Applied Measurement Methods in Industrial Psychology

By Deborah Whetzel

With guidelines on how to conduct job analyses, develop test plans, establish predictor measures, design criterion instruments, and assess the validity of measurement programmes, this text offers... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0891061061
• ISBN13: 9780891061069
• Release Date: November 1997
• Publisher: Davies-Black Publishing
• Length: 528 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.6" x 1.1" x 6.3"

Customer Reviews

Test Development for Work Settings

"The primary purpose of this edited volume is to provide students and entry-level practitioners with practical, systematic guidance on how to develop the various kinds of measurement frequently used in the fields of industrial psychology to assess personnel...[T]he volume contains five major sections: (1) conducting job analyses, (2) developing a test plan for determining the constructs to be measured and how to measure them, (3) developing measures to predict job performance, (4) developing measures of job performance, and (5) conducting studies to assess the quality of the measurement program." (p. 1) These opening words from the editors summarize the book well and exemplify the clear and straightforward style in which it is written. I bought a copy eleven years ago when I began working as a personnel psychologist for the Federal government. I found it easy to read and filled with advice about how to develop valid and legally defensible tests for job applicants. It is still on my shelf over a decade later and I still consult it. Although it has aged well, the practice of personnel psychology has continued to develop. Current readers may care to supplement it with something more recent, such as Essentials of Personnel Assessment And Selection by Robert Guion and Scott Highhouse. Beginners in personnel assessment should start with the current book, however. It is hard to beat for clarity and for a concise and intuitive presentation of personnel testing. Chapter 4, Critical Incident Technique by Lance Anderson and Sandra Wilson, is my personal favorite. It teaches us how to transform an expert's natural inclination to tell workplace "war stories" into useful job analysis data. After crediting its historical roots, the authors describe this method from identifying reliable subject-matter experts, through training them, questioning them, and editing the stories they tell. After the talkative experts finish reminiscing, test developers analyze their "critical incidents" to identify important dimensions on which to base a test. I would like to read more about how these authors mine critical incidents to develop training materials. I am particularly interested whether text mining techniques developed in the last decade (see, for example, The Text Mining Handbook) now play a role in their work. This book--and its competent team of contributing authors--are highly recommended to both current and yet-to-be personnel psychologists.