Ethics and Marginal Cases: the rights of the mentally handicapped

ABSTRACT  Some beings, including children, animals and the mentally handicapped, seem to deserve moral consideration, despite the fact that they are not rational or moral agents. These so-called marginal cases create a problem for theories that heavily stress the role of moral and/or rational agency in ethics: the latter seem unable to account for the former's moral status. This paper discusses the recent and original attempt of Loren Lomasky to solve this problem. It is argued that Lomasky's arguments are self-defeating because they can only succeed by relying on common-sense morality and, thus, by giving up the heavy stress on the role of rational agency in ethics.     

The Need for a New Psychological Model of Religious Development

This article summarizes the most prominent theories of religious development that are rooted in Piagetian tradition: R. Goldman, D. Elkind, J. Fowler, F. Oser. Following a discussion of some of their assumptions and presuppositions, the paper presents a rationale for a new theoretical model of religious development applicable to Christian populations and congruent with a Christian worldview.     

A META-ANALYSIS OF THE VALIDITY OF METHODS FOR RATING TRAINING AND EXPERIENCE IN PERSONNEL SELECTION

This paper reviews the validity evidence for systematic methods used to evaluate training and experience (T&E) ratings in personnel selection. Meta-analytic summaries of the data indicate that validity varies with the type of T&E evaluation procedure used. The lllinois job element and behavioral consistency methods each demonstrated useful levels of validity (.20 and .45, respectively) with small corrected standard deviations, thus supporting validity generalization. Both the point and task methods yielded low mean validities (.11 and .15, respectively) with larger variability. The authors hypothesized that both the point and task methods were affected by a job experience moderator. Partial support for this hypothesis was found. Moderator analyses suggested that the point method was most valid when the applicant pool had low mean levels of job experience and was least valid with an experienced applicant pool. Additional research is desirable on all T&E methods to decrease the potential impact of second-order sampling error in the meta-analytic results. Further research is also needed to explicate the constructs measured by T&E evaluations.     

Cross-Cultural Counseling at the Crossroads: A Dialogue with Clemmont E. Vontress

Clemmont E. Vontress, professor of education at George Washington University, discusses the genesis, status, and future direction of cross-cultural counseling, the subspecialty of which he is a pioneer and frequent contributor to its growing body of literature.     

An empirical study of occupational families in the youth labour market

This research aims at identifying job families for use in broadly based training for young people. A total of 455 job incumbents in the youth labour market were interviewed using the Job Components Inventory (JCI). The job sample was heterogeneous, reflecting a wide range of industries and job titles; some of these were skilled but mainly they were semi- and unskilled. The JCI covers the use of tools and equipment, physical and perceptual skills, mathematical requirements, communication, decision making and responsibility. Cluster analysis of items identified 36 skill components. These formed the basis for job-holder profiles, which in turn were grouped by hierarchical clustering. The optimal solution resulted in six clusters, the characteristics of which were described in terms of JCI component scores. The six clusters were labelled as clerical, skilled interpersonal, operative, unskilled manual, intermediate skilled technical and skilled technical. The stability of these six clusters was assessed using split-half replications. Results are discussed and evaluated in the context of contemporary youth training needs.     

JOB CLASSIFICATION APPROACHES AND THE IMPLEMENTATION OF VALIDITY GENERALIZATION RESULTS

This paper compares two job classification methods for showing the appropriateness of cognitive tests in settings that were not involved in supplying data for a validity generalization analysis. One approach was an elaborate quantitative procedure that involved a lengthy job inventory and a multivariate item analysis. This approach was shown to be highly successful when applied to the responses from 1179 job inventories collected in 54 petroleum-petrochemical plants from 30 different companies. The other procedure involved simple job classification judgments by supervisors and incumbents. This latter approach was shown to be as effective, but was much less time consuming and costly. Professional and legal implications of these findings are discussed.     

THE INFLUENCE OF RATER AND RATEE AGE ON TWO PERFORMANCE JUDGMENTS

The influences of rater age and rater age on performance evaluations of 513 exempt managers from a large manufacturing organization were examined. Two general performance criteria and six specific performance criteria were used. Results showed small but significant age influences on two of the specific performance measures, Self-Development and Interpersonal Skills. Older workers received lower ratings than younger workers on both of these dimensions. In addition, younger raters gave significantly higher ratings than older raters on Interpersonal Skills. Small but significant age interactions were found in both Interpersonal Skills ratings and Self-Development ratings. The findings were replicated in a second sample ( N =178). The influence of age on performance ratings is consistent with previous research and is compared. The extent of the influence is smaller in the present study than in previous research.     

THE JOB COMPONENTS INVENTORY AND THE ANALYSIS OF JOBS REQUIRING LIMITED SKILL

The Job Components Inventory, a new job analysis technique examining the use of tools and equipment, physical and perceptual requirements, mathematical requirements, communication requirements, and decision-making and responsibility requirements, is introduced. Results of a study of 100 job holders demonstrate a high reliability of the technique in terms of supervisor-job holder agreement, and the method is shown by analysis of variance and cluster analysis successfully to discriminate between and within job titles. The technique is proving to be a practical instrument for use in curriculum development, careers guidance and broad-based training, and recommendations for its further use and evaluations are made.