Conference Psychological Assessment Brno

About the Conference

Psychological Assessment Brno (PDB) is the only Czech conference for professionals in both practice and research focused specifically on assessment, and more broadly on measurement and testing across various psychological and related fields.
With up to four parallel sessions, the sixth edition of the conference will offer content relevant to clinical, school and counselling psychologists, as well as to professionals working in personnel or traffic psychology. Part of the programme will also be devoted to forensic topics, large-scale testing in school, educational and other contexts, the development and adaptation of new methods, and psychometric research.

The conference is organised by the Department of Psychology and the Institute for Psychological Research at the Faculty of Social Studies, Masaryk University, in cooperation with the Section for Tests and Testing of the Czech-Moravian Psychological Society. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the conference partners: Propsyco, a publisher of psychological tests, and Pad, an information system not only for psychologists.

Thematic Focus of the Conference

As in previous years, the aim of this year’s conference is to help narrow the gap between the current state of psychological knowledge and assessment practice in the Czech Republic across various areas of psychology and related fields. Rather than focusing primarily on presenting the latest findings, we welcome contributions addressing how knowledge is put into practice. We aim to seek solutions, identify possible ways forward, or at the very least raise questions concerning current pressing issues in psychological assessment practice. Sometimes, simply naming and describing what is perceived as problematic in practice can be useful in itself — solutions may then emerge from subsequent discussion.

Psychological assessment and testing have their place across many fields. Most of the conference programme traditionally covers assessment in school, educational-psychological and clinical psychology, but some contributions will also focus on traffic, personnel, forensic and other areas of psychology, as well as on special education assessment and psychometrics. Attention will also be given to broader topics related to testing and measurement in the social sciences, as well as to psychometrics and the development and adaptation of tests. New Czech assessment procedures, applications, methods and tests will be presented. We also do not want to overlook the people who work with these tools — psychologists and other professionals — including their education, qualifications and supervision. In addition, we want to discuss test developers, clients and, above all, the interaction among all these groups. We want to discuss psychological assessment in the “here and now”.

Programme Topics

We want the pressing issues to be brought forward directly by you, the conference participants. However, we can already identify several topics that are certain to feature at the conference:

• How will artificial intelligence affect psychological assessment? What further technological developments can we expect?
• What is the current state of forensic expert assessment? What is the validity of forensic expert reports? What are the latest developments in assessment in the police, armed forces and emergency services?
• What is happening in measurement within the education system: entrance examinations, high-stakes testing, and the assessment of knowledge and skills? What is the current state of public debate on these tests?
• What new psychological assessment methods have been introduced to the Czech and Slovak markets? What is their quality, and how can this quality continue to be supported?
• What advances and new approaches are emerging in psychometrics? How is the concept of validity changing? Which topics should practitioners be aware of?
• How can we assess current phenomena that are shaping society: behavioural addictions, issues related to social media, cyberbullying, anxiety and depressive difficulties, gender identity and others?

Do you have an idea for your own topic? Propose your own session! If you are unsure, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Programme Committee:

e-mail: pdb@fss.muni.cz

Organising Committee:
E-mail: pdb.podpora@fss.muni.cz