How to Read the Oxford Capacity Analysis Test
"Yous are a unique individual with your own personality traits," the leaflet for the Oxford Capacity Analysis (OCA) told me. And it was good to be reminded of that, as I haven't felt like myself of tardily. Maybe Scientology – for this 200-question test is a recruitment tool for the "Church" – could help me "achieve not bad things in life"? I went to the official website and saw a picture of some happy dude called Shawn who had gone through the analysis process. "Now my interaction with people is tremendously better… Day-to-day life is a joy," he testified. "In that location's null we don't seem to be able to handle now." Shawn seemed pretty happy with the results.
But then the crazy thought passed. I didn't ever want to go what Scientologists call "clear". I had no intention of sending back the completed form, as I was all also enlightened of the rumours nearly the Scientologists' strategies: the OCA evaluators would probably just say the results showed that I was in a terrible state and advise that joining their faith was the only manner to turn things around. But I thought I'd fill in the form anyway, to run into what it could tell me about myself. The OCA – which has nothing to do with Oxford University, despite its name – has been effectually since the 1950s and was quite firmly dismissed as bogus by the British Psychological Society in 1970 (it'due south "not a genuine personality test", apparently). Merely expect at Shawn and his big, toothy grinning. And listen to Daniella, another advocate of the assay, who said on the website: "It has really helped me to achieve my dreams, and reach them in the all-time way possible." I wanted some of what they had, if not all of it.
So I picked up the OCA leaflet that a friend had had placed in her hand almost St Pauls Tube station not so long ago. It was an innocent-looking thing, designed like a flyer for a posh optician or orthodontist. "What are your strengths and weaknesses?" it asked on the front. Let's find out, I thought, and opened it upward. The questions were printed in pocket-sized text, and each was accompanied by three boxes, indicating whether you agreed, were uncertain, or disagreed with it. I had a glance at the iv dense-looking pages and considered not bothering, but… what the hell.
Question one: "Do you make thoughtless remarks or accusations which you later regret?"
That was easy. Yes. Who doesn't? A person who never makes a thoughtless remark should exist avoided. Who wants to exist so controlled? Only weirdos are so robotic. Accusations, though, are no good. When I'd lose something in my room equally a teenager, I used to presume that my mum had "tidied it upward" – ie, put it in the bin – and regularly accused her of having done so. Sometimes, I was wrong; sometimes I was correct. Simply I regretted the times I was wrong, so I ticked the "hold" box.
Question ii: "When others are getting rattled, do you lot remain fairly composed?"
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It depends what "fairly" ways. At work I remain quite composed, come print-deadline hour. But then there have been times when I've been in a mood for no good reason: the other dark, I was "rattled" while talking about "free will" with some friends at a boozy guild. It was a stupidly lofty thing to get rattled nearly but rattled I was. I ticked "uncertain".
Question 3: "Do you browse through railway timetables, directories, or dictionaries just for pleasure?"
An odd one. Perchance this was introduced to entreatment to British trainspotters when the test was first devised: Ian Allan'due south ABC booklets started to sally in the early 1940s and precipitated a craze that peaked around that time. I do visit Ship for London's "Plan a Journey" page quite often merely but when I need to program a journey. "Directories" could hateful phone directories, I suppose, and those are pretty much extinct in the Google age. I use dictionaries when sub-editing for work, simply I wouldn't say that it was for pleasure… So: "disagree".
Question four: "When asked to make a decision, would y'all exist swayed past your like or dislike of the personality involved?"
"Concur". Some people you'd do annihilation for, or at least try. With people I dislike, I try to be fair and do the right thing. But I gauge it's hard to keep that going for ever.
Question v: "Exercise you intend two or less children in your family even though your wellness and income permit more?"
A bit personal, all of a sudden, and poorly phrased in terms of grammar. Besides, with the ongoing housing crisis and wage stagnation, how many people of my generation tin can say that their income permits more? I ticked "agree", though, because that's the truth.
Then it connected, probing whether "the idea of inflicting pain on… small animals" would preclude me from hunting and whether my vocalism was "monotonous, rather than varied in pitch". Sometimes it was political ("Do yous consider more than coin should be spent on social security?"), and sometimes it was banal in a Seinfeld-stand-upwardly-routine sort of way ("Are y'all a slow eater?"). One question reminded me of the empathy test in Bract Runner ("Would you take the necessary actions to impale an animal in gild to put information technology out of pain?"); another made me acknowledge to my irrational fear of ghosts at the historic period of 35 ("Exercise you always go disturbed past the noise of the wind or a business firm settling downwardly?").
The overall feel, though, was depressing. Too many of the questions seemed loaded in a way that would kill anybody's buzz. "Would it take a definite effort on your part to consider the subject of suicide?" "Do you sometimes wonder if anyone really cares well-nigh y'all?" "Do y'all often make tactless blunders?" "Do you often ponder on previous misfortunes?" "Do you lot often 'sit down and think' about decease, sickness, pain and sorrow?" "Are you ordinarily considered 'cold'?" "Do people enjoy being in your company?" "Exercise you ofttimes feel depressed?" "Does life seem rather vague and unreal to you?" "Practise others push you around?" "Do you consider you accept many warm friends?" "Do you tend to put off doing things and so observe information technology is besides late?"
I suppose Shawn had his "audits", went clear and became the happy dude he is today. But he had to get through this horrible test first to go there. Having washed it myself, now all I tin recall nigh is death, sickness, pain and sorrow, previous misfortunes, the friends I've lost, and all the things I should have done just left until it was too late. Scientologists would say that they could fix me. But I don't really believe them, considering they obviously need to make people pitiful before they can convert them. Other religions only accept to inspire.
The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Emotion compares the OCA to a newspaper horoscope, in that aspects of it are designed to "appeal to generalised emotional states that everyone is likely to feel at one time or another". It's plain a façade of pseudoscience that "functions as part of an overall 'thought control' strategy". For me, information technology was just a downer. So the next fourth dimension a friendly stranger offers you lot i of these innocuous-looking things, just say no!
Source: https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2017/02/oxford-capacity-analysis-scientology-personality-quiz
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