Ideal-self responding on the MMPI

A Literature Review of Subtle-Obvious Items on the MMPI

This article chronologically reviews the literature relating to subtle and obvious items of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory. Wiener's original development of subtle and obvious subscales, Seeman's support for the concept of subtlety, and Duffs arguments concerning empirical versus face validity are discussed. Later research exploring demand characteristics are then reviewed, such as the paradoxical relationships under differing instruction sets and population issues. The work from Auburn University researchers on the development of a 5-point subtlety scale, the interaction with personality factors, and individual scale research is critiqued.

Validity of the MMPI subtle items

This article presents a review and critique of research on the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) subtle items in regard to their validity as measures of their scales' characteristics. The main categories of focus are their convergent and discriminative validity, the paradoxical effect, and the issue of whether removing these items would improve MMPI validity. Important problems in the methodologies are noted and discussed in some detail. These methodological concerns and the conflicting results across studies obscure firm conclusions on the validity of the subtle items, although strong support is lacking. However, more evidence is needed before deciding to remove these items from the MMPI; therefore, this article provides recommendations for future research.

Detection of faking good on the MMPI in a psychiatric inpatient population

The efficacy of the Mp and X minus zero scales of the MMPI in identifying fake-good profiles was investigated. 30 volunteers from the admissions unit of a state mental hospital were administered the MMPI once under instructions to fake good and once under standard instructions. Under fake-good instructions, psychiatric inpatients were able to produce profiles similar to those of normal college students. Both the Mp and X minus zero scales discriminated significantly between the standard and fake-good profiles. Interactions with order of administration occurred for the Mp scale.