What do you see in this image? We explain to you to what extent personality tests have a psychological basis

I imagine that many of you have stung to make the curious Internet personality test inserted among the news and that, posed as fun games, seduce with statements of the type:“If you want to know your true self, take a quick look at this image and tell me how many dogs you see here”, either “Indicate which of these trees that appear here painted you like the most and I will tell you what you are like” either “Which of these figures that you see here: dog, iguana, chimpanzee, etc. do you prefer?

They assure that only knowing your singular perceptive style and preferences and supported by this very poor information will they reach accurate conclusions about your true character or even how smart or not you are.

I’m sorry to dissapoint you: these tests are invalidThat is, they do not measure what they claim to measure. In short, they are a hoax. It would be something like if you wanted to know your body temperature with a barometer or better, with a lawn mower. So, Why do we keep falling into the temptation of making them?

Why are personality tests so successful?

The fact that you are predisposed to give these hobbies high credibility would be influenced by several factors:

He General ignorance of the population about what a psychological test ishow they work, how they are interpreted, what are the different and complex tests that exist, as well as the theoretical frameworks of reference in which each of them is part of. We live immersed in a digital age and the fact that they appear on supposed platforms serious on the internet builds trustalthough in reality its distribution just look for the interaction and the “like” to insert your coveted advertising banners.Your level of suggestibility. Some of these tests play guess perceptual styles, but in no case has it been shown that they correlate with a certain way of being, much less give us an IQ as a result.

Why do we see the same image differently?

These games do use some of the famous Gestalt Laws developed by German psychologists at the beginning of the 20th century (Gestalt in German means “form”) and who emphasized the importance in sensory perception of the global configuration of visual and auditory images.

They showed us that perception is much more than what we see, hear, feel, taste or smell. It’s the meaning we give to that feeling. And, we reach it by the unique way in which our brain organizes the sensory information that comes directly from our senses.

So when they ask you what do you see before an image like this or similar know that you will divide the sensory information between the figure (it would be the object on which we focus our attention) and the bottom (the background of the focused object).

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So, If in this image you see a glass or two faces it is indifferent. We would simply be corroborating the existence of a Gestalt law that says: “When the relationship between the figure and the ground is ambiguous, our perceptions of the figure alternate.

It’s more, there is no way to perceive both things simultaneously. Thus, on some occasions you will see a beautiful vase and on others the delicate profile of two faces that are silhouetted against a white background like a beam of light.

In the game of perception of this figure-ground alternation it simply demonstrates the dynamic nature of our perceptual system.

Are there image-based tests in psychology?

The tests that are distributed online some people could confuse them with celebrities projective tests What are they real personality tests in which the person is asked to respond to ambiguous scenes, words or images.

The goal and objective is cause the person to project their internal world asking him to organize the field of stimuli that are presented to him, interpret them and be able to react to them affectively.

When a direct question is asked on a topic in a test, the person dedicates time to elaborate a conscious answer. This can lead to bias or fabricate falsehoods because the subject may be trying to mislead the examiner. And, for example, you want to offer answers so that the evaluator thinks that they are acceptable or more socially expected, but that in reality do not correspond to your feelings or your actual behaviors.

By placing in front of the person a series of ambiguous stimuli as sheets with spots, as in the case of the classic and famous H. Rorschach test (1921), makes it much more difficult because the subject does not know what clues to follow to tell the other what he thinks he should see and in this way better reflect your inner world.

These tests were developed within the framework of associationist and psychoanalytic theories of the early 20th century and consider “projective hypotheses” (Rappaport, 1948), according to which In any perception of an external situation, internal aspects intervenewhich allows to reveal:

The psychological structures (It, I, Superego). essential personality traits (through the unconscious and the latent content of the responses) to the test stimuli.

Projective tests used in psychology:

The most famous projective tests within the field of psychology are:

He Hermann Rorschach inkblot test.He Murray’s thematic apperception test (TAT).drawing of a human figure.Drawing of the house, the tree and the person.

Many of them are used especially in clinical contexts, but also forensic.

Can you determine the degree of intelligence with a test?

If you have ever gone to a psychologist’s office and they have applied a intelligence test designed to measure your intelligence quotient You will have discovered that it means facing a complex task and that it will take a long time (some more than an hour), although that will be a little longer or shorter depending on the test chosen by the evaluator.

These types of tests are currently the most administered and are used in the educational, clinical, labor and forensic fields.

They had their origin, as we understand it today, in France, specifically in schools. In 1905 the French Ministry of Education put the famous psychologist Alfred Binet at the head with the task of identifying those children who were not benefiting from an academic education and thus providing them with special help so that they could continue with their studies.

Binet got down to work and invented the first intelligence test, together with his colleague Theophile Simon, for children between the ages of 3 and 13. They coined a novel concept: the mental level to report a child’s score on the test that later came to be called mental age. This term was used in turn to calculate the I.Q of a person and that Stern, its author, separated from the chronological age. That is, we could know your intelligence regardless of your age and its name “intellectual quotient” was essentially due to the fact that it corresponds to a mathematical formula:

(Mental age/Chronological age) x 100= Intelligence Quotient

What is an intelligence test?

He Inteligence test used to measure a range of cognitive abilities which provides you with a score which in turn provides a measure of your intellectual resources and potential.

How is an intelligence test interpreted?

Then we have to interpret their score. In general, since most tests are statistically standardized, scores are obtained comparing individual performance with the norm for people of the same age group.

The score you get, that is, your IQ (intelligence quotient) tells us how how far above or below you are compared to your peer group The average is always 100, which is where most of the population would be located. In fact, 68.7% of the population falls in the interval between 84 and 116, always with a standard deviation of 16.

What do intelligence tests measure?

In general the IQ tests focus on measuring:

Verbal skillsMathematical skillsLanguage skillsMemoryProcessing speedProblem solving abilityLogical reasoningVisuospatial processing and skills

Do intelligence tests predict success in life?

It’s important to remember that IQ tests are only one measure of intelligence, and while higher scores are associated with better health, academic performance, and overall sense of well-being, do not necessarily always predict a person’s success in life. In fact, the emotional and social skills are more important in predicting success in life, according to a study by Bartholomew DJ in the London School of Economics and Political Science). And this reality connects with Gardner’s theory on multiple intelligences.

The application of any intelligence or personality test requires, in principle, an adequate evaluation context, a psychologist trained in the passing and interpretation of tests, some of them require long specific training. Fulfilling these requirements guarantees knowing the real personality, the level of intelligence and using the results in the appropriate field of application: academic, work, legal or to obtain a correct orientation and therapeutic intervention if necessary. So don’t be fooled and go to your trusted psychologist.