Psychometrist

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A professional trained to give and score psychological tests to assess mental traits and abilities
2. An expert who conducts tests to measure psychological variables and interpret results
3. A specialist skilled in performing standardized psychological assessments for evaluation purposes

Etymology: Psychometrist is a plain formation: English "psychometry" with the agent suffix "-ist" added, so it names a person who practises psychometry. The suffix itself has a long pedigree. It passed from Ancient Greek "-istēs", which marked someone who practised or followed a craft, into Latin as "-ista", then through Old French "-iste" into Middle English as "-ist", which is how it reached English. The interesting part lies in the first element. "Psychometry" combines "psyche" (the mind, or soul, from Greek "psykhē") with "-metry" (measurement, from Greek "metron"). The noun names the measuring of mental traits, so the psychometrist is the professional who carries out that measurement. The word is therefore a modern compound built from older Greek parts, rather than an inherited term with a long history of its own.

Synonyms: psychologist, assessor, evaluator, tester, analyst