When individuals have sustained psychological injuries and make compensation claims for the same, it is becoming increasingly common for defendants to organise examinations which involve an element of psychometric testing.
Psychometric testing is used in litigation, particularly by defendants in personal injury claims, to ‘test’ or call into question, a claimant’s credibility.
Psychometric tests have built-in validity scales; where the subjective complaints of a claimant suffering from a psychological injury can be compared with the objective or expected answer of specific psychometric tests, to determine whether the claimant is exaggerating, under-reporting and/or otherwise answering questions in a way that is atypical for individuals with that psychological illness.
