Retesting in selection: A meta-analysis of coaching and practice effects for tests of cognitive ability.

Hausknecht, John P.; Halpert, Jane A.; Paolo, Nicole T. Di; Gerrard, Meghan O. Moriarty

doi:10.1037/0021-9010.92.2.373

Cited by 284 publications

(333 citation statements)

References 72 publications

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“…The lack of any retesting effect in Mani et al's field study involving Indian farmers is clearly at odds with one of the more robust findings in the literature on cognitive testing (9). Retesting effects on the Raven's tests are particularly profound among test-takers with little education (10).…”

contrasting

confidence: 47%

Comment on “Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function”

Wicherts

Scholten

2013

Science

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Mani et al. (Research Articles, 30 August, p. 976) presented laboratory experiments that aimed to show that poverty-related worries impede cognitive functioning. A reanalysis without dichotomization of income fails to corroborate their findings and highlights spurious interactions between income and experimental manipulation due to ceiling effects caused by short and easy tests. This suggests that effects of financial worries are not limited to the poor. (1) recently presented four laboratory experiments and a field study that aimed to show that poverty impedes cognitive functioning. We criticize their results on statistical and psychometric grounds.Mani et al. ran three randomized experiments in which U.S. adults were assigned to read one of two sets of financial scenarios that differed in their activation of financial concerns. Although participants' income varied from $7560 to $160,000, Mani et al. used a median split to analyze income data. This procedure has been criticized strongly for being associated with lower power, loss of information on individual differences, and its inability to pinpoint nonlinear relations (2). Of the two measures of cognitive functioning in Mani et al.'s studies, only the Raven's scores are fairly symmetrically distributed. We therefore submitted these data to linear regressions involving family income (mean-centered to facilitate interpretation) and an interaction between income and the type of scenario. Results are given in Table 1. In none of the three core experiments (1, 3, and 4) was the interaction significant when analyzed without unnecessary dichotomization of income. We also analyzed data from study 2, which aimed to show that the effect of poverty-related worries could be distinguished from a form of test anxiety and would not occur in similar, but nonfinancial, scenarios. We note that the second experiment is appreciably smaller (N = 39 people) than the other three experiments (N > 95 people) and so is associated with lower statistical power. Of importance are the regression weights; those from study 2 are not appreciably different than those in the core studies.The second measure of cognitive functioning employed by Mani et al., cognitive control, showed nonnormal distributions that render them unsuitable for linear analyses (see Fig.

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confidence: 47%

Comment on “Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function”

Wicherts

Scholten

2013

Science

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“…However, prior experience with ability tests entails another problem. There is ample meta-analytic evidence that retesting leads to higher test scores, and such score gains can even be increased with training (for a recent meta-analysis see Hausknecht, Halpert, Di Paolo, & Moriarty Gerrard, 2007). Furthermore, the magnitude of these retest and training effects is affected by a number of moderators, among them the task type(s) used in the test.…”

Section: Critical Aspects Of the Present Meta-analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

“…An individual who believes that abilities can be improved is called an incrementalist with a "growth" mindset, while an individual who believes that abilities are stable and cannot really be improved is an entitist with a "fixed" mindset. Meta-analytic results on how retesting and training help to increase scores on cognitive ability tests (e.g., Hausknecht et al, 2007;Kulik, Bangert-Drowns, & Kulik, 1984; lend support to the appropriateness of a growth mindset, which in turn can be assumed to lead individuals to reflect on their performance more deeply and critically assess their errors in order to improve. This may subsequently affect the processes involved when people are asked to self-estimate their own cognitive ability.…”

Section: Critical Aspects Of the Present Meta-analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

How smart do you think you are? A meta-analysis on the validity of self-estimates of cognitive ability.

Freund¹,

Kasten²

2012

Psychological Bulletin

237

163

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Individuals' perceptions of their own level of cognitive ability are expressed through self-estimates. They play an important role in a person's self-concept because they facilitate an understanding of how one's own abilities relate to those of others. People evaluate their own and other persons' abilities all the time, but self-estimates are also used in formal settings, such as, for instance, career counseling. We examine the relationship between self-estimated and psychometrically measured cognitive ability by conducting a random-effects, multilevel meta-analysis including a total of 154 effect sizes reported in 41 published studies. Moderator variables are specified in a mixed-effects model both at the level of the individual effect size and at the study level. The overall relationship is estimated at r ϭ .33. There is significant heterogeneity at both levels (i.e., the true effect sizes vary within and between studies), and the results of the moderator analysis show that the validity of self-estimates is especially enhanced when relative scales with clearly specified comparison groups are used and when numerical ability is assessed rather than general cognitive ability. The assessment of less frequently considered dimensions of cognitive ability (e.g., reasoning speed) significantly decreases the magnitude of the relationship. From a theoretical perspective, Festinger's (1954) theory of social comparison and Lecky's (1945) theory of selfconsistency receive empirical support. For practitioners, the assessment of self-estimates appears to provide diagnostic information about a person's self-concept that goes beyond a simple "test-and-tell" approach. This information is potentially relevant for career counselors, personnel recruiters, and teachers.

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“…For instance, longitudinal paradigms featuring repetitions of a particular task are liable to practice effects, in which practice and experience gained on initial engagement with the task might enhance subsequent performance. However, while this is a legitimate concern for short test-retest intervals, a test-retest interview of a year is generally deemed adequate to ensure that such effects are minimal (Hausknecht, Halpert, Di Paolo, & Moriarty Gerrard, 2007). Nevertheless, with the Stroop task, one might still argue that practice effects were operative within each session, since participants completed three trials in each session -undertaking the neutral, negative and positive conditions (in that order).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Cultivating equanimity through mindfulness meditation: A mixed methods enquiry into the development of decentring capabilities in men

Lomas¹,

Edginton²,

Cartwright³

et al. 2015

Intnl. J. Wellbeing

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. Cultivating equanimity through mindfulness meditation: A mixed methods enquiry into the development of decentering capabilities in men. International Journal of Wellbeing, 5(3),[88][89][90][91][92][93][94][95][96][97][98][99][100][101][102][103][104][105][106] Abstract: Mindfulness meditation is thought to help practitioners become more tolerant of dysphoric emotions by enabling them to cultivate decentring skills. Such skills may be especially useful for male meditators, as men are thought to have particular difficulties regulating their emotions, partly due to masculinity norms related to emotional toughness. However, few studies of mindfulness have focussed specifically on men to explore the intersection between wellbeing and masculinity. Uniquely, we sought to examine the development of decentring capabilities in a non-clinical sample of male meditators using a longitudinal mixed-methods design. Thirty meditators were recruited in London, UK. Participants completed an emotional Stroop task -at two points, a year apart -to assess changes in emotional reactivity linked to meditation. Participants also undertook qualitative interviews at both time points, analysed using a modified constant comparison approach. Together, the two datasets converged to suggest that men did develop decentring skills through meditation, leading to greater equanimity in the presence of negative qualia. In addition to offering insights into the mechanisms underpinning the impact of mindfulness on wellbeing, the study provides a gendered dimension to the analysis of wellbeing strategies like meditation, a dimension which has hitherto been conspicuously absent from recent literature in fields such as positive psychology.

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Retesting in selection: A meta-analysis of coaching and practice effects for tests of cognitive ability.

Cited by 284 publications

References 72 publications

Comment on “Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function”

Comment on “Poverty Impedes Cognitive Function”

How smart do you think you are? A meta-analysis on the validity of self-estimates of cognitive ability.

Cultivating equanimity through mindfulness meditation: A mixed methods enquiry into the development of decentring capabilities in men

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