Tests & Measures: Obtaining for academic purposes.

ETHICS: Various professional organizations have ethical criteria governing the use of assessment instruments. Consult your institutional & professional organizations for these standards. [American Psychological Association (2005). FAQ/Finding Information About Psychological Tests. http://www.apa.org/science/faq-findtests.html]

LAW: All of these assessment instruments fall under U.S. or foreign copyright regulations. Just as your work is copyright protected at its creation so are other people's assessment instruments, tests, surveys, etc. Review the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976 (Title 17 U.S. Code) for specifics [http://www.copyright.gov/ ]

Fair use copyright law includes the use of instruments in research. It is usually ok to make a copy for personal use, to show a class, or to include in a paper which will be read and used in a classroom environment. It is not ok to use an instrument in research, particularly if the research will be published or distributed outside a single classroom or course, unless use permission has been given. [University of Texas System Office of General Counsel. (2005). Using the Four Factor Fair Use Test. In Fair use of copyrighted materials. [Author] http://www.utsystem.edu/ogc/intellectualproperty/copypol2.htm#test ]

Why is it hard to find a copy of an instrument just to look at it?

Authors can spend a lot of valuable time and effort to ensure their work is valid, reliable and appropriate for a specific use. Instrument availability may be restricted for validity, research, or economic considerations. It is the author’s choice of how available an assessment instrument may become.

See library guides for suggestions on how to locate copies of tests & measures because many things are NOT on the web. [Hough, H. (2005). Links to Various Libraries' Tests & Measures FAQs. http://libraries.uta.edu/helen/Test&meas/FAQs.rtf]

I’ve found an instrument I want to use. How do I get permission to use it in research?

It depends if the copyright of an inventory or instrument has been sold to a publisher. This transfer of copyright may be the case if the instrument is normally published by a company like Psychological Assessment Resources, and so on, or if the instrument has been printed in full in an article where the journal publishers require the author to sign over copyright of the article.

However, even in cases where journal publishers require the author to sign over copyright, the author may have maintained copyright of the instrument prior to publication of the article. In some cases, permission has to be obtained from both the author and the journal publisher, one of them being pro forma but still necessary.

If the instrument has not been published in full, the author must be contacted.

Where to obtain permissions:

Check with the publisher, if identified as a published instrument.
Searching The Buros Institute of Mental Measures (http://buros.unl.edu/buros/jsp/search.jsp) and The Educational Testing Service (http://www.ets.org/testcoll/) can help locate publisher addresses based on the name of the instrument.

Check with the journal editor/publisher, if it has been reproduced in full in a journal. www.acqweb.org is one of many ways to find publisher contact information.

Check with the author.
[locating the author can be difficult, particularly if retired. Journal articles may include author contact information. Association directories and The National Faculty Directory may be useful for current addresses. Try to confirm current location via the author’s institutional web site]

Check the Library of Congress, Copyright Office (http://www.copyright.gov/) [rarely]
If the author is deceased one must seek information from the estate.

Things of which to be aware:

Any alteration in the instrument should be cleared with the copyright holder and usually the author prior to use. Some authors will refuse permission to use if there is an intention to change the instrument in wording or form. This refusal can be academically legitimate as validity and reliability can be altered by these changes.

If you wish to re-use a measure, scale, or instrument, you must request formal permission for the additional use.

Get all permissions in writing, for record keeping purposes. Your Institutional Review Board will probably need to see them.

It is usually courteous to inform the author of research being done with the instrument, particularly if it is a smaller, less frequently utilized instrument.

If this page is copied for modification on another site, please provide proper attribution. Created 07/27/05, this page covered by all applicable copyright laws. Helen Hough, Central Library, Box 19497, University of Texas at Arlington, Arlington, Texas 76019

DISCLAIMER: This page provided for information purposes only, not to be construed as legal advice. The author of this page is not a lawyer nor licensed to practice law in any country or state. If you have a legal concern in this area, consult a copyright lawyer.