A survey of assessor beliefs and practices related to faking

Purpose – To gather information on assessor beliefs and behaviors in relation to assessee faking issues on a personality inventory in the individual assessment process. Design/methodology/approach – A survey approach was used in this research. Totally 77 experienced assessors who conducted individual assessments for an international consulting firm responded to the survey. Analyses of mean item rankings were used to answer several research questions. Findings – Major results of the study were: assessors believe faking is a problem; assessors believe they can detect faking; and assessors believe they can effectively eliminate all of the effects of faking when evaluating the candidates. Practical implications – The first implication from this research is that assessors believe that they can detect and deal with faking despite a paucity of evidence to support it. The second implication is that organizations may be reluctant to continue to develop effective methods of identifying and dealing with faking if their assessors mistakenly believe they are already successfully doing so. Originality/value – This study is the first to survey experience assessors regarding their beliefs and perceptions of faking issues in the individual assessment process and is designed to garner immediate practical insights and ideas for future testable hypotheses.