Psychometric tests

More employers are turning to psychometric tests as an objective method of matching the right person with the right job; every candidate is assessed on a level playing field by a transparent process. They measure soft skills such as ability (how far your potential can be stretched), behavioural style (how you relate to the team, job and organisation's demands), interests and motivation. Determining who will be good at doing what, and what behaviours candidates are likely to exhibit in the workplace, assists employers to achieve that person/job fit. You are looking for a job that will match your personality and skills, so if you don't succeed, perhaps the job isn't right for you.

Soft skills can be difficult to assess by traditional means (e.g. interview or CV), so many employers use tests as part of their recruitment process. Soft skills are as important as knowledge as your work experience is likely to be limited.

Ability / Aptitude tests

These are timed tests (often multiple choice), under exam conditions, assessing key skills, usually verbal understanding and numerical reasoning. Increasingly, candidates are required to complete ability tests at an early stage of the application process - tests may be online. Familiarity may increase your test performance – revise basic mathematical operations and get used to working without a calculator. If given the option of taking a practice test first, do so. Read instructions carefully; ask if you don't understand and, skip over questions you get stuck on. Accuracy is more important than speed. Give each question equal time and you'll know if there's time to return to difficult questions later.

NB: If English is not your first language or if you are dyslexic, visually or hearing impaired, test materials/conditions can be adapted - alert the assessors to your circumstances in advance.

FREE online Psychometric Testing

We are pleased to be able to offer you the opportunity to gain experience of taking psychometric tests and get feedback on your results. You can access the tests from the link below. Please note that this is only open to University of Aberdeen students and recent graduates.

A series of free online aptitude tests entitled “Profiling for Success” are available to University of Aberdeen students and graduates, these include Numerical Reasoning Skills Tests, Verbal Reasoning Tests and Abstract Reasoning Tests. These tests will provide you with information and feedback on your abilities in these areas. These tests are used extensively by graduate recruiters as part of their selection processes.

In addition the Careers Service has the licence to provide free practice aptitude tests by test provider SHL.

If you are a current University of Aberdeen student you can access the online psychometric tests now (Requires a University of Aberdeen Login).

If you are a graduate of the University of Aberdeen, please contact us and we will send you links to the tests.

Personality questionnaires

These tests assess your personality and how you react in different situations at work. They analyse the key competencies essential to the position and how well candidates might fit into team and leadership roles (and into the company's culture). They are not usually timed and have no right or wrong answers. Questions might be repeated to check consistency or designed to test whether you are trying to present an unrealistic impression of yourself.

A series of free personality questionnaires, entitled “Profiling for Success”, are available to University of Aberdeen students and graduates. These include a Learning Styles Indicator Questionnaire (looking at the way you prefer to approach learning tasks), a Type Dynamics Indicator (TDI), (looking at your preferences and style according to four different dimentions of personality), and a Values-based Indicator of Motivation, (identifying the values that matter to you most).

If you are a current University of Aberdeen student you can access the online personality questionnaires now (Requires a University of Aberdeen Login).

If you are a graduate of the University of Aberdeen, please contact us and we will send you links to the questionnaires.

Further Information

Our virtual library contains a wide range of up to date and recommended materials to help you further in your career-related activities. This section allows you to link to the resources we have available on preparing for psychometric tests.

Further guidelines on preparing for psychometric tests

Resources for improving your numeracy skills