Examining Self-Reports and Peer Reports

Submitted by: Jespreet Bhatia Date: January 31, 2016 Self-Reports vs. Peer Reports
The most common way to measure an individual’s personality is through self-report assessments. Psychologists and researchers use self and peer report methods to assess personality attributes and behaviour. These reporting methods provide the ability to gain feedback on changes of one’s personality, evaluating the effectiveness of therapy, to aid in diagnosing the psychological problem, and establish a treatment for the individual. The main goal is to gain knowledge of the individual personality and the influences of their behaviour. Self-reports are effective and inexpensive as to oppose to other testing methods, which require more party involvement (Paunonen & O’Neill, 2010).
The different varieties of self-reports can be displayed as direct, indirect and open-ended rating methods. Direct self-rating is the simplest form and directly report on their own personality. Indirect self-rating differs as it is based on the researchers interpretations of the individuals (Paulhus & Vazive, 2007). This can prevent “faking” because the respondent will not know what is being assessed. Open-ended self-descriptions differ as it is derived from the individual’s free description of themselves without any structured measures like the other reports (Paulhus & Vazive, 2007).
As for peer reports, an example are projective tests that consider to allow the individual to respond to a stimulus that will reveal their conscious or unconsciously motives and majority are unaware of the factors motivating their behaviour.
The benefits of self-reports are obtaining quality of information, as people are their own best-qualified judge of themselves and their attributes (Paunonen & O’Neill, 2010). This is