AN INTERNATIONAL LOOK AT SELECTION PRACTICES: NATION AND CULTURE AS EXPLANATIONS FOR VARIABILITY IN PRACTICE

A survey of 959 organizations in 20 countries was undertaken to assess whether differences in staffing practices are due in part to nation and culture. Cultural differences in uncertainty avoidance and, to a lesser extent, power distance, explained some of the national differences observed in the extensiveness of method use. Implications for understanding the best approaches to selection on a global basis are discussed.     

The Effect of Selective Serotonin Releasing Agents in the Chronic Mild Stress Model of Depression in Rats

Chronic exposure to mild unpredictable stress has been found to depress the consumption of, and preference for, highly palatable sucrose solution in rats. Stress-induced behavioral deficits may be maintained for a long time, however chronic administration of clinically effective antidepressants can restore normal behavior. This is the first report showing that Sprague-Dawley rats can be used in this model. A preference deficit in this strain of rats took at least 7 weeks to develop; about twice the time required when hooded Lister or Wistar rats are used in this model. Water consumption was not effected by chronic exposure to the mild stress regime and/or by chronic administration of the selective serotonin (5-HT) releasing agent MMAI (5-methoxy-6-methyl-2-aminoindan). The stress-induced deficit in sucrose intake was completely reversed by chronic treatment with MMAI (5 mg/kg, 2 x day) over 3 weeks in the two-bottle tests. In single-bottle tests, chronic treatment with the selective 5-HT releasers, MMAI (5 mg/kg, 2 x day) or MTA (p-methylthioamphetamine; 5 mg/kg, 2 x day), reversed the deficit in rewarded behavior (anhedonia) measured as a decrease in the consumption of 1% sucrose solution in the chronic mild stress model of depression in rats. With the experimental procedure employed, and at a dose of 10 mg/kg/day of 5-HT releasers, the magnitude and onset of this effect were greater than observed following similar administration of the selective 5-HT reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) sertraline (10 mg/kg/day), used as a standard anti-depressant drug.     

Going Beyond Cultural Sensitivity on the Road to Multiculturalism: Using the Intercultural Sensitizer as a Counselor Training Tool

Using the American Psychological Association (APA) Division 17 position paper on cross-cultural counseling competencies as an organizing framework, this article provides an overview of the various cross-cultural counseling training models and points to the need to go beyond sensitivity training to actually providing culture-specific knowledge in our training models. The Intercultural Sensitizer (IS) is presented as a training tool that can serve this need. The history, rationale, and development of the IS, previously called the Culture Assimilator, is described. Some illustrative critical incidents from the Asian American Intercultural Sensitizer are also presented. Finally, future direction for the use of the Intercultural Sensitizer as a training tool and potential problems are discussed. Este artículo usa la positión del APA Division 17 en competencias de consejería intercultural como un cuadro organizational para proporcionar un panorama de los diferentes modelos de preparación de consejería intercultural y para indicar la necesidad de llegar más alla que la preparación sensitiva para dar en realidad a los modelos de entrenamiento un conocimiento culturalmente específico. Se presenta El Sensibilizador Intercultural como un instrumento de entrenamiento para cumplir esta necesidad. Se describe la historia, razonadamente, y el desarrollo de El Sensibilizador Intercultural, anteriormente llamado Asimilador Cultural. También se presentan unos incidentes ilustrativos del Sensibilizador Intercultural Americo-asiatico. Finalmente, ademas de discutir la dirección futura para el uso de El Sensibilizador Intercultural como un instrumento de entrenamiento, se habla sobre los posibles problemas.     

DEVELOPMENT OF MULTIPLE JOB PERFORMANCE MEASURES IN A REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLE OF JOBS

The goal of criterion development in Project A was to construct multiple measures of the major components of job performance such that the total performance domain for a representative sample of the population of entry-level enlisted positions in the U.S. Army was covered. These measures were to be used as criteria against which to validate both experimental and existing predictors of job performance. The initial model specified that performance is multidimensional within two major categories of dimensions designated as organization-wide and job specific. The development strategy involved describing the total domain of job content via extensive task analyses and critical incident analyses, generating the critical performance dimensions that constitute it, constructing measures for each dimension, and evaluating each measure using expert judgment and field test data. The specific measures developed consisted of rating scales, tests of job knowledge, hands-on job samples, and archival records. The major steps in the job analyses, content sampling, instrument construction, and instrument evaluation are described, and the final array of criterion measures is presented.