NUCLEAR PSYCH-OUT
Kruger, Pamela
NUCLEAR Psych-Out Flunk this quiz and you're fired BY PAMELA KRUGER Bill Stauffer thought he had done well earning as much as $ 1,300 a week as a construction worker at Toledo Edison's Davis...
...Some firms believe the prospect of testing "scares and intimidates" undesirables from pursuing jobs, says Bob Smith, publisher of Privacy Journal, which reports on invasions of privacy...
...For a third time, he took a psychological test and was interviewed by a psychologist...
...The same sorts of civil-rights issues that arise from overpredicting violence could arise for overpredicting bad behavior," they wrote...
...None of them were security risks...
...the psychologist continued...
...It "is a separate issue entirely," he says...
...For Stauffer, the pain of this experience will not go away easily...
...I'm a Catholic...
...One took another job while the other was not invited back to work, according to Gallon...
...Workers were forced to answer such true-false questions as 'I like tall women,' 'I like to take a bath,' and 'In walking, I am very careful to step over sidewalk cracks,' Workers at other nuclear plants across the country may soon face a similar experience...
...The plan, NRC officials point out, offers "guidelines," not "rules," but plants that do not adhere to the plan will not be licensed to operate...
...Stauffer recalls the psychologist asking him...
...The company made the workers into "pariahs," he says...
...By standardizing security practices among nuclear plants, NRC officials say, they hope to weed out potential subversives, terrorists, and emotionally unstable workers...
...In one study, blacks and whites gave different responses to almost half of the test's statements...
...Early this year, the NRC halved the plant's $900,000 fine because of improvements, but Kelly contends testing was not included as one of them...
...But the interviews were brief, workers say, and merely served to confirm test results...
...Why the plant elected to administer these tests is a matter of debate...
...That, it seems, is just about right for the nuclear industry...
...Everybody knew the next day because you could see who wasn't at work," says Stauffer...
...The NRC doesn't specify what kind of test should be used, but the most common and the one used by Toledo Edison is the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory test (MMPI...
...I tell you, there were some embarrassing moments...
...The American Psychological Association also expressed reservations...
...A woman who answers true to "I like mechanics magazines" could be categorized as abnormally male...
...Stauffer claimed his signature was forged on the test bearing his name, but discovered this months after he left his job...
...If test results show evidence of "any psychological abnormalities," the document says, a follow-up interview also will be required...
...These included: "I like tall women," "I like to take a bath," and "In walking, I am very careful to step over sidewalk cracks...
...It took me a couple of days just to get back on my feet," Stauffer recalls...
...If operators had not quickly recognized their mistake, a meltdown could have resulted...
...Why are you asking me this...
...In February, Toledo Edison reached the conclusion that Stauffer was not a security risk and asked him to return to work...
...Stauffer and five other workers plan to sue for back pay, which Gallon estimates at about $70,000 for the six...
...Even by the rosiest assessments, tests are only accurate predictors 75 per cent of the time, says Inwald, who created a competing test...
...A series of equipment breakdowns, including an incident widely regarded as a near-disaster in June 1985, led to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) ordering Davis Besse closed...
...I don't," Stauffer responded angrily...
...I cannot believe people are acting as if the MMPI has a 90 per cent accuracy rate...
...Most workers were unable to find new jobs...
...The program is "a farce," says Robin Inwald, a leading test expert, who runs a New York company that develops screening tools for high-risk occupations...
...This has been a whole new world to me," he says...
...I don't," Stauffer replied...
...Under a new NRC plan, expected to be approved soon, all nuclear workers with "unescorted access" to plants will be required to take a psychological test before they are hired...
...Experts say the MMPI profiles of normal teens in the throes of adolescent confusion have been similar to those of adult psychopaths...
...Show me twenty terrorists, and I can identify maybe 75 per cent of them," she says...
...Why do you want to commit suicide...
...Stauffer adamantly denies ever having indicated wanting to commit suicide...
...I'm not a union activist or anything...
...Stauffer and twelve other workers were told they flunked...
...The procedures, he says, represent "the most good for the greatest number...
...Critics have steadily attacked the test as biased against minorities and women...
...One was undergoing a divorce, and Stauf-fer's daughter was awaiting major surgery...
...Their badges allowing admission to the plant were promptly rescinded, and a day later they were fired...
...I know these guys...
...We were a sideline casualty," says Gallon...
...They've been branded publicly as not psychologically fit...
...Rick Kelly, Toledo Edison's spokesman, defended company practices...
...Why do you feel like a failure in life...
...Mechanical failures, followed by design and human errors, removed water needed to cool the reactor's core...
...The company offered to retest all but one of the thirteen dismissed workers, but some didn't show up...
...Many suspect Toledo Edison officials ordered the testing last summer when workers were rebuilding the plant because they wanted to convince a wary public that the plant's past problems would not resurface...
...Workers say they were assured the test would have no bearing on their job status, although Toledo Edison officials have denied authorizing anyone to say that...
...No evidence other than the psychological evaluation indicated that the workers were security risks, says attorney Jack Gallon, who represents most of the fired employees...
...Of the six or seven who did, three passed, Gallon says...
...When they're branded, you've made them unemployable," Gallon says...
...Only a few other standardized psychological tests exist, and while there are disagreements about which is the most accurate, no one disagrees that the tests have a significant margin of error...
...But "everyone has problems," says Stauffer...
...Only "grade B and grade C" companies still use the tests, he says...
...Scores of civil libertarians and psychologists, including some from the American Psychological Association, question the validity of the testing and express concern about potential abuses...
...But last summer, following a psychological test given to Davis Besse workers, Stauffer was out of a job...
...The MMPI is the best available," says Kelly, echoing industry sentiment...
...But I'll also identify incorrectly 25 per cent of them as being terrorists...
...The press had been saying it was a sloppy plant...
...The test, administered to 500 Davis Besse contract employees—about one-third of the plant's on-site work force—contained 566 true-false statements...
...I would never contemplate suicide...
...But Gallon, formerly a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, says Toledo Edison has destroyed the reputations of individuals...
...If there was a better one available, we'd use it...
...At age forty-eight, he had worked there for twelve of the last fifteen years and had never received complaints about his performance...
...In a letter to the NRC the association complained the NRC didn't give enough attention to the issue of confidentiality and possible abuses, including having poorly trained psychologists interpret the tests...
...NUCLEAR Psych-Out Flunk this quiz and you're fired BY PAMELA KRUGER Bill Stauffer thought he had done well earning as much as $ 1,300 a week as a construction worker at Toledo Edison's Davis Besse nuclear plant near Port Clinton, Ohio...
...After he was fired, Stauffer suffered humiliation because he failed a psychological test...
...The plant began operating again in December 1986...
...A psychologist hired by the plant told Stauffer that his test answers qualified him as a "psychopath who belongs in a mental hospital...
...Those whose test results were considered questionable were interviewed by a psychologist hired by Toledo Edison...
...It is unlikely that [psychiatrists and psychologists] could predict behavior in nuclear facilities," wrote Bruce Sales and Lee Schrest, two clinical psychologists in a letter to the American Psychological Association after it agreed to give approval to the NRC plan...
...Why do you feel someone is watching you...
...Almost six months later, Stauffer was still trying to get his job back...
...No psychological test does what the industry wants it to do...
...I thought, 'Is there something wrong with me?'" Some of the workers did have troubles: Pamela Kruger is an assistant editor at US magazine and a free-lance writer...
...I've never been in trouble...
...She adds that some studies have shown that the MMPI is inaccurate in as many as half the cases...
Vol. 51 • June 1987 • No. 6
