Socially desirable responding: The psychometric properties of the Icelandic version of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding

Efst á síðunni er hægt að nálgast greinina í heild sinni með því að smella á hlekkinnBalanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR) er eitt mest notaða mælitækið á félagslega æskilegri svörun. Það samanstendur af tveimur undirkvörðum, sjálfsblekkingu (SB) og ímyndarstjórnun (ÍS), sem innihalda hvor um sig 20 fullyrðingar sem svarað er á sjö punkta kvarða (1=Ekki satt, 4=Að einhverju leyti satt, 7=Mjög satt). Tilgangur þessarar rannsóknar var að þýða BIDR kvarðann og kanna próffræðilega eiginleika íslenskrar útgáfu BIDR með staðfestandi þáttagreiningu og ígrunduðum viðtölum (e. cognitive interviews with probing). Í fyrri fasa rannsóknarinnar (N=321) er þýðingarferlinu og próffræðilegum eiginleikum lýst. Niðurstöður bentu til þess að meðaltöl og fylgni milli undirkvarða væru sambærileg þeim sem finnast í erlendum rannsóknum og áreiðanleiki mælitækisins væri viðunandi. Niðurstöður úr staðfestandi þáttagreiningu voru einnig sambærilegar þeim sem fengist hafa í erlendum rannsóknum, þó fram hafi komið vandamál sem tengjast vissum atriðum kvarðans. Í seinni fasa rannsóknarinnar var fjallað um niðurstöður viðtala (N=20) þar sem farið var ítarlega í íslenska þýðingu kvarðans. Niðurstöður þeirrar rannsóknar bentu til þess að ekki væru til staðar alvarleg vandamál varðandi þýðingu kvarðans.The Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding (BIDR) is one of the most commonly used measures of socially desirable responding. It consists of two scales, Self-Deceptive Enhancement (SDE) and Impression Management (IM), containing 20 statements each, answered on a 7-point scale (1=Not true, 4=Somewhat true, 7=Very true). The purpose of this paper was to translate the BIDR to Icelandic and examine the psychometric properties of the Icelandic translation using Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) and cognitive interviews with probing. The first phase of the study (N=321) focuses on the translation process and the psychometric properties of the BIDR. The results indicated that the means, intercorrelation between the two scales, and CFA results are comparable to those found in previous studies and the reliability is acceptable, although the results indicated certain items were problematic. In the second phase of the study (N=20) cognitive interviews with probing were used in order to identify potential problems with regards to the translation. The results suggest the Icelandic translation is adequate

An item level evaluation of the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale using item response theory on Icelandic Internet panel data and cognitive interviews

The Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MCSDS) is commonly used to validate other self-report measures within social and health research. Concerns over the scale's length (33 items) have repeatedly been raised. Nevertheless, prior efforts to develop psychometrically sound short forms of the MCSDS have not led to consistent findings. The purpose of this study was to develop a short form of the MCSDS, in accordance with guidelines for best practices in short form and scale development. Information on item properties, obtained with item response theory (IRT) and cognitive interviews (CogI), were used to eliminate items with poor properties and select items for a short form to be administered via the Internet. The IRT analyses were based on responses from 536 Internet panel members and the CogI sample consisted of 40 interviewees. Ten items were dropped due to poor psychometric properties and out of the 23 remaining items a ten item short form was developed.publishe

Haters Gonna Hate, Trolls Gonna Troll: The Personality Profile of a Facebook Troll

Personality factors, such as the Dark Tetrad personality factors (Machiavellianism, narcissism and sadism) relate to greater online trolling. Other personality factors, such as the Big Five Personality factors, honesty–humility and negative social potency, may also play a role in cyberbullying, which is an aggressive behavior similar to trolling. The purpose of this study was to predict Facebook trolling behavior based on personality factors. A total of 139 participants completed a survey on their online behavior and personality factors. Online trolling behavior positively correlated with sadism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism, and negatively correlated with agreeableness, conscientiousness and honesty–humility. A hierarchical linear regression showed that sadism, Machiavellianism and negative social potency were the only unique predictors of online trolling behavior. Trolling was unrelated to the frequency of Facebook use and the frequency of commenting. Enjoyment of trolling fully mediated the relationship between Machiavellianism and the trolling behavior. The results thus suggested that Facebook trolling behaviors may be motivated by enjoying the manipulation of others

Psychometric properties of measurements obtained with the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale in an Icelandic probability based Internet sample

© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Internet surveys have become a very popular research tool. Relatively little attention has, however, been devoted to the possible changes in psychometric properties when measurements are obtained with Internet surveys. The Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale (MCSDS) is the most widely used instrument for measuring the tendency to respond in a socially desirable way and is often used to validate other measures. The purpose of the current research is to evaluate the dimensionality and reliability of measurements obtained with the MCSDS and short forms of the scale in an Internet sample of the general public in Iceland. An e-mail invitation was sent to a sample of 1200 panel members drawn from the Social Science Research Institute (SSRI) probability based panel, of those 536 participants completed all items on the MCSDS. Reliability estimates were in line with results from previous studies (α =.81 for the MCSDS data and α ranging from.59 to.75 for short forms). Using confirmatory factor analysis, a good fit was obtained for a one-factor model of measurements obtained with the MCSDS and its short forms (apart from significant chi square values in all cases but one), which generally supports the assumption of unidimensionality

Item-pair measures of acquiescence : the artificial inflation of socially desirable responding

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the role of socially desirable responding in an item-pair measure of acquiescence from the Big Five Inventory. If both items in an item-pair have desirable content, the likelihood of agreeing with both items is increased, and consequently, the type of responding that would be taken to indicate acquiescence. In Study I, item content desirability was evaluated for each of the 32 items belonging to the item-pairs in two samples of 214 and 68 university students. The item-pair desirability was then correlated with the percentage of respondents who agreed with both items in a separate sample of 895 students. Results showed a substantial correlation between item-pairs’ desirability and the percentage of estimated acquiescence, indicating an inflation of acquiescence when item-pairs have desirable content. The finding was further supported by Study II, in which acquiescence and item difficulty, assessed with cognitive interviews, were unrelated.publishe

Social desirability in spouse ratings

Whether or not socially desirable responding (SDR) is a cause for concern in personality assessment has long been debated. For many researchers, McCrae and Costa (1983) laid the issue to rest when they showed that correcting for SDR in self-reports did not improve the agreement with spouse ratings on the NEO Personality Inventory. However, their findings rest on the assumption that observer ratings in general, and spouse ratings in particular, are an unbiased external criterion. If spouse ratings are also susceptible to SDR, correcting for the bias in self-rated measures cannot be assumed to increase agreement between self-reports and spouse ratings, and thus failure to do so should not be taken as evidence for the ineffectiveness of measuring and correcting for SDR. In the present study, McCrae and Costa’s influential study was replicated with the exception of measuring SDR with the Marlowe-Crowne Social Desirability Scale, in both self-reports and spouse ratings. Analyses were based on responses from 70 couples who had lived together for at least one year. The results showed that both self-reports and spouse ratings are susceptible to SDR and thus McCrae and Costa’s conclusion is drawn into question.publishe

Questions on Honest Responding

This article presents a new method for reducing socially desirable responding in Internet self-reports of desirable and undesirable behavior. The method is based on moving the request for honest responding, often included in the introduction to surveys, to the questioning phase of the survey. Over a quarter of Internet survey participants do not read survey instructions, and therefore, instead of asking respondents to answer honestly, they were asked whether they responded honestly. Posing the honesty message in the form of questions on honest responding draws attention to the message, increases the processing of it, and puts subsequent questions in context with the questions on honest responding. In three studies (nStudy I = 475, nStudy II = 1,015, nStudy III = 899), we tested whether presenting the questions on honest responding before questions on desirable and undesirable behavior could increase the honesty of responses, under the assumption that less attribution of desirable behavior and/or admitting to more undesirable behavior could be taken to indicate more honest responses. In all studies the participants who were presented with the questions on honest responding before questions on the target behavior produced, on average, significantly less socially desirable responses, though the effect sizes were small in all cases (Cohen's d ranging between 0.02 and 0.28 for single items, and from 0.17 to 0.34 for sum scores). The overall findings and the possible mechanisms behind the influence of the questions concerning honest responding on subsequent questions are discussed, and suggestions are made for future research.publishe