Jackson Personality Inventory–Revised

The Jackson Personality Inventory–Revised (JPI-R; publisher: Sigma Assessment Systems) was developed for assessing interpersonal, cognitive, and value domains of personality. Moreover, the JPI-R, which is used primarily with normal populations, also was designed to predict behaviors in a variety of contexts. The application of the JPI-R is most appropriate in career counseling and work settings that strive to improve person-environment fit; thus, the JPI-R frequently is used in schools, colleges, and career centers. In addition to applications in practice settings, the JPI-R is used in research settings to identify the relationship between certain personality constructs and behaviors.

The 300 items are presented in a true-false format that takes approximately 35–45 minutes to administer. The profile reports 15 content scales: complexity, breadthofinterest, innovation, tolerance, empathy, anxiety, cooperativeness, sociability, social confidence, energy level, social astuteness, risk taking, organization, traditional values, and responsibility. A high score reflects the particular dimension the scale tries to measure; for instance, a high score on the Social Confidence scale indicates that an individual is confident in social situations. On the other hand, a low score on the Social Confidencescalesuggeststhatapersonwillexhibitvisible discomfort and embarrassment in most social situations. The 15 content scales were theoretically derived and constructed. They are classified into five clusters on the profile: Analytical, Emotional, Extroverted, Opportunistic, and Dependable. The five clusters represent specific traits measured by the scales. For example, the Emotional cluster includes content scales such as empathy, anxiety, and cooperativeness. Factor analyses were applied to extract these five clusters.

The original JPI, published in 1976, was revised in 1994. The changes included renaming six scales, reorganizing profiles on the basis of newer research studies, removing the Infrequency scales, renorming the scales based on demographic samples that better represent the current population, adding and modifying current items, adding carbonless-form answer sheets, and adding new features to the manual.

The profile reports standardized scores that compare the test taker's score with a comparison norm group. The normative sample was collected from the general North American adult population. In addition, norm groups were collected for three main population groups: college students, blue-collar workers, and white-collar workers. Participants employed in a wide range of occupations were included in the blue-collar and white-collar samples. If an individual test taker is not a member of one of these three normative groups, the manual recommends that the individual's score be compared with the general population norm.

Evidence of reliability reported in the manual is limited to internal consistency coefficients, which ranged from r = .78 to r = .93. The manual also reported construct validity of the JPI-R. Studies that used multitrait-multimethod matrices showed evidence of convergence and discriminant validity at the factorial level. Overall, adequate evidence of validity and reliability has been collected for the JPI-R scales.