 1% Hispanic, 1.7% Native American, and 88.4% White. Based upon available DSM-111-R (American Psychiatric Association, 1987) diagnoses, subjects were categorized into six diagnostic groupings for the purposes of this study: three Axis I groupings of affective disorders (major depression, dysthymia), psychotic disorders (schizophrenia, delusional disorder), and adjustment disorders; and three Axis I1 clusters as suggested by DSM-111-R, namely, odd, eccentric behavior cluster, dramatic, emotional behavior cluster, and anxious, fearful behavior cluster. Diagnoses were determined by consensus of a multidisciplinary treatment team, consisting of a psychologist, a psychiatrist, a social worker, psychology interns, and psychiatry residents, and were based upon case history, clinical observation, and assessment results. Using a procedure described by Greene (1988), based on Subtle-Obvious scale scores, subjects were divided into three groups (overreporters, standard reporters, and underreporters). In this method, difference scores are calculated for each of the five pairs of subtle-obvious scores by subtracting the subtle score from the obvious score. For each subject, these difference scores are then summed to provide one total score. Across all subjects, quartiles are calculated and subjects categorized as follows: overreporters are those who score within the top quarcile of the distribution of these scores, underreporters in the bottom quartile, and standard reporters in the second or third quartiles. In Greene's (1988) study this resulted in cutoff criteria of a score lower than -8 for underreporters, a score between - 8 and 89 for standard reporters, and a score above 89 for overreporters. In the current sample, cutoffs were slightly different, pointing toward the importance of having cutoffs specific to the type of population from which a subject is drawn. Specifically, in this sample scores lower than 11.5 indicated underreporting, scores between 11.5 and 127.75 indicated standard reporting, and scores above 127.75 indicated overreporting. The difference between Greene's (1988)cutoffs and the current cutoffs appear to reflect the greater endorsed ~athologyin an inpatient versus an outpatient sample. The categorization process resulted in 73 overreporters, 73 underreporters, and 146 standard reporters for the current study.
Design and Statistical Analyses After grouping subjects according to reporting style, the following analyses were conducted. First, to determine if there were differences in reporting style based
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES
539
upon diagnostic categories, two chi-square statistics were calculated. Second, to determine if reporting style resulted in differential MMPI profiles, a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was calculated on the 3 validity and 10 clinical scales. Third, mean profiles for each group by gender were plotted and compared. Finally, to assess the relationship between reporting style and responses to objective and projective measures of psychopathology, two tests were conducted: a MANOVA calculated using reporting style and gender as independent variables and four Rorschach indices (schizophrenia, suicide potential, affective ratio, and depression) as dependent variables, and an ANOVA with reporting style and gender as independent variables and Beck Depression Inventory total score as dependent variable. For all of these analyses, alpha levels were set at .005 to control for Type I error due to the large number of analyses.
RESULTS Two chi-square statistics were computed to compare the different DSM-111-R diagnostic categories to determine if there was a relationship between diagnosis and reporting style. In both analyses, expected frequency for reporting style was set based upon the quartile method of differentiating reporting style. No significant findings were revealed for either the three Axis 1 or Axis I1 categories, x2(8, N = 213) = 8.57, p < .38 and x2(8, N = 148) = 6.59, p < .58, respectively. These results revealed that reporting style is not related to patient diagnosis. To compare the MMPI ~rofilesof the three reporting style groups, a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) MANOVA was calculated using the 3 validity and 10 clinical scales as dependent variables. Results indicated significant main effects for gender and reporting style, F(13, 274) = 13.66, P < .001; F(26, 548) = 24.21, p < .001, respectively. Univariate analyses for the gender main effect indicated that women's and men's scores significantly differed from one another only on MMPI Scale 5 (Masculinity/Femininity), F(l,284) = 112.24, p < .001, with men scoring higher (M = 63.64) than women (M = 48.06). For the reporting style effect, as shown in Table I,, univariate analyses revealed significant differences on 12 of the 13 MMPI validity and clinical scales, with the only exception being Scale 5. Post hoc analyses of the mean differences, using Scheffe's method with significance level set at .01, were conducted. Examining first the 3 validity scales, the underreporters had the highest mean L score, a score which differed significantly from the standard and overreporters, whose mean scores did not differ from one another. On the F and K scales, all three group means differed significantly from one another. The overreporters had the highest mean score on F, whereas the underreporters had the highest score on K. This pattern indicates that standard reporters produced the most
540
BREMS AND JOHNSON
TABLE 1 Mean T Scores, F and p for MMPI Validity Scales L, F, K, and MMPI Clinical Scales 1 to 0, by Reporting Style Reporting Style Scale
Under
Standard
Over
F(2, 286)
L F
56.12 57.58 61.27 60.71 64.97 66.10 71.81 51.66 62.44 62.93 64.84 57.89 52.63
50.14 66.03 49.35 67.21 79.47 70.75 76.45 52.23 70.61 74.58 77.48 61.98 62.91
47.96 88.29 42.67 77.85 84.89 74.12 83.62 54.47 85.33 85.01 99.68 67.60 72.88
21.28* 128.31* 136.14* 26.84* 39.77* 6.41** 10.33* 1.99 62.30* 47.22* 99.99* 8.85* 64.91*
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
K 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0
*p < .001. **p < .005.
valid protocols, whereas overreporters produced the most likely faked validity profiles. For the clinical scales, post hoc results revealed a consistent pattern across all nine significant findings. Specifically, these analyses revealed that all three groups had significantly different mean scores from each other, with the overreporters having the highest scores on the nine scales, the standard reporters having the second highest score, and the underreporters having the lowest score. No significant results were revealed for the Gender x Reporting Style interaction, F(26, 548) = .79, P < .76. Figures 1 and 2 provide the mean profiles for the patients, broken down by reporting style and gender. To assess whether differences in reporting style are related to responses to objective versus projective measures of psychopathology, the three groups were compared relative to Beck Depression Inventory total scores and Rorschach indices. Results of a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) analysis of variance (ANOVA) for the Beck Depression Inventory total score revealed a main effect for reporting style, F(2, 113) = 36.82, P < .001. Post hoc analyses, using Scheffe's procedure, revealed the same pattern as the MMPI clinical scales. That is, all three mean scores differed significantly from one another, with overreporters scoring the highest (M = 32.76), standard reporters scoring next highest (M = 20.42), and underreporters scoring the lowest (M = 10.97). No significant findings were revealed for the Gender x Reporting Style interaction or Gender main effect, F(2, 113) = 0.86, f~ < .43; F(l, 113) = 2.12, < .15, respectively. The results of a 2 (Gender) x 3 (Reporting Style) MANOVA, using the Rorschach indices of schizophrenia, suicide ~otential,affective ratio,
SUBTLE-OBVIOUS SCALES T d C
1
L
F
K
120 7
"5+ FEMALE
110
105
loo
Downloaded by [Central Michigan University] at 06:32 29 December 2014
95
-
