PSYCHOLOGY MASTER'S THESIS ABSTRACT

Ryan Faulkner
Industrial/Organizational
May 1999

How Age and Expertise Moderates the Relationship between Interview Type and Interview Performance:
An Analysis of Response Patterns

    The employment interview is the most common selection procedure practiced by organizations.  Experienced-based interviews and situational-based interviews are formats used in structured interviewing to predict how an applicant will respond to job related situations.  Experienced-based interviews are oriented to past behavior and situations, while situational-based interviews examine how an applicant would respond in certain hypothetical situations. Most of the research contrasting these two interview types has been conducted using applicants with a large amount of experience.  But, situational-based interviews might be a more valid predictor of job performance for less experienced applicants.  Very little research has also been conducted to discover how the cognitive framework of an applicant might contribute to response patterns in structured interviews.  This study focused on the way applicants of different ages and experience levels responded to both experienced-based and situational-based interviews.

    The participants in this study were applicants applying for various positions at a temporary employment firm.  Participants were interviewed using a structured interview format with both experienced-based and situational-based questions. 

    As predicted, results of this study indicated an interaction between interview type and applicant expertise level.  Experts scored higher on experienced-based questions and novices scored higher on situational-based questions.  Differences were not found between applicants of different age levels and their performance on either interview type.  These results support previous research indicating that experienced-based questions may indeed be better predictors of job performance for experienced applicants, while situational-based questions may be better predictors of job performance for less experienced applicants.  The criterion-related validity study did not result in significant validity coefficients when supervisors’ rating of overall job performance was used as the criterion.  However, a criterion sample of only 25 supervisor ratings was used.

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