“The MAT [Music Apperception Test] provides a veritable playground for the psychological, organizational, or educational researcher. The test is a very attractive alternative to paper-and-pencil tests or other static measures of personality, creativity, emotional maturity, leadership, adaptability, sociability, and response to stress.” In Spies, R. A., Geisinger, K. F., & Carlson, J. F. (Eds.). (2010). The eighteenth mental measurements yearbook. Lincoln, NE: Buros Institute of Mental Measurements.
The Music Apperception Test (MAT) is an individually administered test of verbal and creative ability, fantasy production, emotion recognition and empathy, response to stress, and defensiveness. Prerecorded instructions with an example invite respondents to “tell a story to the music.” Twelve compositions based upon psychological theory and research represent primary emotions. The emotions range from “interest” and “joy” to “terror” and “disgust”. Each composition is followed by a standard silent period. The MAT includes pre-formatted short, standard, and extended versions for evaluation, assessment, and research. The short-form A or B may be administered in less than eight minutes.
Respondents display dramatic individual differences in latencies, fluency, pace of speech, content, voice, narrative style, “emotional fit” to music, perceptual accuracy, mood, and measures of defense. Recent research demonstrates that the MAT is a great “ice-breaker” with respondents more comfortable and fluent on the TAT when the MAT is given first. For more information, see Features, Reliability & Validity, and Uses.
MAT features are not readily duplicated by alternative tests. The MAT weds performance and projective testing to yield a synergy of measurement-oriented and dynamic approaches to understanding and predicting human behavior.
Qualified Purchasers order on line or call 702-997-2566 to qualify and order the MAT (See FYI Page for qualifications). Psychodiagnostics provides coding and evaluation of MAT results.