Do Applicants Fake Their Personality Questionnaire Responses and How Successful are Their Attempts? A Case of Military Pilot Cadet Selection

Abstract

This paper presents the results of three interrelated studies investigating the occurrence of response distortion on personality questionnaires within selection and the success of applicants in faking situations. In Study 1, comparison of the Big Five personality scores obtained from applicants in a military pilot cadet selection procedure with participants responding honestly, faking good, and faking an ideal candidate revealed that applicants responded more desirable than participants responding honestly but less desirable than respondents under fake instructions. The occurrence of faking within the military pilot selection process was replicated in Study 2 using the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire and another comparison group. Finally, in Study 3, comparison of personality profiles obtained in selection and ‘fake job’ situations with experts' estimates indicated that participants were partially successful in faking the desirable profile.

The influence of item order on intentional response distortion in the assessment of high potentials: Assessing pilot applicants

“…As test-takers tend to show different faking styles (Galic et al, 2012;Robie et al, 2007;Zickar et al, 2004;Ziegler, 2011), we cannot maintain that all applicants distorted their responses to the same extent. Furthermore, it must be taken into account that the applicants received no information about the requirements profile, which might have decreased their ability to fake (c.f.…”

SGR Modeling of Correlational Effects in Fake Good Self-report Measures

“…Generally, evidence suggests that scores under faking-good motivating conditions tend to have smaller variances and lower reliability estimates (Ellingson et al 2001;Eysenck et al 1974;Hesketh et al 2004;Topping and O'Gorman 1997). However, opposite results have also been observed where simple fake good instructions tend to increase the intercorrelations between the manipulated or faked items (Ellingson et al 1999;Galić et al 2012;Pauls and Crost 2005;Zickar and Robie 1999;Ziegler and Buehner 2009). …”

“…There is some evidence that experimental manipulations of faking do not induce homogeneous patterns of faking (e.g., Zickar et al 2004). In particular, we are not sure what set of instructions describing hypothetical conditions tell us about faking in real situations (e.g., Galić et al 2012). So, for example, individuals' profiles under faking motivating instructions may not match those of actual applicants in personnel selection.…”

Prior Related Work Experience and Job Performance: Role of personality

“…Validity of personality tests has been subjected to assessment situations (e.g., Galic, Jerneic, & Kovacic, ; Morgeson et al, ). However, with significantly high reliabilities (Ones, Dilchert, Viswesvaran, & Judge, ), multiple pilot tests and adequate exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis results (Salgado, Moscoso, & Berges, ; Stark, Chernyshenko, Chan, Lee, & Drasgow, ), situation‐based bias is not much of a concern for the present study.…”