Performance of the Personality Inventory for Youth Validity Scales

Abstract

Response sets as well as cognitive and academic deficits compromise the validity of child and adolescent self-report of emotional adjustment. Three studies using clinical and asymptomatic samples of 4th to 12th grade students detail applications of the four validity scales of the Personality Inventory for Youth (PIY), namely, (a) Validity (VAL) a scale of six highly improbable statements, (b) Inconsistency (INC) consisting of pairs of highly correlated statements, (c) Dissimulation (FB) constructed of statements that were infrequent and characteristic of intentional distortion, and (d) Defensiveness (DEF) an extension of the Lie scale of the parent-report Personality Inventory for Children. The effects of minimizing, malingering, and random response sets on the PLY validity scales are reported. The importance of such validity scales derived from child and adolescent response is discussed.