Many organizations utilizing a personality assessment as part of their selection system also include a measure of social desirability, to identify applicants who may be trying to “fake” the assessment.

The term social desirability is used to describe applicant faking as responding to items in ways that make the applicant appear more favorable in the eyes of the hiring manager.

Operationalizing applicant faking in this way has long been the norm for test developers, researchers, and users; however, there has been a recent push to take a step back and redefine what these social desirability scales actually measure.

How Social Desirability Scales Work

Social desirability scales typically contain items which resemble the following:

• I try to follow the rules.
• I would never cheat on my taxes.
• I would never take things that aren’t mine.

The logic being that it is very unlikely for there to be a person who “always” follows the rules, “never” cheats, or “never” steals — thus the greater the number of these items an applicant affirmatively responds to, the more likely it is that they are engaging in socially desirable responding.

Why They Can Be Problematic

The difficulty present when using social desirability scales to identify applicants who may be trying to fake an assessment, is that there has been little research demonstrating a strong statistical relationship between scores on social desirability scales and observed applicant faking.

Additionally, social desirability scales are themselves susceptible to being faked!

For these reasons, it is unlikely that these types of scales will be useful for correctly identifying applicants who are purposefully attempting to fake, and particularly problematic for attempting to statistically “correct” assessment scores.

Implications for Practice

Organizations worried about applicants attempting to fake their assessments would be best served to follow these suggestions:

1. Where possible, utilize multiple assessments in selection systems.
2. Include assessments which are less susceptible to “faking”.
3. Consider adding assessments which do not rely on applicant self-reports.
4. Cease attempts to statistically “correct” applicant scores based on results from social desirability scales.
5. Most importantly, follow up with applicants suspected of faking.

Interpretation by:

Kathleen Melcher

The DeGarmo Group

This was a summary of the research and practice implications from: Griffith, R.L., & Peterson, M.H. (2008). The Failure of Social Desirability Measures to Capture Applicant Faking Behavior. Industrial and Organizational Psychology, 1, 308-311.

A number of organizations are utilizing measures of emotional intelligence (EI) as part of their selection systems, because of EI’s ability to predict performance. Emotional intelligence has been defined from two different perspectives, in terms of how it can be utilized.

Trait-based emotional intelligence.

The trait-based perspective defines EI as a personality trait “emotional self-confidence”, based on the characteristics of conscientiousness and resilience. From this perspective, EI determines how individuals cope with the demands and pressures of their environment, based on five main aspects:

1. Awareness and understanding of one’s own emotions
2. Awareness and understanding of other people’s emotions
3. Flexibility and adaptability for changing one’s own emotions
4. Coping with and managing stress
5. Remaining optimistic and in a good mood

Ability-based emotional intelligence.

The ability-based perspective defines EI as a type of cognitive ability, similar to general intelligence, and focuses on four main aspects:

1. Perception of emotion in one’s self, others, and inanimate objects
2. Facilitating and using emotions for communicating feelings
3. Understanding how emotions progress in relationships
4. Managing feelings in one’s self and others.

Which perspective is the most appropriate?

While both perspectives have a fundamentally similar focus, the type of questions/items that are used to measure each type differ, and as such, the measures’ susceptibility to faking differs.

Faking on a selection test occurs when an applicant attempts to choose answers that they think are the “right answer” rather than answering truthfully about him or herself.

Trait-based measures of EI are particularly susceptible to faking, due in part to the items being so similar to personality test items (which have been shown to be fakeable). Additionally, trait-based items tend to be more transparent, in that the “right” answer tends to be more obvious to the responder.

With top-down selection systems, faking can alter the rank order of applicants, such that those whose scores are increased due to faking rise to the top, making them more likely to proceed to the next phase of the application process.

What should organizations do?

Organizations with a need for selecting or promoting employees on the basis of their emotional intelligence may wish to avoid problems associated with faking by utilizing ability-based measures of EI, as opposed to the more susceptible trait-based measures.

In instances where trait-based measures are necessary or preferred, the use of warnings against, or repercussions for, faking or distorting responses is encouraged. These types of “preventative measures” have been shown to reduce the incidence of applicant faking, and can help diminish the amount of faking on trait-based measures.

Interpretation by:

Kathleen Melcher

DeGarmo Group

This was a summary of the research and practice implications from: Day, A.L., & Carroll, S.A. (2008). Faking emotional intelligence (EI): comparing response distortion on ability and trait-based EI measures. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 29, 761-784.

Almost every organization uses an interview for making employment decisions. Hiring managers, and others conducting interviews are well aware of interviewee use of “impression management” – applicants’ attempts to create a favorable impression. Some typical examples of impression management during interviews include verbal self-promotion (“I’m a very hard worker”), adjustment of non-verbal behaviors (smiling, welcoming body posture), and “looking the part” (wearing professional clothing).

Types of Impression Management

The most frequent type of impression management attempts are verbal self-promotions – the statements an applicant makes regarding his/her skills and abilities. These types of statements are considered either assertive (applicant initiated) or defensive (applicant response to interviewer assumptions). Assertive self-promotion is typified by self-focused statements that indicate the applicant possesses necessary skills, abilities, and positive characteristics. Additionally, applicants typically try to get the interviewer to feel good about them (other-focused) by trying to demonstrate that they hold similar beliefs and values, and attempting to build rapport and familiarity with the interviewer.

Defensively, applicants try to “repair” their image when an interviewer appears to be dissatisfied or offended by something the applicant has said or done. For example, applicants may try to justify, or explain away, a gap in the employment history on their resume, or rephrase their response (“what I really meant was…”) to a question if they get the feeling their answer was not what the interviewer wanted to hear.

The Influence of Personality

Research on employment interviews indicates that personality is related to the way an applicant will think and act. Depending on the situation, some personality traits may be more pronounced, and influence impression management strategies. For example, very conscientious applicants may take advantage of the opportunity to describe accomplishments and achievements, while those especially agreeable applicants will try to win favor by behaving exceedingly thoughtfully and considerately.

The Strength of the Situation

One potential moderator to this relationship is the strength of the situation – the degree to which the expectations for how to behave are clear. In “strong” situations, people have certain expectations for how to behave (e.g., quiet and subdued at a funeral), and thus most everyone behaves the same way, no matter if they are a very shy or very rambunctious person. In “weak” situations, the expectations for how to behave aren’t as clear, and thus people must decide for themselves what they feel is appropriate.

What may be surprising to HR practitioners is that people may be predisposed to engaging in impression managing behaviors.

The employment interview tends to be on the “strong” end of the scale – most people have reasonable expectations about what is appropriate behavior during an interview. However, the different circumstances surrounding why applicants are interviewing may over-ride the “strength” of interview expectations and affect their likelihood to engage in impression management. For example, applicants who have been looking for work for months may be more motivated to make a good impression (compared to an applicant who is just starting the job search process), because they desperately need the job.

When Will Impression Management Occur?

Understanding the relationship between these different aspects of the interview process can help HR practitioners understand how employment interviews may be affected by impression management, and how negative effects can be minimized. When personality is measured prior to the interview process, the extent to which people exhibit different personality traits can be determined and taken into account. For example, highly altruistic individuals tend to be less focused on themselves and thus more likely to use impression managing behaviors related to ingratiating themselves with others than they are to use self-promotion or defensive excuses. Similarly, more self-disciplined people are further likely to prepare for interviews and dedicate additional time and effort to how they will respond to likely questions. In this way, they are more likely to use self-promotion – taking responsibility for actions – and thus less likely to need to make excuses.

Two Main Types of Interviews

Most employment interview questions are in one of two formats: behavior description or situational based. In behavior description interviews, applicants are asked to describe their behaviors from past experiences similar to those of the target job (how did you act when…). Conversely, situational interviews use questions regarding hypothetical situations (how would you act if…). As such, the format of the interview may make it more likely for an applicant to engage in impression management – such that describing past behaviors encourages applicants to boast/brag about themselves, as well as defend how they acted in a particular situation if the interviewer seems skeptical.

Applicant personality affects the use of impression management behaviors, which in turn affects performance on the interview. Particularly when the motivation for using impression management is lower, and there are unclear expectations for how to behave, the relationship between both personality and interview type with impression management behaviors is high.

Implications for Practice

The most relevant implication for HR practitioners, is that use of behavior description interview questions can result in greater likelihood of self-promoting and defensive impression managing behaviors. With many interviews relying on the use of behavior-based questioning because, according to the old adage, “past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior”, interviewers may be unknowingly allowing themselves to be “played” by applicants. This is not to suggest that situational questions are better than behavioral-based questions – it is strictly a reminder for interviewers to be aware of, and prepared for, applicants likelihood for using these types of behaviors when responding to interview questions. Remember, a well constructed interview will ask questions, of either type, that are relevant and predictive for the position, and criteria, at hand.

Summary

Interviewers would be best served to examine applicant personality profiles through a well-constructed and validated measure beforehand, so as to better prepare themselves to watch for and identify applicants’ use of different types of impression managing behaviors.

These issues are particularly relevant for organizations using unconventional selection processes (i.e., a very informal or casual interview environment). As more and more companies come up with novel ways to attract candidates, “messing with” the expected interview experience may be detrimental – in that placing applicants in situations where there aren’t clear expectations for behavior, leads to greater likelihood of impression management.

Interpretation by:

Kathleen Melcher

DeGarmo Group

This was a summary of the research and practice implications from: Van Iddekinge, C. H., McFarland, L.A., & Raymark, P.H. (2007). Antecedents of Impression Management Use and Effectiveness in a Structured Interview. Journal of Management, 33 (5), 752-773.