Specific abilities in the workplace : more important than g?

A frequently reported finding is that general mental ability (GMA) is the best single psychological predictor of job performance. Furthermore, specific abilities often add little incremental validity beyond GMA, suggesting that they are not useful for predicting job performance criteria once general intelligence is accounted for. We review these findings and their historical background, along with different approaches to studying the relative influence of g and narrower abilities. Then, we discuss several recent studies that used relative importance analysis to study this relative influence and that found that specific abilities are equally good, and sometimes better, predictors of work performance than GMA. We conclude by discussing the implications of these findings and sketching future areas for research

The great debate : general ability and specific abilities in the prediction of important outcomes

The relative value of specific versus general cognitive abilities for the prediction of practical outcomes has been debated since the inception of modern intelligence theorizing and testing. This editorial introduces a special issue dedicated to exploring this ongoing “great debate”. It provides an overview of the debate, explains the motivation for the special issue and two types of submissions solicited, and briefly illustrates how differing conceptualizations of cognitive abilities demand different analytic strategies for predicting criteria, and that these different strategies can yield conflicting findings about the real-world importance of general versus specific abilities

General mental ability and specific abilities : their relative importance for extrinsic career success

Recent research on the role of general mental ability (GMA) and specific abilities in work-related outcomes has shown that the results differ depending on the theoretical and conceptual approach that researchers use. While earlier research has typically assumed that GMA causes the specific abilities and has thus used incremental validity analysis, more recent research has explored the implications of treating GMA and specific abilities as equals (differing only in breadth and not subordination) and has used relative importance analysis. In this article, we extend this work to the prediction of extrinsic career success operationalized as pay, income, and the attainment of jobs with high prestige. Results, based on a large national sample, revealed that GMA and specific abilities measured in school were good predictors of job prestige measured after 11 years, pay measured after 11 years, and income 51 years later toward the end of the participants' work lives. With 1 exception, GMA was a dominant predictor in incremental validity analyses. However, in relative importance analyses, the majority of the explained variance was explained by specific abilities, and GMA was not more important than single specific abilities in relative importance analyses. Visuospatial, verbal, and mathematical abilities all had substantial variance shares and were also more important than GMA in some of the analyses. Implications for the interpretation of cognitive ability data and facilitating people's success in their careers are discussed

The Ursinus Weekly, December 4, 1911

Alumni notes • The last game: Ursinus held to tie score by Bucknell at Reading, on Thanksgiving Day • Oratorical union meets • English-Historical group meets • Mathematical groups hold meeting • Senate meeting • The Vale of Perkiomenhttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/2749/thumbnail.jp

The Ursinus Weekly, January 27, 1911

Day of Prayer • To the memory of Robert Burns • Price football dinner • Alumni • Married • Society noteshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/2791/thumbnail.jp

Commenting on the 'great debate' : general abilities, specific abilities, and the tools of the trade

We review papers in the special issue regarding the great debate on general and specific abilities. Papers in the special issue either provided an empirical examination of the debate using a uniform dataset or they provided a debate commentary. Themes that run through the papers and that are discussed further here are that: (1) the importance of general and specific ability predictors will largely depend on the outcome to be predicted, (2) the effectiveness of both general and specific predictors will largely depend on the quality and breadth of how the manifest indicators are measured, and (3) research on general and specific ability predictors is alive and well and more research is warranted. We conclude by providing a review of potentially fruitful areas of future research

Predicting Professional and Technical Performance among Medical Students: Personality, Cognitive Ability, and the Mediating Role of Knowledge

The distinction between technical and contextual performance is widely recognized in the Industrial/Organization Psychology literature (Sackett & Lievens, 2008). Less well-understood are the causal antecedents of performance in these domains and how those antecedents relate to each other. Motowidlo, Borman, and Schmit (1997) proposed that technical performance is determined largely by cognitive ability, which acts through the mediator technical knowledge to influence technical performance. They also proposed that contextual performance is mainly determined by personality traits and that these traits influence contextual performance via the mediating variable contextual knowledge. Although prior research has examined some of the causal antecedents proposed by Motowidlo et al. (1997), no study has examined these four variables simultaneously, in addition to gathering information about performance criteria in the two domains. This study examined these six variables in a sample of medical students. In keeping with the verbiage used in the medical literature, students' contextual knowledge is referred to as professional knowledge and their contextual performance is referred to as professional performance. Medical students (N = 209) beginning their third year at the University of Texas Medical School at Houston completed measures of professional knowledge and the Big Five personality traits and consented to have their MCAT scores (a proxy for cognitive ability) and their first- and second-year course grades (grade point average; a measure of their technical knowledge) gathered for this investigation. Performance criteria consisted of attending physicians' ratings of students' professional and technical performance during their clinical rotations. Rotations were grouped according to whether they fell into the domain of Primary Care or the Specialties. Notable findings are summarized by a path analytic model. Agreeableness exerted a causal influence on professional knowledge (β = .38) and Primary Care professional performance (β = .14). Extraversion causally affected professional knowledge (β = -.22). Professional knowledge accounted for variance in Primary Care professional (β = .19) and technical performance (β = .22). Openness to experience and conscientiousness influenced technical knowledge (β's -.19 and .25). Cognitive ability was directly related to technical knowledge (β = .43) and Specialties professional (β = -.21) and technical performance (β = -.19). Technical knowledge was related to Primary Care professional (β = .32) and technical performance (β = .42) and also Specialties professional (β = .46) and technical performance (β = .57). Results generally suggest that separate causal paths underlie performance in Primary Care and the Specialties, respectively

Approval motivation and situational judgment tests: The role of personality and implicit trait policies

The effects of faking on situational judgment test (SJT) scores have only recently been explored. The research reported here tested a model linking an individual difference frequently associated with social desirability, approval motivation, with SJT score through its associations with agreeableness, conscientiousness, and implicit trait policies (ITPs) for those traits. One-hundred fifty-seven undergraduates completed a managerial SJT along with a measure assessing personality. Approval motivation was assessed using the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale. Results indicated that approval motivation is correlated with SJT score and the ITP for conscientiousness. Path analyses revealed approval motivation is causally related to SJT score through its influence on the ITP for conscientiousness, and is also linked to conscientiousness and agreeableness. Findings extend ITP theory (Motowidlo, Hooper, & Jackson, 2006a) by suggesting that personality traits are associated with SJT scores through their causal influence on their ITPs

The Ursinus Weekly, January 26, 1914

Library notes • Lecture on Christianity • Will hold Valentine fete • Platform meetings • Examinations over: let us celebrate • Youth\u27s progress • Operated upon for appendicitis • Christian organizations • Final call • Modern philanthropy • An economic aspect of war • Shakespeare\u27s attitude toward history • Ch.-Bi\u27s. lose out to H.-P.\u27s • Lecturer coming • Society noteshttps://digitalcommons.ursinus.edu/weekly/2685/thumbnail.jp