General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB)
The General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB) is a vocational aptitude assessment developed by the U.S. Employment Service, designed to identify individuals' aptitudes for various occupations. Taking approximately two to three hours, the test includes twelve timed subtests that evaluate abilities across nine aptitudes, such as intelligence, verbal skills, spatial awareness, and manual dexterity. It combines physical tasks, like manipulating small objects, with paper-and-pencil questions, making it a comprehensive tool for assessing both cognitive and psychomotor skills.
The GATB has been utilized by state employment services and other organizations for job seeker assessments, allowing individuals to receive counseling based on their scores. While it has been implemented in numerous countries and translated into multiple languages, the GATB has also faced significant controversies, particularly regarding race-norming practices that were deemed biased. Following legislative changes, the GATB's methodology has evolved, and it is no longer race-normed, with scores now standardized across diverse groups. Despite its historical significance as one of the oldest aptitude tests, many organizations have shifted towards more contemporary assessment tools in light of identified limitations.
General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB)
- DATE: 1947 onward
- TYPE OF PSYCHOLOGY: Intelligence and intelligence testing; personality; social psychology
SIGNIFICANCE: The General Aptitude Test Battery is a vocational aptitude test that takes about three hours to complete and includes both physical tests, such as manipulating objects, and paper-and-pencil questions.
Introduction
Developed by the US Employment Service, the General Aptitude Test Battery (GATB) can identify aptitudes for different occupations. It has been used by state employment services as well as other agencies and organizations, such as the US Employment Service and the Employment Security Commission.
The GATB comprises twelve timed subtests: vocabulary, arithmetic, computation, mark making, assembling, disassembling, turning, placing, name comparison, tool matching, form matching, and three-dimensional space. These twelve subtests correspond to nine aptitudes: intelligence, verbal, numerical, spatial, form perception, clerical perception, motor coordination, finger dexterity, and manual dexterity. These nine aptitudes, in turn, can be divided into three composite aptitudes: cognitive, perceptual, and psychomotor.
The entire test takes about two to three hours to complete. About one-half of the test deals with psychomotor tasks, such as manipulating small objects with the fingers; the other half consists of paper-and-pencil questions. In some cases, an examiner might administer only selected tests of the battery as a measure of aptitude for a specific line of work. Scores for each aptitude test are based on the total number of correct answers. Raw scores are converted to norm-referenced aptitude scores. Its average is 100 and its standard deviation is 20. Anyone of working age can take the GATB. Most people complete fewer than half of the items, but people who are familiar with timed tests may be able to increase their scores by quickly completing all the items.
Uses and Limitations
The GATB can be used to help job seekers or employers. Typically, job seekers who take the GATB receive counseling on their scores for each of the nine aptitudes. Their pattern of scores can be compared with the patterns deemed necessary for different occupations. Employers might use the GATB in their efforts to hire qualified employees. Also, the GATB has been used in research, such as exploring the differences in abilities of different groups or assessing the impact of various training programs or work experience.
The GATB has been translated into several languages and has been used in many different countries, including Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Colombia, France, India, Italy, Portugal, Switzerland, and in the United States. There is also a completely computerized version.
The GATB is one of the oldest aptitude tests still used in the twenty-first century. However, the GATB has limitations and should only be used as part of a battery of tests for job applicant selection to avoid adversely impacting protected groups. In the late 1980s, the GATB became a center of controversy when people discovered that it had been race-normed. Subsequently, the National Academy of Sciences studied the situation and concluded that race norming was reasonable because it corrected for test bias. In a controversial decision, the National Academy of Sciences recommended continuing the practice of race norming. In July 1990, the Department of Labor (DOL) proposed a two-year suspension of the GATB to study whether it worked well enough to continue to be used. However, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1991, which outlawed the practice of race norming, making the question moot. Consequently, reports are no longer race-normed. Instead, raw scores of people from all racial and ethnic groups are converted to standard scores using the same norms.
As a result of the controversy and federal suspension of the GATB, the US federal government, as well as many state governments and other employers, have discontinued it in favor of other, more up-to-date multiple-aptitude test batteries or more specific ability and skill assessments. For example, the DOL's O*NET Ability Profiler tool was developed to indicate percentile ranks of each aptitude needed for a specific occupation based on forms of the GATB. For some time, it largely replaced the traditional GATB. However, further investigation into the tool found it may help predict who would be the most successful person on the job, but it was not a strong enough indicator to consistently and fairly advise selection decisions. Critics noted that the tool had poorly constructed questions that introduced bias by using slang, complex, or jargon. This distinctly disadvantaged traditionally marginalized groups. The tool was retired in 2021.
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