chapter 5

• Reference Check – confirming the accuracy of resume and job application information
• Reference – the expression of an opinion regarding an applicant’s ability and previous performance
• Letters of Recommendation – the written expression of opinion regarding an applicant’s ability and performance.
• Confirming Details on a Resume – applicants can engage in resume fraud so the reference is simply to confirm the truthfulness of the information provided by the applicant.
• Resume Fraud – the intentional placement of untrue information on a resume
• Checking for Discipline Problems – to check whether the applicant has a history of such discipline problems as poor attendance, sexual harassment, and violence
• Negligent Hiring – a situation in which an employee with a previous criminal record commits a crime as part of his/her employment.
• Discovering New Information About the Applicant – employers and professors can provide information about an applicant that may be inaccurate or purposefully untrue.
• Predicting Future Performance – references and recommendation letters are ways to predict future performance but has not been successful in predicting future success
• Validity Coefficient – correlation between scores on a selection method and measure of job performance
• Corrected Validity – term usually found with meta-analysis, referring to a correlation coefficient that has been corrected for predictor and criterion reliability and for range restriction. Sometimes called “true validity.”
• Job Knowledge Test – a test that measures the amount of job related knowledge an applicant possesses.
• Ability Tests – tap the extent to which an applicant can learn or perform a job-related skill.
• Cognitive Ability Tests – designed to measure the level of intelligence or the amount of knowledge possessed by an applicant.
• Wonderlic Personnel Test - is an assessment used to measure the cognitive ability and problem-solving aptitude of prospective employees for a range of occupations. The test was created in 1939 by Eldon F. Wonderlic
• Perceptual Ability -Measure of facility with such processes as spatial relations and form perception.
• Psychomotor Ability → Measure of facility such processes as finger dexterity and motor coordination.
• Physical Ability Test – measure an applicant’s level of physical ability required for a job.
• Work Samples - Method of selecting employees in which an applicant is asked to perform samples of actual job-related tasks.
• Assessment Centers - Method of selecting employees in which applicants participate in several job-related activities, at least one of which must be a simulation, and are rated by several trained evaluators
• In-Basket Technique – assessment center exercise designed to simulate the types of information that daily come across a manager’s or employee’s desk in order to observe the applicant’s response to such information.
• Simulations – designed to place an applicant in situation that is similar to the one that will be encountered on the job
• Leaderless Group Discussions – applicants meet in small groups and are given job-related problem to solve or job-related issue to discuss
• Business Games – an exercise that is designed to simulate the business and marketing activities that take place in an organization
• Experience Ratings - The basis for experience ratings is the idea that past experience will predict future experience
• Biodata - Method of selection involving application blanks that contain questions that research has shown will predict job performance.
• File Approach – gathering biodata from employee files (previous employment, education, interests, and demographics) rather than questionnaire
• Questionnaire Approach – obtaining biodata from questionnaires rather than employee files
• Criterion Groups – division of employees into groups based on high and low scores on a particular criterion
• Vertical Percentage Method – scoring biodata in which the percentage if unsuccessful employees
• Derivation sample - group of employees who were used in creating the initial weights for a biodata instrument.
• Hold-out sample - group of employees who are not used in creating the initial weights for a biodata instrument
• Personality Inventories - A psychological assessment designed to measure various aspects of an applicant’s personality.
• Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) – the most widely used objective test of psychopathology.
• Test of Psychopathology - → Determine whether individuals have serious psychological problems such as depression, bipolar disorder, and schizophrenia
• Projective tests – a subjective test in which a subject is asked to perform relatively unstructured tasks,
• Rorschach Inkblot Test – a projective personality test
• Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) – a projective personality test in which test-takers are shown pictures and asked to tell stories.
• Objective tests – a type of personality test that is structured to limit the respondent to a few answers that will be scored by standardized keys.
• Interest Inventories - A psychological test designed to identify vocational areas in which an individual might be interested