Personality Tests - Discrimination against the nuerodiverse

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Yes! I wanted to work at Petco once because I love animals and actually have some experience working with them, but I failed their "online assessment" so they wouldn't even interview me and give me a chance. Same happened with Petsmart. I don't understand how people do them and manage to get hired.

See, this is the kicker. I just did one of these tests and not even for a single moment did it occur to me to just baldly LIE. I could see the answers I was giving were probably not what they were after, as anyone who admits to liking time alone is immediately seen by normal people as a threat/weirdo/mental-case, but it did not even occur to me to give answers that were not true just because this was what the examiner wanted to hear.
I have a great deal of difficulty explaining this to people and it's beginning to seriously piss me off. People just LIE. Needlessly. All the time. About everything. And when I say I don't lie - if something is untrue and I know it to be untrue I cannot say that it is true - I get stupid speeches about how I need to grow up, learn to play the game, because otherwise I'll never get anywhere in life and it'll all be my fault because lying your arse off is apparently a basic prerequisite for life and telling the truth is a childish character flaw.
That doesn't make me Jim Carey in "Liar, Liar" - I don't compulsively blurt out the truth about absolutely everything uncontrollably - I usually keep my mouth shut or if asked about a topic I want to keep private, I will say I am not willing to answer that question or speak about that topic.
I WILL NOT LIE ABOUT IT INSTEAD and I'm sick of being told I have to.

Agreed. I view disclosing I am autistic (by way of refusing to take my medical ID info off) to be the same. If you're me, it's going to be obvious eventually, even if I manage to come across as "together" at an interview. Employers need to know this about me. They need to know that is going to be part of my behaviour and thinking. Trying to hide it just to make a good first impression only leads to people being hostile tenfold later, when they realize what I'm really like and then behave as if I have tricked them into thinking I'm normal when instead I'm a useless autistic.

^Not lying is seen as childish. Being told to grow up, I get this a lot too, as if other peoples dishonesty is my fault, and something I should adapt to.

I had to take one of these tests for a work experience placement. There were questions such as; "Would you consider yourself an optimist?", "Are you often cheerful?", "Do you smile a lot?" and so on.

The honest answer to these questions for me would be: No, I would not consider myself an optimist and have a tendency to be pessimistic. Sometimes I am cheerful, but not often. I don't smile that much, unless I'm in a really good mood.

But I just lied and put strongly agree for any questions asking if I loved people, risks, and being super duper optimistic. I passed the test and got an interview, which I ended up failing miserably. The questions were difficult, plenty of ones I didn't anticipate came up, such as; "What has been your greatest sacrifice in life?"

I've lived a privileged life for the most part, so I haven't had to make many sacrifices. The placement was just for office work, but by the dramatic questions they asked you'd think it was for extreme sports whilst simultaneously serving customers or something.

Yeah, I understand that some of these are just to test if you can think on your feet, which I usually can, but thinking of an answer for the question above within a space of a few minutes was exceptionally difficult.

Usually I get INTP or INFP (thinking and feeling scores are often close to 50/50), and I agree that most of these personality tests look for extroverted individuals. I tend to lie on these tests, and act more extroverted and risk taking than I actually am.

Depends on the test.

I did a practical problem solving challenge once for a job that was all about solving puzzles by identifying patterns, combinations of images and predicting the next image - they interviewed me first!

Not all test are created equal.

Regarding the idea of lying to give the expected answers - I wonder if that is actually the purpose of the test sometimes. That is, in part it is a test of whether you are able to discard your real personality while at work so that, on demand, you can produce the traits that the employer desires. After all, it makes no difference to the employer whether your behaviour is your genuine personality or not, only that you are compliant in behaving in the ways that they expect.

I have had several co-workers in the past who surely got through the test for being "a good team worker" who have absolutely no team spirit at all when alone with colleagues, but who seem to be able to amply demonstrate this whenever a manager is watching - and will then gas-light if other team members point out the disruption that they cause.

I would have to say that if an employer is using these sorts of tests to determine who to hire then very likely these aren't good employers to begin with. I don't see how these tests are scientifically valid nor relevant to the actual job positions they are given for. Even for jobs that might legitimately require a psych test (like in some security related jobs, for example) the testing process is only partially effective at selecting candidates from what I understand.

aikoinazuma

granted. however, i have applied for plenty of minimum wage jobs, and many of them had personality tests.

so what, if employers that give personality tests are bad employers? there are so many of them, it is not practical to just correctly conclude that they would have been bad employers anyways.

legally, if it is not an "essential function" of the job, requiring something is then "discrimination". but right now, personality tests for work are still legal.

it's kind of hard to imagine that "personality tests" might not be discrimination against someone with personality disorders.

introverts often get screened out of personality tests.

maybe ten years later someone will win a civil lawsuit and personality tests will become illegal, for work.

however it takes a lot of $$ to take out a civil lawsuit.

and just b/c someone has the moral high road, does not guarantee the outcome.

KMart, Toys R Us, Aaron Brothers. personality test after personality test. weird questions like, on cold nights i sleep with the window open . or even though i am not always polite, i always have a good reason".

it appears that, introverts, and especially autistics have a serious disadvantage in finding jobs.

job networking.

job interviews.

job personality tests.

many job descriptions require multitasking, "outgoing", customer service, work in teams.

introvert jobs - much fewer than extrovert jobs. and introvert jobs tend to be STEM. or something like that.

^^^There is no emoji for nodding in agreement so please imagine one.

Trogluddite

In a book about job personality test questions, it claims that the tests have a "lie scale" and detects inconsistencies in answers.

Although, questions like true or false I smile more often than most people , have no "truth" because they are so vague. Unless you took a videotape of "most people" and with a stopwatch measured how often they smile. So there is no "lie". But allegedly, according to the book, there is a "lie scale"

The tests have a disclaimer of there is no right or wrong answer. Tell the truth .

Wrong.

Any answer that is not what they define as the model answer, and you can't even submit the job application online. So no job interview. So no job.

The jobs that require those personality tests tend to be minimum wage type. The exceptions are jobs where personality really does matter. Police and firefighter.

Maybe the applicants that apply for those jobs do not have enough $$ to take out a civil lawsuit against a corporation.

Some lawyers charge six hundred dollars per billable hour

Some lawsuits take over two years

Just because someone has the moral high road, does not guarantee the outcome will be favorable

Having said that, I have had at least 36 counselors. Includes psychologists, psychiatrists, licensed clinical social workers

And sometimes I wonder if they should have been subjected to personality tests

Before getting a job

In my experience usually employers that require these personality quizzes and tests tend to be bad as employers since the tests are not pertinent to the job and are easily fudged. I've interviewed and worked at places that had these tests (in the few times I did actually pass the test by luck) and they always seemed very dysfunctional. As a customer I've found that these same companies and institutions are often times not the highest caliber places to do business with or such due to them being dysfunctional.

I will agree, though, that introverts and Aspies have a harder time getting jobs in the industries that use these tests.

Department of Rehab diagnosed 6 out of 10 personality disorders in me

autism, diagnosed officially

introvert

Gender Identity Disorder, diagnosed

only had minimum wage jobs

How could personality tests not discriminate against the neurodiverse?

but whatever. california is an "at will" employer anyways

I think that these tests do discriminate against the neurodiverse but they also tend to marginalize a lot of NTs as well. Most of the personality traits desired by the tests are not common even with quite a few NTs.

I'm not a big fan of them, either. I typically try to answer high on Agreeability and Conscientiousness questions, and honestly answer lower on Extroversion. So that I would come across as friendly but quiet and nonconfrontational, which I can do well. I think my responses were pretty good for that.

I find not being completely honest so exhausting and frustrating that I give up in the middle and apply somewhere else instead.

Fluffysaurus

Some of the questions do not have an "honest" answer.

One question asked if, given the chance, "most people" would cheat to get ahead

There is no "honest" answer to that question