Assessment of Situational Demands in a Selection Interview: Reflective style or sensitivity?

Abstract

Correctly understanding situational demands is necessary to handle social situations appropriately. Past selection research has shown that candidates who are better at identifying the targeted dimensions in an interview or an assessment center, in fact, perform better in these procedures. However, at least two different processes might be responsible for the obtained findings. First, candidates might differ in their ability to correctly interpret given cues, meaning that some candidates generate better (i.e., more accurate) ideas than others. Second, some candidates might generally reflect more upon potential demands and therefore generate more ideas concerning potentially targeted dimensions. The present study used signal detection theory to investigate to what degree these two processes are related to interview performance. The interview was administered during a selection simulation for university graduates (N = 147). Interviewees' assumptions concerning the targeted dimensions were assessed in a postinterview questionnaire in which they had to write down any hypotheses as to what a certain question was trying to assess. We found that generating better ideas was essential for candidates' interview performance and not the degree to which they generally generated ideas about targeted interview dimension.

In Defense of the Situation: An Interactionist Explanation for Performance on Situational Judgment Tests

“…Consistency in SJT performance for versions with and without prompts (Krumm et al, 2015) might reflect the previously noted issue that situational cues are still present and clear in the response options of SJTs, such that the two versions do not reflect a substantial difference in situational strength (i.e., general domain knowledge is important in both measures). This interpretation of the role of situational strength is consistent with Rockstuhl et al's (2015) finding that SJTs that explicitly ask respondents to judge the situation provide incremental validity over SJTs that do not, as well as consistent with studies showing the importance of situational cues in other assessment formats (Jansen et al, 2013;Melchers et al, 2012). Further, we suggest that all SJTs invoke situational cues that are stronger than in self-report personality tests, which may account for the incremental validity of SJTs above and beyond personality tests (Meriac, Hoffman, Woehr, & Fleisher, 2008).…”

“…The ability to evaluate situational demands predicts performance across assessment types, including structured interviews (Melchers, Bösser, Hartstein, & Kleinmann, 2012) and assessment centers (Jansen et al, 2013). Further, the ability to identify criteria for performance evaluation (broadly conceptualized as situational cues) has been posited as a key explanation of the criterion-related validity for selection assessments (Kleinmann et al, 2011).…”

The Ability to Identify Criteria: Its Relationship with Social Understanding, Preparation, and Impression Management in Affecting Predictor Performance in a High-Stakes Selection Context

“…Melchers et al (2012) also found a nonsignificant or small effect in relation to nonverbal and verbal ability. However, in the current study these two components of cognitive ability were not only unrelated to ATIC but also, at least in terms of zero-order correlations, negatively related to the overall MMI score.…”

“…Correlations are typically in the low to moderate range, and although it appears to be more strongly associated with verbal than nonverbal ability (Melchers et al, 2009), a recent study (Melchers et al, 2012) found even verbal ability only related at r = .17. In addition, Konig et al (2007) demonstrated that ATIC explained incremental variance in selection test performance over and above cognitive ability.…”

“…Labelled "the ability to identify criteria" (ATIC), this concept is offered as a possible mechanism driving the criterion validity of these procedures . Evidence is accumulating that ATIC is associated with actual performance in selection tests (Kleinmann, 1993;Konig, Melchers, Kleinmann, Richter, & Klehe, 2007;Melchers, Bösser, Hartstein, & Kleinmann, 2012), and there has also been some initial work investigating possible predictors of ATIC (e.g., Melchers et al, 2009). However, additional research on the nomological net of its related constructs is warranted .…”