Detection of Feigning Psychosis With Multiscale Personality Inventories: A Simulation Design Pilot Study in Taiwan

• Published in: SAGE open Vol. 7; no. 3
• Main Authors: Chang, Yi-Ting, Tam, Wai-Cheong Carl, Chiang, Shih-Kuang
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01-09-2017; SAGE Publishing
• Subjects: malingering; MMPI-2; dissimulation; response styles; forensic assessment
• ISSN: 2158-2440; 2158-2440
• DOI: 10.1177/2158244017734023

Assessing feigning psychosis is extremely important in forensic psychological assessment. This pilot study investigated the utility of three multiscale personality inventories, namely, the Chinese Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI-2), the Ko Mental Health Questionnaire (KMHQ), and the Health-Personality-Habit Inventory (HPH), in the detection of feigning psychosis in Taiwan. It was hypothesized that the above three inventories were effective in the detection of feigning psychosis. The sample consisted of 70 participants (students and community members; with 19 men and 51 women), with mean age of 22.01 years (SD = 3.86), who were randomly assigned to two different groups: feigning psychosis and honestly responding. The KMHQ, the HPH, and the Chinese MMPI-2 were administered to each participant in this sequential order. Altogether 16 scales from these inventories were statistically analyzed using MANOVA, t test, Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis, and discriminant analysis. Of these 16 scales, the scores of 14 scales differed significantly between the feigning psychosis and honestly responding groups. In addition to the exploration of the best discriminant variables, the effect size, best cutoff score, classification accuracy rate, sensitivity, and specificity of the scales of the above three inventories in discriminating participants between feigning psychosis and honestly responding were presented, respectively. The results of this study supported the utility of the Chinese MMPI-2, the KMHQ, and the HPH in the detection of feigning psychosis.