ADDITIONAL EVIDENCE FOR THE ACCURACY OF BIOGRAPHICAL DATA: LONG-TERM RETEST AND OBSERVER RATINGS

Although the predictive validity of biographical information has been extensively documented in a variety of environments, the extent to which responses to a biodata questionnaire are accurate has not been adequately investigated. In particular, the accuracy of unverifi-able biodata items has not been determined. Evidence of accuracy was obtained in the present study using a test-retest design and informed external observers for verification. Responses were obtained from 237 study participants and 200 observers. Factor and item re-test correlations were obtained for subject and observer data, and responses were compared using product-moment correlations and t tests. Results provide evidence that many responses to a biodata questionnaire are accurate. Sources of inaccuracy were assessed, including the impact of social desirability, and applications of the findings to industrial uses of biodata were noted.     

Five Factor Biodata Inventory: resistance to faking

Faking on a biographical inventory compared to a traditional personality inventory was assessed in measuring the Five Factor Model of Personality. 705 subjects were randomly assigned to either an Answer Honestly or Faking condition. All subjects were recruited from psychology classes at two New Jersey State colleges. Women comprised 68.6% of the participants. The average age of the subjects was 24 yr. 383 subjects took part in the Answer Honestly condition. 322 participated in the Faking condition. In the Faking condition, subjects responded as if applying for the position of librarian. All subjects completed a biodata inventory, the NEO-Five Factor Inventory, a social desirability scale, a letter-cancellation task, and self-reported their grade point average. Criterion-related validity was assessed for both test scores across samples. Comparisons between samples indicated that subjects inflated scores on both inventories in socially desirable directions. Biodata Inventory scores were less elevated under the Faking conditions than the NEO-Five Factor Inventory scores.     

Impact of elaboration on socially desirable responding and the validity of biodata measures

The current study investigated the impact of requiring respondents to elaborate on their answers to a biodata measure on mean scores, the validity of the biodata item composites, subgroup mean differences, and correlations with social desirability. Results of this study indicate that elaborated responses result in scores that are much lower than nonelaborated responses to the same items by an independent sample. Despite the lower mean score on elaborated items, it does not appear that elaboration affects the size of the correlation between social desirability and responses to biodata items or that it affects criterion-related validity or subgroup mean differences in a practically significant way.     

BEYOND THE MEAN BIAS: THE EFFECT OF WARNING AGAINST FAKING ON BIODATA ITEM VARIANCES

We studied the effects of faking biodata test items by randomly warning 214 of 429 applicants for a nurse's assistant position against faking. While the warning mitigated the propensity to fake, the specific warning effects depended on item transparency. For transparent items, warning reduced the extremeness of item means and increased item variances. For nontransparent items, warning did not have an effect on item means and reduced item variances. These faking effects were best predicted when transparency was operationalized in terms of item-specific job desirability in addition to the item-general social desirability. We also demonstrated a psychometric principle: The effect of warning on means at the item level is preserved in scales constructed from those items, but the effect on variances at the item level is masked at the scale level. These results raise new questions regarding the attenuating effects of faking on validity, and regarding the benefit of warning applicants against faking.     

Social desirability in personality inventories: Symptoms,diagnosis and prescribed cure

An analysis of social desirability in personality assessment is presented. Starting with the symptoms, Study 1 showed that mean ratings of graded personality items are moderately to strongly linearly related to social desirability (Self Deception, Impression formation, and the first Principal Component), suggesting that item popularity may be a useful heuristic tool for identifying items which elicit socially desirable responding. We diagnose the cause of socially desirable responding as an interaction between the evaluative content of the item and enhancement motivation in the rater. Study 2 introduced a possible cure; evaluative neutralization of items. To test the feasibility of the method lay psychometricians (undergraduates) reformulated existing personality test items according to written instructions. The new items were indeed lower in social desirability while essentially retaining the five factor structure and reliability of the inventory. We conclude that although neutralization is no miracle cure, it is simple and has beneficial effects.     

PARALLEL TEST FORM DEVELOPMENT: A PROCEDURE FOR ALTERNATE PREDICTORS AND AN EXAMPLE

A procedure for developing alternate test forms that are parallel in the sense that scores on the different forms have similar means, standard deviations, and factor structures is described and applied to a bio-data inventory and a situational judgment test. Careful consideration of item-by-item parallelism during development resulted in alternate forms that were parallel at the item level. Further, comparison with a biodata test form comprised of items randomly selected from a pool of biodata items revealed that for the types of measures described here it may be necessary to produce parallel forms of each item to create alternate forms that are parallel in the way in which Cronbach (1947) originally defined parallelism.     

Relation of the Big Five and Factor V subcomponents to social intelligence

Factor analysis of trait terms defining Factor V yielded five oblique subcomponents (Creativity, Intellect, Reflectiveness, Conservatism, and Closed Minded), the last of which seems to be an artifact due to social desirability. Factor analysis of Sternberg's laymen's and experts' implicit conceptions of intelligence yielded seven oblique factors. These seven factors (Social Competence, Reading, Planning, Objectivity, Inquiring Intellect, Nonjudgmental, and Problem Solving) describe dimensions of what could be termed Social Intelligence. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that the Social Intelligence factors were quite predictable from Factor V subcomponents and other Big Five traits. Several Social Intelligence factors were predicted in a large part primarily by other Big Five Traits. Higher order factor analysis followed by regression revealed that a general Social Intelligence factor was predicted primarily by a higher order Factor V. Addition of the other Big Five traits to prediction increased Rmodestly but did not diminish the influence of Factor V. These results suggest that at a low level of the factor hierarchy specific aspects of Social Intelligence are broader than the subcomponents of Factor V and involve other personality traits. However, at the highest level of the factor hierarchy Factor V is the primary predictor of Social Intelligence; while other traits aid in prediction, they do not diminish the relation between the two. The results provide some support for the lexical hypothesis prediction that Factor V trait terms summarize behaviors that shape implicit conceptions of intelligence, which is more social and practical than IQ assessed as g Copyright © 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Personality for free: Psychometric properties of a public domain Australian measure of the five‐factor model

Fifty items from Goldberg's International Personality Item Pool were compiled to form a public‐domain measure of personality, the Australian Personality Inventory (API). Data from a random community sample (N = 7615) and a university‐based sample (N = 271) were used to explore psychometric properties of this 50‐item measure of the five‐factor model of personality (FFM). In both samples, internal reliabilities were adequate. In the university‐based sample an appropriate pattern of convergent and divergent relationship was found between scale scores and domain scores from the NEO Five‐Factor Inventory. After adjusting for an apparent response set (mean response across items), exploratory factor analyses clearly retrieved the FFM in both samples. It is provisionally concluded that raw scale scores from the API provide reliable estimates of the FFM, but adjustment for mean response across the 50 items might clarify the five‐factor structure, especially in less educated samples.     

A CROSS-CULTURAL STUDY OF PERSONALITY: EGYPTIAN AND ENGLISH CHILDREN*

679 Egyptian boys and 696 girls completed the Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, translated into Arabic. Factor comparisons were moderately high for extraversion and social desirability but weak for neuroticism and psychoticism. Suitable item substitution produced a scoring key resulting in adequate reliabilities with the exception of a somewhat low reliability for the boys on extraversion and low reliabilities on psychoticism for both sexes. Sex differences on means of the dimensions were as usual, boys scoring higher than girls on extraversion and psychoticism, but lower on neuroticism and social desirability. Moreover, on comparing Egyptian with English means, using scales of items in common only, the English boys and girls scored higher than their Egyptian counterparts on extraversion but significantly lower on social desirability. British boys scored higher on psychoticism than did Egyptian boys but British girls scored lower than Egyptian girls.     

Predicting consistent psychological test item responses: A comparison of models

The efficacy of four models for predicting the stability of a given individual's test item responses on a structured inventory was examined. Two models were based on item characteristics alone and predicted that an individual would be most likely to change responses to items with moderate endorsement probabilities, or with moderate social desirability scale values. Two other prediction models incorporated individual differences in the perception of item characteristics by predicting that unstable items would have relatively long response latencies for an individual, or would be near an individual's threshold for responding desirably to items. Results from two studies yielded support for the following conclusions: (a) a person's test item responses are relatively stable over short time intervals; (b) items to which a person will show response changes on retest can be identified to a statistically significant degree; (c) the models based on response latencies constituted in both studies a significantly better predictor than the other models examined. The implications of these results for the threshold model were discussed as were the practical and theoretical applications of the response latency-item stability relationship at the level of an individual's test protocol.     

Person‐factors in the California Adult Q‐Set: closing the door on personality trait types?

To investigate recent hypotheses of replicable personality types, we examined data from 1540 self‐sorts on the California Adult Q‐Set (CAQ). Conventional factor analysis of the items showed the expected Five‐Factor Model (FFM). Inverse factor analysis across random subsamples showed that none of the previously reported person‐factors were replicated. Only two factors were replicable, and, most importantly, these factors were contaminated by mean level differences in item endorsement. Results were not due to sample size or age heterogeneity. Subsequent inverse factor analysis of standardized items revealed at least three replicable factors; when five person‐factors were extracted, they could be aligned precisely with the dimensions of the FFM. The major factors of person similarity can be accounted for entirely in terms of the FFM, consistent with the hypothesis that there are no replicable personality types in the CAQ. Published in 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

An Examination of Biodata Theory‐Based Constructs in a Field Context

This study examined whether items from a biodata inventory were consistent with theory‐based constructs as suggested by the ecology model. The model posits five constructs explain biodata predictive ability. Items were sorted using the theory‐based construct domains. The resulting scale scores were assessed for evidence of content, criterion‐related, and construct validity in a sample of 6032 automated systems controllers. Results suggested moderate support for the theory‐based constructs. A notable finding was that items capturing a theoretical construct were impacted by the life stage in which they were anchored. Results further suggest the need to examine if certain life stages are more predictive than others or perhaps if certain constructs are more predictive when related to a particular life stage.     

A procedure for isolating social desirability variance in a three-way component analysis

Three-way component analysis aims to summarize all the information in a three-way data set related, for example, to the responses of individuals to a set of items in a set of situations. The data are decomposed into three component matrices (person, item and situation components) and a core matrix. Such data are generally obtained by means of a situation-response questionnaire administered to a sample of participants. This paper proposes a preprocessing procedure for controlling social desirability in these kinds of questionnaires. The essential idea is to isolate the variance due to social desirability response bias and remove it from the data set. The procedure is demonstrated through its empirical application in the personality domain. Its performance is also assessed by means of a simulation study which shows that the presence of social desirability bias in a data set had different consequences: (1) the variance effect due to persons increased, and the effect of the triple interaction persons × items × situations decreased; (2) the person component and core matrix were partially distorted. However, the social desirability bias in the data set was successfully controlled by our preprocessing method.     

Probing item social desirability by correlating personality items with Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR): A validity examination

Researchers often include a social desirability measure in personality measures, commonly the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR), and correlate it with personality items to probe for social desirability of the items. A strong correlation between BIDR scores and a personality item would indicate high item social desirability. The current research assesses the validity of this practice. Results showed that these correlations have high validity only when BIDR scores are calculated as a continuous variable rather than as dichotomized item scores. In addition, self-deception scores have higher validity for detecting item social desirability than do impression management scores. The current research supported the use of the self-deception scores, in particular, to detect highly desirable or undesirable items.     

Scoring Biodata: Is it rational to be quasi‐rational?

Five quasi‐rational biodata scales were developed by empirically keying biodata items to predict scores on a measure of the Big Five dimensions of personality. The criterion‐related validities of the quasi‐rational scales were compared to empirical and rational biodata keying methods using supervisory ratings of job performance as the criterion. Empirical keying outperformed the quasi‐rational and rational methods (which had similar validities).     

Is the Political Skill Inventory Fit for Personnel Selection? An Experimental Field Study

The political skill inventory (PSI) assesses social effectiveness in organizations by self‐reports and has demonstrated strong evidence of validity. It was the purpose of this experimental field study to investigate construct and criterion‐related validity of the PSI when used under conditions of personnel selection. In the experimental group (n=102), the instructions asked job incumbents to work on the PSI, a social desirability scale, and a Big‐Five personality inventory as if they took part in a personnel selection procedure for a personally very attractive position. Additionally, they were asked to report yearly income. In the control group (n=110), job incumbents were asked to answer the items honestly. As expected, in both conditions, the PSI did not correlate with social desirability, but it correlated positively with extraversion, conscientiousness, and income, and negatively with neuroticism, thus demonstrating construct and incremental criterion‐related validity under both conditions. Implications and limitations are discussed.     

Implications of Item Keying and Item Valence for the Investigation of Construct Dimensionality

Factor analysis and nomological network analysis are commonly used as complementary procedures in the investigation of the dimensionality of constructs (e.g., self-esteem, job satisfaction). Although it has been demonstrated that factor analyses are often biased toward a two-dimensional solution for measures including regular- and reverse-keyed items, less attention has been paid to the implications for nomological network analyses. We propose, and demonstrate empirically in two studies, that item keying is confounded with item valence (i.e., favorability of item content), and that item valence can bias the results of both factor analysis and nomological network analysis toward a two-dimensional interpretation. We also demonstrate that the valence effect is related to, but distinguishable from, social desirability response bias. We caution that the practice of excluding reverse-keyed items to achieve unidimensionality can lead to distortion in correlations among constructs, and we offer alternative remedies to the valence problem.     

Social desirability and self-reports: testing models of socially desirable responding

The present research investigated the cognitive processes involved in responding to self-report items under varying conditions of social desirability. Participants in three experiments judged the extent to which a set of items (personality traits in Experiments 1 and 2; behaviors in Experiment 3) described them under instructions that either increased or decreased concerns with social desirability. Under most conditions, instructions that produced the greatest concern with social desirability resulted in the longest response times. This finding is consistent with the view that social desirability operates as an editing process; participants retrieve the requested information and then evaluate it before responding. There was also some evidence for individual differences in social desirability; participants scoring high on the trait of self-deception were generally faster at making these judgments than were participants scoring low on self-deception.     

A psychometric evaluation of the revised Temperament and Character Inventory (TCI-R) and the TCI-140

The psychometric properties of the newest version of the Temperament and Character Inventory (the TCI-R) were evaluated in a large (n = 727) community sample, as was the TCI-140, a short inventory derivative. Facets-to-scale confirmatory and exploratory factor analyses of the TCI-R did not support the organization of temperament and character facet scales within their superordinate domains. Five of the 29 facet scales also displayed relatively low internal consistency (a < .70). Factor analyses of the TCI-140 item set yielded only limited support for hypothesized item-to-scale memberships. Harm Avoidance, Novelty Seeking, and Self-Directedness items, in particular, were not well differentiated. Although psychometrically comparable, the TCI-R and the TCI-140 demonstrate many of the limitations of earlier inventory versions. Implications associated with the use of the TCI-R and TCI-140 and C. R. Cloninger's theory of personality are discussed.     

The influence of item order on intentional response distortion in the assessment of high potentials: Assessing pilot applicants

An experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of item order and questionnaire content on faking good or intentional response distortion. It was hypothesized that intentional response distortion would either increase towards the end of a long questionnaire, as learning effects might make it easier to adjust responses to a faking good schema, or decrease because applicants' will to distort responses is reduced if the questionnaire lasts long enough. Furthermore, it was hypothesized that certain types of questionnaire content are especially vulnerable to response distortion. Eighty‐four pre‐selected pilot applicants filled out a questionnaire consisting of 516 items including items from the NEO five factor inventory (NEO FFI), NEO personality inventory revised (NEO PI‐R) and business‐focused inventory of personality (BIP). The positions of the items were varied within the applicant sample to test if responses are affected by item order, and applicants' response behaviour was additionally compared to that of volunteers. Applicants reported significantly higher mean scores than volunteers, and results provide some evidence of decreased faking tendencies towards the end of the questionnaire. Furthermore, it could be demonstrated that lower variances or standard deviations in combination with appropriate (often higher) mean scores can serve as an indicator for faking tendencies in group comparisons, even if effects are not significant.