Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gxg78 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T05:42:59.328Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

2 - Complex and Sticky Issues in Assessment and Selection

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 June 2021

Adrian Furnham
Adrian Furnham
Affiliation:
University of London
Get access

Summary

The whole process of assessment and job selection is becoming considerably more complicated. There are more choices of methods and great differences in costs. Perhaps one of the hottest topics addressed in this chapter is that of bias, discrimination and fairness. The way an organisation goes about assessment is a matter of PR as candidates and competitors see it as a statement about a company’s philosophy and values. The chapter discusses, as an example, the data which suggest that physically attractive people have undue advantages in the selection process. Assessors and selectors have to become mindful of the perception and reaction of those being assessed, and particularly changes in the law which varies from country to country. The business of selection has to be much more than choosing test methods on fundamental psychometric criteria or economic constraints. Ways of dealing with and reducing bias are considered.

Keywords

Acceptability of methodsAccepting feedbackAttractivenessBiasCandidates perspectiveDiscriminationLegal considerationsPreferences for methodsReactions to assessmentUnconscious bias.
Type
Chapter
Information
Twenty Ways to Assess Personnel
Different Techniques and their Respective Advantages
 , pp. 45 - 74
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Chamorro-Premuzic, T., & Furnham, A. (2014). Personality and intellectual competence. Psychology Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chamorro-Premuzic, T., Furnham, A., Dissou, G., & Heaven, P. (2005). Personality and preference for academic assessment: A study with Australian University students. Learning and Individual Differences, 15(4), 247–256.Google Scholar
Furnham, A. (1990). Can people accurately estimate their own personality test scores? European Journal of Personality, 4(4), 319–327.Google Scholar
Furnham, A. (2018). Estimating one’s own and other’s psychological test scores. Psychology, 9(8), 2231–2249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Furnham, A., Batey, M., & Martin, N. (2011). How would you like to be evaluated? The correlates of students’ preferences for assessment methods. Personality and Individual Differences, 50(2), 259–263.Google Scholar
Furnham, A., & Chamorro‐Premuzic, T. (2005). Individual differences and beliefs concerning preference for university assessment methods. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 35(9), 1968–1994.Google Scholar
Furnham, A., & Chamorro‐Premuzic, T. (2010). Consensual beliefs about the fairness and accuracy of selection methods at university. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 18(4), 417–424.Google Scholar
Furnham, A., Christopher, A., Garwood, J., & Martin, N. G. (2008). Ability, demography, learning style, and personality trait correlates of student preference for assessment method. Educational Psychology, 28(1), 15–27.Google Scholar
Furnham, A., & Swami, V. (2012). Occupational and economic consequences of physical attractiveness. In Cash, T. F. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of body image and human appearance (pp. 581–587). Oxford: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Gatewood, R. D., Feild, H. and Barrick, M. (2016). Human resource selection. Thomson South-Western.Google Scholar
Hausknecht, J. P., Day, D. V., & Thomas, S. C. (2004). Applicant reactions to selection procedures: An updated model and meta‐analysis. Personnel Psychology, 57(3), 639–683.Google Scholar
Hovorka‐Mead, A. D., Ross, W. H. Jr, Whipple, T., & Renchin, M. B. (2002). Watching the detectives: Seasonal student employee reactions to electronic monitoring with and without advance notification. Personnel Psychology, 55(2), 329–362.Google Scholar
Jones, J. W. (1991). Assessing privacy invasiveness of psychological test items: Job relevant versus clinical measures of integrity. Journal of Business and Psychology, 5(4), 531–535.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Judge, T. A., & Cable, D. M. (2011). When it comes to pay, do the thin win? The effect of weight on pay for men and women. Journal of Applied Psychology, 96(1), 95–112.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Langlois, J. H., Kalakanis, L., Rubenstein, A. J., Larson, A., Hallam, M., & Smoot, M. (2000). Maxims or myths of beauty? A meta-analytic and theoretical review. Psychological Bulletin, 126(3), 390.Google Scholar
Lievens, F., Harris, M. M., Van Keer, E., & Bisqueret, C. (2003). Predicting cross-cultural training performance: The validity of personality, cognitive ability, and dimensions measured by an assessment center and a behavior description interview. Journal of Applied Psychology, 88(3), 476–489.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McCarthy, J. M., Bauer, T. N., Truxillo, D. M., Anderson, N. R., Costa, A. C., & Ahmed, S. M. (2017). Applicant perspectives during selection: A review addressing “So what?,” “What’s new?,” and “Where to next?”. Journal of Management, 43(6), 1693–1725.Google Scholar
Moerdyk, A. (2016). The principles and practice of psychological assessment, 2nd edn. Van Schaik.Google Scholar
Noon, M. (2018). Pointless diversity training: Unconscious bias, new racism and agency work. Employment and Society, 32(1), 198–209.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ryan, A. M., & Sackett, P. R. (1987). Pre-employment honesty testing: Fakability, reactions of test takers, and company image. Journal of Business and Psychology, 1(3), 248–256.Google Scholar
Society for Industrial and Organisational Psychology of South Africa. (2005). Guidelines for the validation and use of assessment procedures for the workplace. SIOP(SA), Pretoria.Google Scholar
Stagner, R. (1948). Psychology of personality. McGraw-Hill.Google Scholar
Struyven, K., Dochy, F., & Janssens, S. (2005). Students’ perceptions about evaluation and assessment in higher education: A review. Assessment & Evaluation in Higher Education, 30(4), 325–341.Google Scholar
Swami, V., Furnham, A., & Joshi, K. (2008). The influence of skin tone, hair length, and hair colour on ratings of women’s physical attractiveness, health and fertility. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 49(5), 429–437.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Truxillo, D. M., Steiner, D. D., & Gilliland, S. W. (2004) The importance of organizational justice in personnel selection: Defining when selection fairness really matters. International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 12, 39–52.Google Scholar
Zweig, D., & Webster, J. (2003). Personality as a moderator of monitoring acceptance. Computers in Human Behavior, 19(4), 479–493.Google Scholar

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Available formats
×