Chapter 3 - Individual differences and assessment

Question 1

Individual differences

Human characteristics / personal attributes.

Answer 1

The more-or-less enduring psychological characterstics tht distinguish one person from another, and thus help to define each person’s individuality;
- Cognitive abilities.
- Knowledge
- Physical abilities
- Personality
- Interests
- Emotion

Question 2

What are the assumptions regarding individual differences?

Answer 2

• Adults have attributes that are relatively stable over time.
• People differ in these attributes.
• People’s relative differences in these attributes remain, even after training, job experiences, and other interventions.
• Differ job required different attributes.
• These attributes can be measured.

Question 3

The imporatance of personal attributes of organizations;

Answer 3

Job requirements + personal attributes = FIT, result to a good performance effective work behavior.

Question 4

Mental test/ Intelligence test

Answer 4

An instrument designed to measure subjects ability to reason, plan and solve problems (intelligence test).

Question 5

Psychometrician

Answer 5

Is a psychologist trained in measuring characteristics such as mental ability.

Question 6

Cognitive ability

Answer 6

A general mental capability involving reasoning, problem solving, planning, abstract thinking, complex idea comprehension, and learning from experinece.

Question 7

General mental ability

“g”is an abbreviation

Answer 7

Nonspecific capacity for resoning, learn and solve in any way.

Question 8

g-ocentric model

Answer 8

Sternberg and Wagner (1993), called this model to understand and predict the behavior of workers simply by examining “g”.

Question 9

Intelligence “g”

General mental ability (GMA)

Answer 9

General cognitive capability of people; e.g. reasoning, planning, problem solving, abstract thinking, understanding of complex ideas, fast learning, learning from experience.

Question 10

Intelligence model of Caroll (1993)

Answer 10

Caroll proposed that there are three layers of intelligence. The highest layer is “g”, next layer has the seven braod abilities, and the third includes abilities that are tied to the seven broad abilties.

Question 11

Is “g” important for work?

Answer 11

Yes, it contributes to work performance;
- It is shown in meta-analyses using European and US samples.
- For more complex jobs: higher predictive validity of “g”.
- But not perfect relation (average correlation r=0.50).
- Other attributes such as emotional reaction, personality traits, and interests also play an important role in successful job performance.

Question 12

Stamina

Answer 12

Ability to supply muscles with oxygenated blood

Question 13

Fluid intelligence

Answer 13

You are quick in understanding things

Question 14

Crystalilized intelligence

Answer 14

Your database of knowledge.

Question 15

Sensory abilities

Answer 15

The physical functions of vision, hearing, touch, taste, smell and kinesthetic feedback (feedback from your body about position etc.)

Question 16

Americans with disabilities act

Answer 16

Says that an employer can’t test areas such as sensory or physical abilities that mya be considered disabilities.

Question 17

Pscyhomotor abilities

Answer 17

A division of sensory abilities. This is reaction time, coordination, dexteritiy, arm-hand steadiness and wrist-finger speed.

Question 18

Physical abilities

Answer 18

The most physically demanding jobs reuire all three (muscular strength, cardiovascular edurance, movement quality) physical capacities.

Question 19

Personality

Answer 19

Predisposition (typical patterns of behavior, thinking, and emotion): “habitual way of responding”.

Question 20

Taxonomy Five-factor model (FFM)/Big Five

OCEAN

Answer 20

1. Openness to experience (curious, imaginative, independent).
2. Conscientiousness (responsible, persistent, planful).
3. Extraversion (Sociable, talkative, energetic).
4. Agreeableness (cooperative, trusting).
5. Neuroticism (secure, calm, relaxed)

Question 21

Some conclusions about personality

Personality, ability, conscientiousness

Answer 21

• Personality debends on work behavior, independent of “g” and is based on motivation “will do”.
• Ability is the knowledge and skillss “can do”.
• Conscientiousness is important trait in work situations and has a bigger impact on work behavior as the autonomy of employees increases.

Question 22

Some conclusions about personality

P-factors, functional personality at work, Ones (1993), Judge (2007)

Answer 22

• Personality factors have influence on different jobs: Emotional stability (security jobs, teamwork), Extraversion (sales performance, management), Openess to experience (expats, sucess in training), Agreeableness (custmer service, teamwork).
• Functional personality at work: combinations of personality traits predict success.
• High C, High A and Low N = high integrity (Ones 1993).
• High E & Low N = Happy/buoyant personality (Judge 2007).

Question 23

Emotional intelligence meaning

Answer 23

A individual’s ability to perceive emotion in self and others, to understand emotion, and then to manage emotion in self and others.

Question 24

What are the measurement “streams”of EI?

Answer 24

1. Ability test.
2. Self- and peer-report instruments.
3. Mixed instruments.

Streams 1 and 3 measures show that EI has added value in predicting performance, in additon to cognitive ability tests and personality test (O’Boyle 2011).

Question 25

Occupational information network (O*NET)

Answer 25

Is a collection of electronic databases based on well-developed taxonomies.

Question 26

Tacit knowledge

Answer 26

Action-oriented, goal directed knowledge acquired without direct help from others to achieve goals you value.

Question 27

Procedural knowledge

Answer 27

Knowing how to solve something (so tacit knowlegdge).

Question 28

Declarative knowledge

Answer 28

Is understanding what is equired to perform a task (so having information like O*NET), knowing informaiton about a job task.

Question 29

Psychological test

Answer 29

An objective and standardized procedure to measure a psychological construct, using samples of human behavior.

Question 30

Objective implies

Answer 30

Quantification, numerical results

Question 31

Standardized

Answer 31

Test results get meaning by norming, comparing test scores to other relevant test scores.

Question 32

Norm group

Answer 32

Group whose test scores are used to compare and understand an individual’s test score.

Question 33

Test battery

Answer 33

Combining multiple tests. Typically different characteristics are measured. “Battery” within one test period, or over a very short time period.
- Important decions, based on which combinaiton of test? AND how should the results of the different test be combined?

Question 34

Types of psychological tests

Answer 34

• Speed vs Difficulty: Speed test and Power test.
• Group vs individual.
• “Pencile and Paper” vs. “Performance”.

Question 35

Ethical Aspects of tests are

Answer 35

• Test bias: are there (structural) errors in the perdiction for certain subgroups?
• Test fairness: Are the decisions based on the test scores fair?
• Culture: Opportunity to become familiar with the subject matter or processes required by a test item.

Question 36

What are characteristics of Assessment Center?

Answer 36

• Done in groups.
• Multiple assessors.
• Focus on observable behavior, assessed via simulations.
• Job-relevant behaviors.
• Combinations of different methods.
• Transparent procedures and criteria.

Question 37

Application of Assessment Center is used for;

Answer 37

• Selection (external and internal).
• Training
• Especially for management functions.
• Especially for functions that require interaction with others.

Question 38

What are problems of Assessment center?

Answer 38

• Construct validity; What is actually measured? (mainly intelligence?).
• Inter-rater reliability: Assessors do not always agree with each other.
• High costs: Often multiple days, multiple assessors, costs of development, payment of assessors.

Question 39

What are adventages of Assessment Center?

Answer 39

• Relatively high perdictive validity (average correlation with work performance is r-.40)
• Enthusiastic participatns, acceptance of feedback.

Question 40

Integrity tests

Answer 40

Aim is to predict dishonest behaviors at work.
- Predicts overall performance better than FFM personality test (r=.41 vs r=.23).
- Predicts counterproductive work behaviors not as well as FMM personality test (r=.32 vs r=.51).

Question 41

Overt Integrity test

Answer 41

Questions about past honesty behavior (stealing, etc.) as well as attitudes toward various behaviors (employee theft, etc.).

Question 42

Personality Based Integrity Test

Answer 42

Infers honesty and integrity from questions dealing with broad personality constructs (e.g. conscientiousness, social responsability).

Question 43

Unstructured vs structured interviews

Answer 43

• Predictive validity (r=.51 vs .38) and inter-rater reliability are higher for structured interviews.
• Problems with objectivity (halo-effect, overweighing of negative information.

Question 44

Desing of structured interviews

Answer 44

• Based on analysis of the job.
• Similar kinds of questions and percise answering categories.
• Scoring procedure is standardized.

Question 45

Situational interview

Answer 45

Candidate is asked to describe in specific and behavioral detail how he or she would respond to a hypothetical situation.

Question 46

Cognitive ability test

Answer 46

Allows individuals to demonstrate what they know, perceive, remember, understand, or can work with mentally.

Question 47

Pyschomotor ability test

Answer 47

Is a test that also involves the coordinated movement of the limbs.