written psychological

[Ken]

Well I am not a rookie yet, but I am working on it. I have gotten a commitment to hire (CHP)contingent on my passing the psych, background, poly and med exam. The only thing I am really concerned about is the written pysch. Frankly I am a little concerned about it. Being a Marine for 6 and half years, my outlook on things isn't quite right.
Well I take the exam on Saturday, so we'll see...
Any advice, words of wisdom?

[DesertRat]

Same advise we always give on these matters. Be honest and don't try to guess what they are looking for. A couple of decades ago when I was younger and stupider, I tried to do that and answered the questions in what I thought was a non "aggressive" way. Then when I got to the interview with the shrink he informed me that in his opinion, based on their written exam, I was not "assertive" enough to be a police officer. I then went off on him in a polite and assertive way as to what I thought of his opinion and he laughed and said he figured he may be wrong in this case. I got the job, but, I nearly hung myself out to dry trying to guess what they wanted. As long as you don't have sex with barnyard animals in public on Thursdays, or plan your daily life around stalking those people the little voices in your head tell you to kill, you will probably do just fine.

PS: Go to the FOR COPS ONLY section and read Don's last post on the thread "Of interset to Don?"

[This message has been edited by DesertRat (edited 09-05-2000).]

[This message has been edited by DesertRat (edited 09-05-2000).]

[Blue23]

>>As long as you don't have sex with barnyard animals in public on Thursdays<<

Don't knock it till ya try it http://www.officer.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

Relax and answer honestly Ken. I have been reading your posts for awhile now. Your just as wacky as the rest of us, you'll do fine.. http://www.officer.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Ken]

Hey thanks for the advice I was worried about coming of as too agressive. As for the post in the Cops Only forum. How cool is that, living in Vegas. Living there would make a CHP officer a resident would it not. Being a resident he could apply for a CCW permit and be legal, couldn't he?

[Don]

Ken,

I believe that one major thing they look for is consistency. They will ask you what is basically the same question several different ways. For most of these questions there is no right or wrong answer. They just want to see if you are logical and consistent in your thinking. IMHO these tests have little or no value.

I have known people who took several tests for several departments. They passed some of the psych tests and failed some others. Now where is the value in that?

Good luck, I'll bet you do fine.

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Senility is just a passing stage. . .
Stay safe out there,
6P1 (retired)

[dkiefner]

No rhyme or reason to these, IMO. No, I don't want to be a florist, but yes, I do like houseplants - hmmm, must be a liar!!!

The biggest thing is not to think about it too much or read into the questions. Check your answer, move on, and don't look back. Just make absolutely sure you are correctly marking the answer sheet, or you may inadvertently admit to torturing domestic animals.

There are MANY different ways to assess the MMPI, depending upon what the testers are looking for. I spoke with the gentleman who evaluates them for all police applicants in VT, and he admitted to me that, in his many years of experience, he assigns them about 87% accuracy for that purpose.

But what if you really do believe in ghosts and exactly what do they mean by "abnormal" sex practices???............... http://www.officer.com/ubb/biggrin.gif


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Dave Kiefner
[i]Die Wahrheit ist eine Perle. Werfen sie nicht vor die S

[The Cynic]

Personally I think the MMPI is a joke. It tells how a person feels but not why. I took it when I got hired six years ago and I took it 1 1/2 months ago after my shooting. Guess what the results were way different and I wouldn't have been hired on my second set. As is, the second one was just to see if I had any hangups about the shooting which I didn't so I was safe. But according to the test I was paranoid and had a huge distrust for people, much more so than when I was hired. Whoo, big surprise. Show me any cop who doesn't distrust the public and isn't paranoid and I'll show you a rookie or someone whos been riding a desk for quite a while.

[waltitia]

No drawing of "stick" people
No answering "yes" to wanting to kill anything or hearing things when no one is around.

They won't hire you out west for that stuff...but we will http://www.officer.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Ken]

Well.....

I took it.

And it sucked.

I will get the results in a few weeks when I get an appoint to see the psychologist.

I am pretty sure that it going to say I have a disrespect for authority (which really isn't the case), I just answered the questions as honestly as I could. To late to worry about it now, the damage has been done.

[waltitia]

Out of curiosity, how many questions were on the test you took?

I recall taking the one here (10 yrs ago) and it had 697 questions.

[Ken]

There was actually 4 different
One was 567 questions
Another was 185,
Then there was a 40 or so questionaire
And another questionaire about 30 questions.

[The Cynic]

Another reason the MMPI sucks and is a joke.

My wife tried for a while to get into police work. She got hired by a sherriffs dept but failed the MMPI. Based on it the shrink said said she was totally unsuited for a militaristic type profession and did not respect supervisory authority enough to succeed in a police / military job.

That judgement seems slightly wrong to me since at the time she was an active reserve (she works full time but is still a reserve) for the ARMY and had been for two years. She was racing up the promotion charts and made Sgt in just 3 years. She is now next in line to head the reserve's motor pool. But she is "unsuited" for a militarisic profession. Yeah right.

[Sparky]

I, too, scored high in the "resistance to authority" section. And at the time I was already a reserve officer and member of the Army Reserves. In my interview, I pointed out that there is no index for discipline on the MMPI.




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-Sparky