Forced-choice and conventional personality assessment: Each may have unique value in pre-employment testing

Forced-choice (FC) personality scales are purported to predict criteria such as counterproductive work behavior (CWB) incrementally beyond conventional personality measures in pre-employment testing situations. Unfortunately, the research upon which FC tests’ claims of superiority are founded, relies upon undergraduate participants in highly artificial scenarios. Moreover, the possible predictive advantages of FC personality scales with regards to important contextual performance (CP; Borman & Motowidlo, 1993) criteria have not been investigated. We used a sample of call center employees to investigate the incremental validity of a FC personality scale over a conventional personality scale (and vice versa) with CP measures, and CWB, as criteria. Our FC and conventional personality measures were highly correlated, but each still offered unique predictive value with regards to CP or CWB. Thus, contrary to past research with student samples, in field settings FC personality scales may not be clearly superior to conventional personality scales. Moreover, contrary to widespread concern that FC measures’ predictiveness is attributable to their overlap with general mental ability, the unique predictive value of our FC measure remained even when variance due to general mental ability was statistically controlled.     

Impact of anxiety and depression on the physical status and daily routines of cancer patients during chemotherapy

The evolution of symptoms, emotional state and daily routines in patients with breast cancer and lung cancer during treatment with intravenous chemotherapy (CT) is described and the influence of anxiety and depression on these variables is analyzed. 66 patients, 29 with breast cancer and 37 with lung cancer, were evaluated before starting treatment, and after completing the first, second and last cycle of CT using the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), rating scales and interview. Less than 30% of the patients showed clinical anxiety or depression according to the HADS. Throughout the treatment, tiredness, fatigue and nausea increased significantly and work and leisure activity decreased. Concern about the future of relatives and insomnia increased significantly over time in patients with breast cancer whereas they decreased in patients with lung cancer. By introducing the HADS scores as covariates, it was found that most differences are due to the time factor and the type of cancer. During treatment with CT, emotional disturbances do not seem to have significant impact on the symptoms and changes in daily life reported by cancer patients.     

Attribution-based motivation treatment efficacy in an online learning environment for students who differ in cognitive elaboration

Attribution-based motivation treatments can boost performance in competitive achievement settings (Perry and Hamm 2017), yet their efficacy relative to mediating processes and affect-based treatments remains largely unexamined. In a two-semester, pre-post, randomized treatment study (n?=?806), attributional retraining (AR) and stress-reduction (SR) treatments were administered in an online learning environment to first-year college students who differed in cognitive elaboration (low, high). Low elaborators who received AR outperformed their SR peers by nearly a letter grade on a class test assessed 5 months post-treatment. Path analysis revealed this AR-performance linkage was mediated by causal attributions, perceived control, and positive and negative achievement emotions in a hypothesized causal sequence. Results advance the literature by showing AR (vs. SR) improved performance indirectly via cognitive and affective process variables specified by Weiner’s (1985a, 2012) attribution theory of motivation and emotion.     

Effects of Reward and Coercion for Transgression Compliance on Judgments of Responsibility and Recommended Punishment

Previous research ( Greitemeyer & Weiner, 2003 ) has demonstrated that compliance to commit a transgression for an anticipated reward as opposed to an anticipated punishment results in greater inferences of personal responsibility. The present studies extend these findings to a courtroom context in which punishment decisions are made. In Study 1, a nurse who administered a non-approved drug was perceived as more responsible; and more severe punishment decisions were recommended, given compliance for an offered reward relative to a threatened punishment. These findings subsequently were replicated while varying the consequences of the drug administration (Study 2) and employing an antisocial scenario (Study 3). Legal theory, field theory, and prospect theory are discussed as possible explanations for these phenomena.     

Recruiting Teen Smokers in Shopping Malls to a Smoking-Cessation Program Using the Foot-in-the-Door Technique

Persuading teen smokers to volunteer for smoking-cessation programs is a challenging yet understudied problem. As a method of dealing with this problem, we used and tested a foot-in-the-door (FITD) approach. Teen smokers were intercepted at malls and were assigned randomly to request compliance with a small behavior request of either (a) answering a few questions (light FITD) or (b) answering the same questions and a few additional ones, plus watching a short video about the effects of nicotine (heavy FITD). Participants were then called back by telephone several weeks later and asked to comply with a large behavior request of joining a cessation program that involved the use of self-help materials and telephone counseling. Although no differences were found in responses from the light and heavy groups, consent to enter the program was obtained from 12% of the pooled qualified intercepts and their parents (for those under 18 years). This recruitment rate was considered good, given that this is one of the only reported studies that recruited teen smokers from the general population to cessation programs.     

Honesty doesn’t Always Pay – The Role of Honesty of Accounts for Success made in an Educational Setting in Inferences of Modesty and Arrogance

Previous research has documented that attributional information contained in causal accounts for success induce impressions of arrogance and modesty. The research further examined the role of accounts as well as level of success when perceivers know the real reason for success. Two studies of university students revealed that honesty strongly decreases arrogance and increases modesty in the case of effort accounts, and not in situations of communicated ability. In addition, honesty was determined not only by the truth value of an account but also by the extent to which the account induced impressions of arrogance and modesty. The present findings provide further understanding of the link between attributional information and social judgments.     

Migrant Well-Being is a Multilevel, Dynamic, Value Dependent Phenomenon

Research demonstrates that the well-being of migrants is a multilevel, dynamic, and value dependent phenomenon. It is multilevel because risk and protective factors are present at various ecological planes, from the individual to the social sphere. It is dynamic because objective and subjective risk and protective factors interact across ecological levels, creating favorable or unfavorable conditions for migrants to adjust to the new surroundings. Finally, it is value dependent because access to resources is conditioned by norms of justice prevalent in the host society. Findings from this special section on acculturation are combined with previous literature to support the three claims advanced in this article.     

Accepting Testimony

I defend the acceptance principle for testimony (APT), that hearers are justified in accepting testimony unless they have positive evidence against its reliability, against Elizabeth Fricker's local reductionist view. Local reductionism, the doctrine that hearers need evidence that a particular piece of testimony is reliable if they are to be justified in believing it, must on pain of scepticism be complemented by a principle that grants default justification to some testimony; I argue that (APT) is the principle required. I consider two alternative weaker principles as complements to local reductionism; one yields counter–intuitive results unless we accept (APT) as well, while the other is too weak to enable local reductionism to avoid scepticism.