Tests and Measurements
Psychological tests and measurements are tools which can be used by psychologists to help assess their patients for various conditions, and by researchers for data collection or research purposes
These tabs provide a list of resources to help you:
- find a review of a specific test to decide if it is valid or appropriate
- locate a full text copy of a specific test
- identify appropriate tests that are available on a topic or variable
- find additional online test resources, including a list of free and proprietary tests
- access virtual desktop applications
- share a link to a test.
Title: Finding Tests in APA PsycTests: Using the Ovid Platform
Running Time: 5:22 mins
Further information relating to the appropriate use of psychological tests is available on the American Psychological Association's Testing and Assessment web page and in the Australian Psychological Society's Position Statement on Psychological tests and testing.
Check whether the test you selected is valid and appropriate.
Locate critical reviews of individual tests in the following sources:
- Mental Measurements Yearbook and Tests in Print - provides full text edited reviews that have been written by content area experts. Reviews include information about validity, reliability, test administration, test materials, scoring and reporting, etc.
Print copies of the Mental Measurements Yearbook are also available from 1st edition (1938) to 19th edition (2014) in our Offsite storage facility.
- Test Reviews Online - allows you to search for citations to reviews that have been included in the Mental Measurements Yearbook series (above). Full text is not freely available from Test Reviews Online
Additional test reviews can be located in journal articles
When you are searching for reviews, include the name of the test and relevant search terms such as "validity", "validation", "reliability", or "reviews". You can also consider searching databases using subject headings to increase the precision of your search.
Key library databases to search include:
- Health and psychosocial instruments (Ovid) This link opens in a new window Health and Psychosocial Instruments provides ready access to information on measurement instruments (i.e., questionnaires, interview schedules, checklists, index measures, coding schemes/ manuals, rating scales, projective techniques, vignettes/scenarios, tests) in the health fields, psychosocial sciences, and organizational behaviour. HaPI assists researchers, practitioners, educators, administrators, and evaluators, including students, to identify measures needed for research studies, grant proposals, client/patient assessment, class papers/projects, theses/dissertations, and program evaluation.
- CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new window CINAHL Complete indexes the top nursing and allied health literature available. CINAHL Subject Headings help users effectively search and retrieve information and follow the structure of the Medical Subject headings (MeSH) used by the National Library of Medicine. These Subject Headings help researchers find new concepts, including COVID-19, social distancing and vaping as well as local terminology. CINAHL Complete includes 1,314 journals with searchable cited references.
- PubMed This link opens in a new window PubMed is a free resource supporting the search and retrieval of biomedical and life sciences literature, including behavioural sciences, chemical sciences, and bioengineering. The PubMed database contains more than 32 million citations and abstracts of biomedical literature. It does not include full text journal articles; however, links to the full text are often present when available from other sources, such as the publisher's website or PubMed Central (PMC). Available to the public online since 1996, PubMed was developed and is maintained by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM).
- ERIC via ProQuest This link opens in a new window This database comprises indexes and abstracts of published and unpublished literature in the field of education. Source documents include journal articles, conference papers, government documents, theses, reports, audiovisual media, bibliographies, research reports, curriculum and teaching guides, and books. Major areas of subject coverage include: adult, career, and vocational education; counseling and personnel services; elementary and early childhood education; education management; handicapped and gifted children; higher education; reading and communication skills; rural education and small schools; tests, measurement and evaluation; etc.
- A+ education (Informit) This link opens in a new window A+ Education, based on AEI : the Australian Education Index, is an indexing and full text database that provides access to journal articles from published material on all aspects of education in Australia. A+ Education is produced by the Cunningham Library at the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). Full text articles from 2000, and index/abstracts from 1978, are available.
- Sociological abstracts (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window Sociological Abstracts abstracts and indexes the international literature in sociology and related disciplines in the social and behavioural sciences. The database provides abstracts of journal articles and citations to book reviews drawn from thousands of serial publications, and also provides abstracts of books, book chapters, dissertations, and conference papers. Coverage is from 1952 to the present.
Use the following sources to find a copy of a specific test
Tests on the internet:
Tests can often be found on websites. Search using Google, or follow some of the suggested links on the "Additional online test resources" tab
Browse Library resources:
- PsycTESTS This link opens in a new windowSee: APA PsycTests. Focuses primarily on non-commercial psychological measurement tools that have been reported in the scholarly literature.
The appendices of articles or theses will sometimes include the full text of instruments. Use relevant keywords AND "append*" when searching the following databases:
- ProQuest dissertations & Theses GlobalPredominantly US masters and PhD theses, includes 1.2 million available for download in PDF format.
- ERIC via ProQuest This link opens in a new windowThis database comprises indexes and abstracts of published and unpublished literature in the field of education.
- Ovid MEDLINE (R) This link opens in a new windowOvid MEDLINE covers the international literature on biomedicine, including the allied health fields and the biological and physical sciences, humanities, and information science as they relate to medicine and health care. Information is indexed from approximately 5,600 journals published world-wide. Records start in 1946 up to the present, with daily updates. Ovid MEDLINE is produced by the National Library of Medicine.
- CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new windowCINAHL Complete indexes the top nursing and allied health literature available. CINAHL Subject Headings help users effectively search and retrieve information and follow the structure of the Medical Subject headings (MeSH) used by the National Library of Medicine. These Subject Headings help researchers find new concepts, including COVID-19, social distancing and vaping as well as local terminology. CINAHL Complete includes 1,314 journals with searchable cited references.
- Library SearchCheck the library's discovery tool - enter the exact name of the test to find holdings.
Requesting permission to use a test:
You are usually required to contact authors or individuals for permission to use their test. The blog site by Jane Friedman provides sample permissions letters students can customize for this purpose.
Psychological Tests Inventory:
The Monash School of Psychological Sciences does have an inventory of tests. Direct any inquiries to testloan.psych@monash.edu
Purchase a test
If you cannot find a free copy of a test, you can search the following sources to find out how to purchase a copy of the test. Most of these sources will list the publisher, cost and availability details for specific tests. Publishers usually hold the copyright to tests, and some purchasing restrictions may apply to ensure purchasers are qualified to administer and interpret the tests.
- Test Reviews OnlineIncludes descriptive information and publisher contact information for more than 3,500 commercially available tests
- ETS Test CollectionCheck whether tests can be purchased online, or find out publishers' details under the "Availability" field of each test record. Note: This field will also indicate If a test has been published in a book or journal article
- Mental Measurements Yearbook (online)Contains reviews and descriptions of the latest version of tests. The print edition is also held in the library.
- Directory of Unpublished Experimental Mental MeasuresHargrave-Andrew Library Reference v.1 (1974) - v.9 (2008).
Use the following sources to identify any tests that are available to measure a particular variable, such as a cognitive skill or personality trait:
- Mental measurements yearbook and Test in print (Ovid) This link opens in a new window
- ETS Test Collection This link opens in a new windowclick on the "Advanced Search" tab and select "Subject Search" from the search field options
- Health and psychosocial instruments (Ovid) This link opens in a new windowlimit your search to "Primary Source" to retrieve articles about the test and its development. (Note that the "Secondary Source" limit refers to articles in which the test was used)
- PsycTESTS This link opens in a new windowSee: APA PsycTests. Refine results using "Additional Limits"
- PsycINFO This link opens in a new windowMethod 1: search for terms in the "Tests and Measures" (tm) field, e.g. state trait anxiety inventory.tm.
Method 2: Use APA's classification codes to find tests and measures. Click on the screenshot below for further details
- CINAHL Complete This link opens in a new windowMethod 1: Enter your search terms and select "Instrumentation" from the drop-down search options
Method 2: Limit your search results by "Publication Type", and select Questionnaire/scale and Research Instrument from the list - ERIC via ProQuest This link opens in a new windowNarrow your search results by selecting Tests/Questionnaires from the "Document Type" list
Tip: If the database does not have special search fields to assist in finding studies you can search by keyword and enter additional terms such as "test", "questionnaire", "assessment", "measurement" etc to refine your search.
There are a variety of freely available online resources which can be used to develop and conduct your experiments.
Some of the Open Source or Proprietary Software and included Web guides and Platforms are listed below.
Overview and comparisons of available tools:
Free software for Monash students and researchers:
Note: Free tools and applications to collect and analyse data are available from the Psychology Research Portal, via the Virtual Lab (vLab). These include:
Installed tools:
- Experiment generation software: Inquisit, Open Sesame
- Data analysis software: SPSS Statistics, NVivo, MATLAB, and R.
Web-based tools:
- Survey generation software: Qualtrics
- Participant acquisition tools are crowdsourcing services: Sona Systems and TurkPrime
Study generators and editors: Free/Open source software
Study generators and editors: Proprietary software
Links to online experiments:
(note: sites can include either surveys and/or online experiments)
Recommended reading:
Advanced Methods for Conducting Online Behavioral Research
The Internet is revolutionizing the way psychologists conduct behavioral research. Studies conducted online are not only less error prone and labor intensive but also rapidly reach large numbers of diverse participants at a fraction of the cost of traditional methods. In addition to improving the efficiency and accuracy of data collection, online studies provide automatic data storage and deliver immediate personalized feedback to research participants - a major incentive that can exponentially expand participant pools. Furthermore, behavioral researchers can also track data on online behavioral phenomena, including Instant Messaging (IM), social networking, and other social media. This book goes beyond the basics to teach readers advanced methods for conducting behavioral research on the Internet. Short chapters offer practical advice by leading experts in key domains of Internet research. Readers are shown, step by step, how to conduct online experiments, surveys, and ability testing, use advanced graphic tools such as drag-and-drop objects, apply automatic text analysis tools, check the validity of protocols, automate the storage and analysis of data, record 'field notes' on the behavior of online subjects and chatroom or blogging communities, and much more. Chapters also address critical issues such as data security, ethics, participant recruitment, and how to ensure the completion of tests or questionnaires. This volume also features a companion Web site with additional resources, links, scripts, and instructions to further assist readers with their online research. This book is designed for researchers and advanced graduate students in the behavioral sciences seeking greater technical detail about emerging research methods. Readers will be well equipped to implement and integrate these exciting new methods into their own Internet-based behavioral research effectively, securely, and responsibly.
ISBN: 9781433806957Publication Date: 2010-01-15
- Supplementary SiteAdvanced Methods for Conducting Online Behavioral Research - Includes a supplementary site
Occupational Therapy Assessment Tools are held in the closed reserve collection in Peninsula campus library and are available for students to use for 3 hours in the library. Staff may borrow these tools for negotiable periods of time.
The closed reserve collection is located on the ground floor of the Peninsula campus library. Ask at the Information Point with the details of the assessment tool you wish to use.
For a comprehensive printable PDF list of occupational therapy assessment tools available at the Peninsula Library click on the link below:
- Occupational Therapy Assessment ToolsOccupational Therapy Assessment Tools at Peninsula campus library (alphabetic by title).