The Validity of Conscientiousness Is Overestimated in the Prediction of Job Performance

Introduction Sensitivity analyses refer to investigations of the degree to which the results of a meta-analysis remain stable when conditions of the data or the analysis change. To the extent that results remain stable, one can refer to them as robust. Sensitivity analyses are rarely conducted in the organizational science literature. Despite conscientiousness being a valued predictor in employment selection, sensitivity analyses have not been conducted with respect to meta-analytic estimates of the correlation (i.e., validity) between conscientiousness and job performance. Methods To address this deficiency, we reanalyzed the largest collection of conscientiousness validity data in the personnel selection literature and conducted a variety of sensitivity analyses. Results Publication bias analyses demonstrated that the validity of conscientiousness is moderately overestimated (by around 30%; a correlation difference of about .06). The misestimation of the validity appears to be due primarily to suppression of small effects sizes in the journal literature. These inflated validity estimates result in an overestimate of the dollar utility of personnel selection by millions of dollars and should be of considerable concern for organizations. Conclusion The fields of management and applied psychology seldom conduct sensitivity analyses. Through the use of sensitivity analyses, this paper documents that the existing literature overestimates the validity of conscientiousness in the prediction of job performance. Our data show that effect sizes from journal articles are largely responsible for this overestimation

Questionable Research Practices Among Researchers in the Most Research-Productive Management Programs

Questionable research practices (QRPs) among researchers have been a source of concern in many fields of study. QRPs are often used to enhance the probability of achieving statistical significance which affects the likelihood of a paper being published. Using a sample of researchers from ten top research-productive management programs, we compared hypotheses tested in dissertations to those tested in journal articles derived from those dissertations to draw inferences concerning the extent of engagement in QRPs. Results indicated that QRPs related to changes in sample size and covariates were associated with unsupported dissertation hypotheses becoming supported in journal articles. Researchers also tended to exclude unsupported dissertation hypotheses from journal articles. Likewise, results suggested that many article hypotheses may have been created after the results were known (i.e., HARKed). Articles from prestigious journals contained a higher percentage of potentially HARKed hypotheses than those from less well-regarded journals. Finally, articles published in prestigious journals were associated with more QRP usage than less prestigious journals. QRPs increase in the percentage of supported hypotheses and effect sizes that likely result in overestimated population parameters. As such, results reported in articles published in our most prestigious journals may be less credible than previously believed

Contingencies in the effects of job-based pay dispersion on employee attitudes

When does pay dispersion elicit positive or negative employee attitudes? A review of the pay dispersion literature indicates a controversy around this vital question and suggests that numerous contingency factors moderate the effects of pay dispersion. In an empirical study of four Finnish companies consisting of 141 work units, we examine contingencies in attitudinal reactions to job-based pay dispersion among blue-collar workers. Based on archival pay data matched with employee survey responses (n = 536), we find that perceptions of pay basis legitimacy, task interdependence, and an individual's pay standing within the work unit explain the strength and direction of the relation between job-based pay dispersion and employee attitudes (i.e., work engagement and organizational commitment). Our findings have implications for the design of pay systems and contribute to a better appreciation of the complexities underlying employee attitudinal responses to pay dispersion.Peer reviewe

The trustworthiness of the cumulative knowledge in industrial/organizational psychology: The current state of affairs and a path forward

The goal of industrial/organizational (IO) psychology, is to build and organize trustworthy knowledge about people-related phenomena in the workplace. Unfortunately, as with other scientific disciplines, our discipline may be experiencing a “crisis of confidence” stemming from the lack of reproducibility and replicability of many of our field's research findings, which would suggest that much of our research may be untrustworthy. If a scientific discipline's research is deemed untrustworthy, it can have dire consequences, including the withdraw of funding for future research. In this focal article, we review the current state of reproducibility and replicability in IO psychology and related fields. As part of this review, we discuss factors that make it less likely that research findings will be trustworthy, including the prevalence of scientific misconduct, questionable research practices (QRPs), and errors. We then identify some root causes of these issues and provide several potential remedies. In particular, we highlight the need for improved research methods and statistics training as well as a re-alignment of the incentive structure in academia. To accomplish this, we advocate for changes in the reward structure, improvements to the peer review process, and the implementation of open science practices. Overall, addressing the current “crisis of confidence” in IO psychology requires individual researchers, academic institutions, and publishers to embrace system-wide change

Three forest plots for the validity of conscientiousness by data source.

<p>(A) Conscientiousness data from all data sources. (B) Conscientiousness data from journal articles. (C) Conscientiousness data from non-journal sources. Forest plots for the cumulative meta-analyses by precision for the validity of conscientiousness (i.e., the correlation between conscientiousness and job performance) are displayed. To obtain the plots, validities were sorted from largest sample size to smallest sample size and entered into the meta-analysis one at a time in an iterative manner. The lines around the plotted means are the 95% confidence intervals for the meta-analytic means. For panels A and B, the mean validities drift from smaller to larger as correlations from smaller and smaller sample size studies are added the to the distribution being analyzed. For Panel C, no noticeable drift is observed. The drifts from smaller to larger meta-analytic means are consistent with an inference of statistically insignificant correlations from smaller sample size studies being suppressed (i.e., publication bias). The lack of meaningful drift in panel C suggests that the data suppression is largely in the journal published articles (see panel B). Thus, it is the data published in journal articles that are largely responsible for distorting the research on the validity of conscientiousness.</p

Moderator statistical tests using the between-group <i>Q</i> test.

<p>Moderator statistical tests using the between-group <i>Q</i> test.</p

Three contoured funnel plots for the validity of conscientiousness by data source.

<p>(A) Conscientiousness data from all data sources. (B) Conscientiousness data from journal articles. (C) Conscientiousness data from non-journal sources. Correlations are graphed as circles with an X-axis of correlation magnitude and a Y-axis of the inverse standard error of the correlation. The filled black circles represent the observed correlations and the clear circles represent the trim-and-fill imputed correlations. The clear area contains correlations that are not statistically significant (<i>p</i> > .05). The darkest gray area contains correlations that may be described as marginally significant (<i>p</i>-values ranging from .05 to .10). The lighter gray area contains correlations that are statistically significant (<i>p</i> < .05). Note that most of the imputed correlations are found in the data distribution drawn from studies published in journals; relatively few of the imputed correlations are found in the data distribution drawn from unpublished studies. This fact is consistent with an inference that publication bias in the full data distribution is largely due to the suppression of statistically insignificant correlations in journal published articles. Thus, it is the journal articles that are largely responsible for distorting the research on the validity of conscientiousness.</p