Date Available

5-12-2017

Year of Publication

2017

Document Type

Doctoral Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

College

Arts and Sciences

Department/School/Program

Psychology

Advisor

Dr. Thomas A. Widiger

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation was to provide a further validation of the Five Factor Form (FFF; Rojas & Widiger, 2014). The FFF is a brief (one page) rating form that assesses for adaptive and maladaptive variants of both poles for each of six facets for the five domains of the five-factor model. Two prior validation studies of the FFF have been completed using the items as they are scored within the FFF (Rojas & Widiger, 2014, in press). However, the FFF has a unique scoring system in which each item has normal and abnormal variants at both poles (e.g., abnormal high and abnormal low trust). This dissertation focused on a dismantling of each of the 30 FFF items in order to explore whether the four components of each item related to one another in a manner consistent with the scoring of the FFF. Two separate studies were conducted using participants from MTurk to examine this relationship. In Study One, 540 persons who were currently in or had previously received mental health treatment were sampled. Study One examined the correlations among the four components of each FFF item, including the two components on the same side as well as with the two components on the opposite side. It would be consistent with the FFF scoring to have the two FFF components occupying the same side of the item (i.e., assessing the same or similar trait but differing in adaptivity) correlate positively with one another and components occupying opposite sides of a respective item correlate negatively. However, this was not expected to occur due perhaps to the impact of the maladaptivity and adaptivity of the items on the correlations, which worked in a direction opposite to the conceptual meaning of the respective components. The results of Study One were consistent with expectations, producing mixed results for the FFF scoring. Study Two examined the perceived similarities and differences in the conceptual meaning for the same component comparisons. The sample sizes ranged from 89 to 101 persons. It was hypothesized in this case that for each FFF item, the two FFF components occupying the same side of the item would be rated as being similar in meaning to one another, whereas components occupying opposite sides of the respective item would be considered to be opposite in meaning. The results from Study Two provided consistent and strong support for the FFF scoring. The implications of the results from Studies One and Two for the assessment of adaptive and maladaptive personality functioning are discussed.

Digital Object Identifier (DOI)

https://doi.org/10.13023/ETD.2017.216

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