The rise and fall of Katherine Blackford's character analysis.

Dr. Katherine Blackford's writings on physiognomy-based character analysis were popular in the business community during the period roughly from 1914 to 1925. I document the rise of the Blackford System of character analysis and discuss how she gained influence in the business community.

Assessment of the Mate Retention Inventory-Short Form Using Item Response Theory.

The mate retention inventory (MRI) has been a valuable tool in the field of evolutionary psychology for the past 30 years. The goal of the current research is to subject the MRI to rigorous psychometric analysis using item response theory to answer three broad questions. Do the individual items of the MRI fit the scale well? Does the overall function of the MRI match what is predicted? Finally, do men and women respond similarly to the MRI? Using a graded response model, it was found that all but two of the items fit acceptable model patterns.

Applying Item Response Theory to the Development of a Screening Adaptation of the Goldman-Fristoe Test of Articulation-Second Edition.

Purpose: Item response theory (IRT) is a psychometric approach to measurement that uses latent trait abilities (e.g., speech sound production skills) to model performance on individual items that vary by difficulty and discrimination.

Would you work if you won the lottery? Tracking changes in the American work ethic.

Although many social scientists and political commentators have speculated that the American work ethic is in decline, the last longitudinal study of this issue was conducted by Vecchio (1980) on data collected over 30 years ago. Vecchio examined whether workers would wish to continue working even if it were not financially necessary (i.e.

A history of the early days of personality testing in American industry: an obsession with adjustment.

Objective personality testing began with Woodworth's Personal Data Sheet in 1917. That test was developed to identify soldiers prone to nervous breakdowns during enemy bombardment in World War I (WWI). Soon after, many competing personality tests were developed for use in industry.

A cluster analysis investigation of workaholism as a syndrome.

Workaholism has been conceptualized as a syndrome although there have been few tests that explicitly consider its syndrome status. The authors analyzed a three-dimensional scale of workaholism developed by Spence and Robbins (1992) using cluster analysis. The authors identified three clusters of individuals, one of which corresponded to Spence and Robbins's profile of the workaholic (high work involvement, high drive to work, low work enjoyment).

Personality trait inferences about organizations: development of a measure and assessment of construct validity.

The authors conducted 4 studies to construct a multidimensional measure of perceptions of organization personality. Results of the first 2 studies suggest that (a) 5 broad factors are sufficient to capture the structure of organization personality perceptions, (b) real-world organizations differ on personality profiles, and (c) personality trait inferences are related to organizational attraction. Results of a 3rd study suggest that personality trait inferences assessed in 1 sample are related lo ratings of organizational attractiveness by a 2nd sample.

Remembering Arthur Kornhauser: industrial psychology's advocate for worker well-being.

Arthur Kornhauser was an early industrial psychologist whose contributions have been neglected in written histories of applied psychology. Throughout his career, he was a staunch advocate for an industrial psychology that concentrated on improving workers' lives. This article describes his contributions to improving worker well-being in the research areas of testing, employee attitude surveying, labor unions, and mental health of workers.