Content validity: A neglected strategy for developing managerial selection tests?

There is a lack of quick, valid, and cost effective methods for selection of low-and mid-level managerial personnel. Using content-valid methods to develop managerial selection instruments may reap substantial benefits for applicants as well as for the organizations using such tools. To this end, based upon extensive job analysis, a content-valid managerial selection test was developed. Criterion-based validity collected on the new instrument suggested that an instrument developed using content-valid procedures can also show acceptable levels of criterion validity.     

Gender,psychological well-being and somatic cardiovascular risk factors

The purpose of this study is to determine associations between cardiovascular risk factors and subjective experience of psychological general well-being with special reference to gender-related differences. One hundred fifty white-collar workers in a car manufacturing plant in Sweden participated in a health care screening program. Subjective experience of psychological well-being was significantly correlated with cardiovascular risk factors among both men and women. There were, however, marked differences between the genders. For men, the following specific psychological variables were significantly correlated with cardiovascular risk factors: estimation of general health, anxiety, self-control and vitality. For women, more complex significant relationships between the two sets of variables were found. Moreover, the direction of the correlations differed between the genders. For example, men with cardiovascular risk factors, such as increased blood pressure, blood lipids and body mass index, reported significantly morepositive estimation of their general health. For women the relation was the opposite with a significantly positive correlation (p-0.004) between experience of good health and a low risk factor profile indicating the concordance between physiological and psychological parameters. Possible reasons for these sex differences are discussed.     

Intelligence and the Frontal Lobe: The Organization of Goal-Directed Behavior

Basic to the study of individual differences is the concept of “general intelligence” or Spearman'sg.In this article we suggest thatgis largely a reflection of the control functions of the frontal lobe. A series of experiments investigates a phenomenon we callgoal neglect:disregard of a task requirement even though it has been understood and remembered. Subjectively it is as though the neglected requirement “slips the subject's mind.” Previously described in frontal patients, we show that goal neglect can also be seen in some members of the normal population. In line with conventional distinctions between controlled and automatic processing, eliciting conditions for goal neglect include novelty, weak error feedback, and multiple concurrent task requirements. Under these conditions neglect is linked closely togand extremely common after frontal lesions. Following many other models, we suggest that behavior in any task is structured by a set of action constraints or requirements, derived in part from verbal instructions and specified at multiple levels of abstraction. A frontal process of constraint or requirement activation is fundamental to Spearman'sg.     

On the time course of negative priming: Another look

In two experiments, the pattern of persistence of negative priming effects across delay intervals of 500 and 2,500 msec was assessed using a within-subjects, random sequencing of delays. Neill and Valdes (1992; Neill, Valdes, Terry, & Gorfein, 1992) have argued that a within-subject experimental design is required for decay of negative priming to be seen, in contrast to results reported elsewhere (e.g., Tipper, Weaver, Cameron, Brehaut, & Bastedo, 1991) showing stable negative priming effects across delays. In neither experiment was substantial evidence of decay detected, raising questions for the notion that suppression necessarily declines across brief temporal intervals and for the assertion that episodic retrieval is the sole source of negative priming.     

PROFESSIONAL NETWORKS OF JUNIOR FACULTY IN PSYCHOLOGY

Composition and functioning of academics' professional networks were assessed in a study of 47 women and 43 men holding tenure-track assistant professor positions in psychology at sixty universities. Women's networks had significantly more women colleagues, more higher-status women colleagues, and fewer associates from their previous institutions than men's. Women also consistently rated their networks as less effective at helping them build a professional reputation. However, women were similar to men in terms of the number of "important colleagues" and higher status associates in their networks and ratings of colleagues' effectiveness at providing professional socialization, friendship, career information, and access to current research. The results suggest that by the third year at the assistant professor level, women in psychology have established a small same-sex support network, but that their larger network functioning may be beginning to diverge from men's in one important area: building a profesional reputation. Implications for women's career strategies are discussed.     

THE FUNCTIONAL RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN ARTIFICIAL FOOD COLORS AND HYPERACTIVITY

The presence of a functional relationship between the ingestion of artificial food colors and an increase in the frequency and/or duration of selected behaviors that are representative of the hyperactive behavior syndrome was experimentally investigated. Two eight-year-old females, who had been on the Feingold K-P diet for a minimum of 11 months, were the subjects studied. The experimental design was a variation of the BAB design, with double-blind conditions. This design allowed an experimental analysis of the placebo phases as well as challenge phases. Data were obtained by trained observers on Out of Seat, On Task, and Physically Aggressive behaviors, as they occurred in the subjects' regular class setting. Results indicated (a) the existence of a functional relationship between the ingestion of artificial food colors and an increase in both the duration and frequency of hyperactive children.     

An observational case study of failure in social problem-solving

An observationally based assessment of social problem-solving skill was contrasted with more traditional testing methods. A preschool child with low social success was chosen for a demonstration profile analysis. The relative frequencies of the social goals, strategies, and targets shown by this child during free play were plotted in relation to that of his same-sex peer group. Parallel profiles of his relative success with specific goals, strategies, and targets were also constructed and compared to relevant group means and standard deviations. Specific social problem-solving strengths and weaknesses were identified from these profiles, using both intra- and interindividual analyses. The benefits and limitations of this approach for measurement and treatment of social problem-solving deficits were discussed.     

The birth order puzzle.

Studies relating intellectual performance to birth order report conflicting results, some finding intellectual scores to increase, others to decrease with birth order. In contrast, the relationship between intellectual performance and family size is stable and consistently replicable. Why do these two highly related variables generate such divergent results? This birth order puzzle is resolved by means of the confluence model that quantifies the influences upon intellectual growth arising within the family context. At the time of a new birth, two opposing influences act upon intellectual growth of the elder sibling: (a) his or her intellectual environment is "diluted" and (b) he or she loses the "last-born's handicap" and begins serving as an intellectual resource to the younger sibling. Since these opposite effects are not equal in magnitude, the differences in intellectual performance among birth ranks are shown to be age dependent. While elder children may surpass their younger siblings in intellectual performance at some ages, they may be overtaken by them at others. Thus when age is taken into consideration, the birth order literature loses its chaotic character and an orderly pattern of results emerges.