Guides: Mental & Behavioral Health Research Guide: Test & Measurements

Finding Test Instruments

What are tests and measurements?

Test instruments are standardized measures of a particular variable of interest. Tests can be purchased commercially, or unpublished tests can be found in the literature using one of several resources.

Search for instruments using these databases. Finding the full instrument or its related literature is not always easy and often requires checking several resources including directories, textbooks, theses, and databases. The resources in this guide may assist in finding and acquiring the actual test instrument or locate the literature that discusses the use and validity of the test. Sometimes it may be necessary to contact the author, creator or publisher of the test to gain access.

Academic Search Premier This link opens in a new window
A favorite for the social sciences, humanities, fine arts, medicine, and education, ASP indexes 8,200 periodicals. Full-text articles from 3,750 peer-reviewed, scholarly journals are found here, plus a number of popular sources.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide
CINAHL (Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature) Complete This link opens in a new window
CINAHL is the professional source for full-text articles from journals in nursing and allied health. It also has citations and abstracts for many additional journals. Other publication types included are relevant legal cases, clinical innovations and trials, and citations to dissertations in nursing. CINAHL Headings help define search terms.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide
HaPI - Health and Psychosocial Instruments This link opens in a new window
Provides information about behavioral measurement instruments. Information in the database is abstracted from hundreds of journals covering health sciences and psychosocial sciences. Instruments from Industrial/Organizational Behavior and Education are also included.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide
MEDLINE This link opens in a new window
The largest index of medical literature, MEDLINE has citations and abstracts from more than 5,400 journals worldwide. The citations link to full-text in our other databases, where available. The MeSH subject headings help in selecting the best search terms.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide
PsycINFO This link opens in a new window
Article citations and detailed abstracts of articles from over 2,000 journals published internationally in all areas of psychology from 1872 to the present. Links to full-text articles from PsycARTICLES and Academic Search Premier.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide
PsycTESTS This link opens in a new window
Produced by the American Psychological Association, this repository of tests and measures features instruments that are relevant to psychology, psychiatry, education, medicine, and business. PsycTESTS includes tests that were originally developed for research and were not made commercially available; a growing selection of multilingual test instruments; and information about select tests that are available from commercial test publishers.
Additional search help is available at: https://help.ebsco.com/interfaces/EBSCO_Guides/EBSCO_Interfaces_User_Guide

How to Find Research Instruments

Using the right topic keywords along with terminology to find test instruments in the databases is key to locating them.

Add this search string in the database search bar to locate a tests or measure:

(assessment* OR checklist* OR instrument* OR inventor* OR measure* OR questionnaire* OR scale* OR score* OR survey* OR test OR tests OR tool*)

Add this search string to find validated and reliable tests or measures:

(psychometric* OR reliability OR reliabl* OR validate OR validation OR validity) AND (assessment* OR checklist* OR instrument* OR inventor* OR measure* OR questionnaire* OR scale* OR score* OR survey* OR test OR tests OR tool*)

If you need help finding instruments, please contact the Research Help Desk at 303-458-4031 or library@regis.edu.

Recommended Websites

APA FAQ: Finding Psychological Tests
APA neither sells nor endorses testing instruments, but it does provide guidance in using available resources to find psychological tests. Answers to frequently asked questions are provided.
CAHPS Patient Experience Surveys and Guidance
Surveys & tools to advance patient-centered care from the Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality
Decision Making Individual Differences Inventory (DMIDI)
A free, public resource that categorizes and describes the most common individual difference measures used in judgement and decision-making (JDM) research.
ETS Test Collection
The Test Collection at ETS is a database of more than 25,000 tests and other measurement devices, covering information from 1900 through today.
Multidimensional Measurement of Religiousness/Spirituality for Use in Health Research
This links to a booklet from the Fetzer Organization with recommended instruments.
RAND Health Care Surveys
Available for free in the public domain, these surveys are designed for a wide range of purposes, including assessing patients' health, screening for mental health conditions, and measuring quality of care and quality of life. Many of these surveys are intended for the general population, but can be tailored to specific groups, such as the elderly, Medicaid recipients, veterans, and families with small children.
Substance Use Screening and Assessment Database
Search for substance use and abuse instruments. Some of the instruments are in the public domain and can be downloaded free and others are under copyright protection.