Deck 13: Simulation Tests

Question 1

Asking many questions rapidly and not allowing much time for the applicant's response in a selection interview is an effective performance test for assessing the stress associated with high work demands.

Answer 1

False

Question 2

Simulation (performance) tests provide only indirect evidence of the applicant's ability and skill to work on the job.

Answer 2

False

Question 3

When scoring motor performance tests, a number of separate standards can be scored for both process and product categories.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

Trainability tests are useful for jobs requiring general knowledge or skill that applicants can be expected to possess.

Question 5

Minicourse trainability tests use a training setting to create a performance test that predicts future job performance.

Question 6

In general, a process is scored in a simulation test when there are a small number of ways to do the job and these ways invariably lead to an acceptable product..

Question 7

Simulation tests should never serve as a realistic job preview.

Question 8

Tasks that have standardized operations or products or have easily defined verbal or interactive components are more appropriate in performance tests than tasks not so characterized.

Question 9

Performance tests have only been found to successfully predict job performance for clerical and skilled manual labor positions.

Question 10

Ordinarily, simulation tests are much more expensive than other selection devices if many applicants are involved.

Question 11

All else being equal, it is preferable to have the applicant's performance on one part of the test be closely tied to a previous part of the test.

Question 12

The most appropriate tasks to consider for a performance test are those that depend on specialized knowledge, abilities, or skills to use company products, personnel, materials, customers, etc, since these tasks distinguish the company's jobs from other organizations' jobs.

Question 13

From a cost standpoint, when developing a simulation test it is preferable to select tasks that require a long time to perform rather than tasks that require a short time to perform.

Question 14

Simulation tests commonly assume that the applicants already have the knowledge, ability, and skill to complete the job behavior required in the test.

Question 15

The Management Progress Study of AT&T marked the beginning of the use of assessment centers for industrial organizations.

Question 16

Tasks that a large majority of applicants can do are useful in discriminating among good and poor applicants.

Question 17

Studies that examine the results of using simulation tests in selection have been universally positive and have identified several benefits.

Question 18

In general, tasks chosen to be represented in a performance test are those that have a strong bearing on job performance.

Question 19

Research shows that the adverse impact of the performance tests was less than that of the written tests.

Question 20

Signs are selection tests that gather information about behaviors that are consistent with the job behavior being predicted.

Question 21

In assessment centers, correlations among dimensions that are measured with the same exercise are very low.

Question 22

Partially because of the cost and lack of convergent and discriminant validity of Assessment Centers, selection specialists have turned their attention to other types of simulation devices.

Question 23

In assessment centers, correlations among dimension ratings are usually quite high.

Question 24

In an assessment center, each exercise should not measure more than one dimension.

Question 25

In general, adverse impact has not been a problem associated with assessment centers.

Question 26

Which of the following is a true distinction between simulation tests and other selection devices?

A)Simulation tests provide indirect evidence of an applicant's ability and skill to work on the job, while other selection devices provide direct evidence.
B)The focus is more on the test representing important job activities than on linking the test to specific WRCs.
C)Simulation tests do not require judgments by raters or interpretations of scores, while other selection devices do require judgment and interpretation.
D)Simulation tests predict future job performance while other selection devices assess current WRCs.

Question 27

Assessors (in an assessment center) are usually outside consultants hired for their expertise and objectivity.

Question 28

The major duty of an assessor in an Assessment Center is to record the behavior of a participant in an exercise and use the data to rate the participant on each behavioral dimension appropriate for the exercise.

Question 29

Assessment Centers are a more practical option for small businesses than large ones.

Question 30

Operating a machine is an example of a(n) ____________ test.

A)motor
B)verbal`
C)easy
D)sign

Question 31

Assessment centers are usually administered to individuals one at a time rather than to groups of individuals.

Question 32

One problem with assessment centers is that they have rarely received favorable support by the courts and the EEOC in alleged discrimination cases.

Question 33

Unfortunately, assessment centers have been found to be valid for predicting job potential but not job performance.

Question 34

Which of the following is a limitation in the use of simulation tests?

A)Much care must be taken in the construction of work sample tests to ensure their representativeness of job activity.
B)Inferences of the applicant's future job performance must be made from only verbal information.
C)The carryover from verbal description to job performance needed in performance tests is not always complete.
D)The data are subject to willing distortion or faking by the applicant.

Question 35

There is evidence to support the conclusion that it is possible to use data currently available in organizations to yield comparable selection data that are content valid at a lower cost than assessment centers.

Question 36

Usually, there are twice as many assessors in an assessment center as there are participants.

Question 37

The interview is employed quite often in assessment centers.

Question 38

The development of an Assessment Center starts with a job analysis to identify clusters of job activities that are the important parts of the job of interest.

Question 39

"Signs" and "samples" are categories of selection tests that both rely upon which of the following "principles" of human behavior?

A)behavioral consistency
B)behavioral variability
C)trait consistency
D)trait variability

Question 40

Personality tests, both paper-and-pencil and projective, are commonly being included in recent assessment centers.

Question 41

What are the two most often-used simulation tests in assessment centers?

A)case analysis; personal history data
B)peer assessment; measures of leadership ability
C)leaderless group discussion; in-basket
D)mental ability tests; projective tests

Question 42

The development of an assessment center starts with a job analysis to identify clusters of job activities that are important parts of the job of interest.These job clusters are referred to as:

A)categories
B)profiles
C)patterns
D)dimensions

Question 43

Participants' performance in Assessment Centers is composed of:

A)a General Performance factor and an Exercise factor.
B)a General Performance factor and Measurement Error.
C)an Exercise factor and Measurement Error.
D)Latent Traits and Measurement Error.

Question 44

Which of the following is a criticism of assessment centers?

A)lack of validity
B)adverse impact
C)very expensive to develop and maintain
D)lack of acceptance by organizations

Question 45

Which of the following is true about the relationship between dimensions and exercises in an assessment center?

A)Each dimension is measured by one exercise.
B)Each dimension must be measured by more than one exercise.
C)Each exercise measures only one dimension.
D)One exercise is usually adequate to measure all dimensions.

Question 46

Which of the following is a behavioral dimension frequently measured in assessment centers?

A)attention to detail
B)cooperation
C)decisiveness
D)reliability

Question 47

Which of the following behavioral dimensions is NOT frequently measured in Assessment Centers?

A)Oral communication
B)Time management
C)Decisiveness
D)Tenacity

Question 48

Which of the following are considered a "low-fidelity" simulation?

A)situational interviews
B)situational judgment tests
C)hypothetical work situation
D)blueprint reading test

Question 49

Which of the following is the knowledge or skill that all assessors in an Assessment Center must have in common?

A)a greater proficiency in interviewing
B)a greater proficiency in communicating information
C)an understanding of behavioral dimensions
D)tolerance for stress

Question 50

Which of the following is TRUE about the choice of standards for scoring a performance test?

A)Quality is more important when correctness of the task effort is secondary to time or cost to complete the task.
B)Quantity is most importantly scored for those performance tests in which amount produced within a given period of time is not within the control of the worker.
C)Learning time is a logical standard for tasks which are characterized by having a variety of novel demands placed on the job incumbent.
D)Safety is an important dimension to consider for all tasks.

Question 51

Which of the following is true in terms of about what we know about assessment centers?

A)They have very mixed results - about half work and half don't.
B)They work (i.e., are valid in predicting both job performance and career movement),
C)They don't work (i.e., aren't valid in predicting both job performance and career movement) because the dimensions do not measure empirically distinct characteristics of the participants.
D)The cost of using them outweighs the benefits.

Question 52

The following are steps in the development of simulation tests.What is the correct order of steps to produce a performance test?

A)ii, iv, v, i, iii
B)ii, iv, v, iii, i
C)ii, iv, i, iii, v
D)ii, v, i, iii, iv

Question 53

Work sample tests have been classified as falling into two categories.What are those two categories?

A)signs, samples
B)physical, mental
C)verbal, motor
D)mechanical, problem-centered