Measuring ability to fake occupational interest

Abstract

Retesting under conditions of changed instruction was undertaken with the Strong Vocational Interest Blank in an attempt to measure ability to make scores. Results seem to warrant the following conclusions: (1) Students are able intentionally to distort their scores on an interest blank, and to succeed in qualifying well for an occupation chosen at random, so far as they are concerned, despite a low average initial predilection. (2) Students are able to improve their scores markedly when they try, and this ability is inversely related to true score. (3) Faked marking affects not only the simulated occupational interest of the students, but distorts seriously at least half of the other occupational indications. Experimentation of this sort with personality tests is suggested. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2025 APA, all rights reserved)