Army Alpha

The Army Alpha is a group-administered test developed by Robert Yerkes and six others in order to evaluate the many U.S. military recruits during World War I. It was first introduced in 1917 due to a demand for a systematic method of evaluating the intellectual and emotional functioning of soldiers. The test measured "verbal ability, numerical ability, ability to follow directions, and knowledge of information". Scores on the Army Alpha were used to determine a soldier's capability of serving, his job classification, and his potential for a leadership position. Soldiers who were illiterate or foreign speaking would take the Army Beta, the nonverbal equivalent of the exam.

Army Beta The Development of the beta test and of the performance test for the examination of the foreign speaking and illiterate presented special problems. The use of demonstration charts and mime to convey the instructions to the persons being examined proved successful. The new type of the test in the beta, using geometrical designs, mutilated pictures, etc., required different principles in its construction. The individual performance tests also involved additional and peculiar standards of construction and evaluation.

The important purpose of these supplementary tests was, of course, to give to those handicapped by language difficulties a real opportunity to show their ability. In addition, two definite aims were planned in the use of all forms of testing: first, to point out the feeble-minded and those incapable of military service because of mental deficiency; and second, to find those of unusual or special ability. The arrangement of each test, in both group and individual examinations, was therefore checked against the sources of men in institutions for the feeble-minded. If no score had meant low mentality, the first task would have been solved; but it had been shown that literacy was an important factor in the alpha test. The beta test practically eliminated this factor and was thus a step further in selecting those of low intelligence. To prove conclusively that a man was weak-minded and not merely indifferent or malingering, the performance test was added.

The individual examinations as finally used in the U.S. Army were, therefore, primarily checks on the group examinations. No person was reported as feeble-minded until a detailed individual psychological examination had been made. Many cases of mental disorder were discovered and referred to the psychiatrists for examination. Disciplinary cases referred to the psychologists were always given individual examinations, as were referred cases of men having difficulty with drill or those who failed to improve in the YMCA schools and elsewhere. Both the Army Alpha and Army Beta tests were discontinued after World War I.

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