The History of Psychological Assessment

The history of psychological testing is a gateway of development and has a copious significance to modern-day procedures. Taking into account that contemporary tests is just is merely an off- spring from this fruition; these methods of tests grew gradually way of a multitude of predecessors within the time span of one hundred years. This paper will be exploring a historical event that took place in China that assist with the psychology assessment that we use today. One of the branches of Clinical Psychological, Psychology Assessment, specializes in the area of measurement: traits, characteristics, and human abilities.

Primarily, utilize by psychologists to tests the quantity of intelligence, personality characteristics, and cognitive (e.g., thinking, attention, memory) characteristics (Cohen & Swerdlik, 2010).

Appling measurement gives a hypothesis to the questions of what, why, where, and who including that of space and time. Psychological measurement is primarily focused in on answering these question that of humans. The tactic of these inquiries is driven purely by our beliefs and curiosity concerning the nature of why we exist.

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From written documented history let us benefit and observe the nature of human’s ability to thrive throughout the many eras in order their desired to answers their “whys” in the many different forms.

As a result of the many professionals; their answers is in focuses of the “whys” they questioned and tried to answer. The origin of psychology assessment is believed to have begun in China approximately in 2200 B.C.E. Government officials established this assessment test because of the overwhelming number of people that were applying for civil servant jobs.

This method of conducting assessments was the rave of this era; obtaining a civil official position base off of a point system instead of lineage or influential connections, instituting a central role in Chinese social and intellectual life(Elman, 2000).

Civil service examinations were not an open opportunity for extensive social mobility; theses tests were not an avenue for the large mainstream of artisans and peasants to move forward in the cast system; from the lower classes into the privileged sphere. According to Liangyan (1998), “…data from the years 1500 to 1900 indicate that peasants, traders, and artisans, who made up 90 percent of the population, were not a significant part of the 2 to 3 million candidates who usually took the local biennial licensing tests”.

Government leaders and the majestic court had played a great role in influencing the continually this developing government by reexamine individuals yearly, and adjusting the tradional course in order to make it more difficult, and to improve the organizational system for deciding their civil servant workers. Resulting in the civil servant examinations, as a test of educational merit, also served to tie the dynasty and culture of China. It was an assessment of bureaucratically taste because it contains numerous elements: classical philosophy literature, philosophy, political, cultural, rituals, and educational (Elman, 2000).

Under the Sui dynasty, a civil service examination system consisting of three parts was initiated: regular examinations stressing classical cultural knowledge, a committee examination before the emperor stressing planning and administrative features, and a third examination on martial arts (Wang, 1993). Due to China being the first in documented history with their civil service examinations they contributed to the modern 21th century psychological testing because they set the foundation for the further curious individuals needing questions to their “whys”; from their progress of improvement and strategize of developmental reasoning in the advancement of civil testing other countries took notice.

Now, in the 21th century we utilize these assessment still for jobs such as professional, performance, and SATs even evaluation derive from design the Chinese assessment. One of the most important tests that we use in the field is intelligence test such as the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Test and the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children because it helps to assessment individuals that really care someone to protect, to help, aid, and coordinator avenues were they cannot, and that in itself is why I am in this field.

References
Cohen, J. & Swerdlik, M. (2010). Psychological testing and assessment: An introduction to tests and measurement (7th ed.) New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Elman, B. (2000). A cultural history of civil examinations in late imperial China. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press. Liangyan, G. (1998). Rou putuan: Voyeurism, exhibitionism, and the examination complex. Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews (CLEAR), 20, 127– 152.