Integrity Tests in the Workplace: APA Findings and Critiques
This paper critically reviews the 1994 American Psychologist article by Wayne J. Camara and Dianne L. Schneider, which examined workplace integrity testing in the wake of an APA task force study. The review covers the APA's evaluation of 37 integrity test instruments, the validity and reliability standards applied, and how the findings compared with a prior Congressional OTA study. It also critiques the APA's conclusions regarding test administration qualifications, the high rate of false positives, and the balance between employer interests and employee rights. The paper raises concerns about definitional inconsistencies in the term "integrity" across instruments and questions the practical implications of the APA's recommendations.
- Introduction: The Polygraph and the APA's Initiative: APA origins of workplace integrity test research
- Scope of the APA Study and Test Administration Standards: 37 instruments evaluated; administrator qualifications lacking
- Validity, Reliability, and the OTA Comparison: APA vs. OTA findings on test validity
- APA Conclusions and Employer Guidance: APA endorses tests with administration guidelines
- Critical Assessment: False Positives and Employee Rights: High false positive rates harm job candidates
- Definitional Ambiguity and Unanswered Questions: No consistent definition of integrity across instruments
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper closely follows the source article's argument while maintaining a critical stance, clearly distinguishing between what the APA found and where those findings fall short.
- It uses direct quotations strategically to anchor its analysis, grounding critiques in the actual language of the original study rather than paraphrase alone.
- The conclusion raises an original practical objection — that mandating qualified administrators defeats the cost-efficiency rationale employers have for using integrity tests — demonstrating applied critical thinking.
Key academic technique demonstrated
This paper demonstrates source-based critical analysis: it summarizes a scholarly article thoroughly and accurately before pivoting to evaluate the implications and internal contradictions of its conclusions. The writer identifies a logical tension within the APA's own recommendations without introducing unsupported claims.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens by contextualizing integrity testing through the polygraph and explaining the APA's motivation for the 1994 study. It then moves through the study's scope, methodology, and findings before shifting to critique. The final paragraphs challenge the APA on practical grounds (cost of qualified administrators), ethical grounds (false positive rates and candidate reputation), and conceptual grounds (undefined use of "integrity"), giving the paper a three-pronged critical structure.
Introduction: The Polygraph and the APA's Initiative
According to the 1994 American Psychologist article "Integrity Tests: Facts and Unresolved Issues" by Wayne J. Camara and Dianne L. Schneider, the most famous integrity test in popular culture is the polygraph. However, most peer-reviewed studies of the polygraph have been published by professional polygraph analysts with a vested interest in validating the instrument. Psychologists, because of ethical concerns regarding individual privacy as well as questions about the technical adequacy and validity of integrity tests, had been cautious about conducting research on newer, more widely used, and potentially more reliable exams. Then, in 1989, the American Psychological Association (APA) asked its members to examine existing data on such integrity tests and other methods employers were using to predict dishonesty and the potential for theft among employees (Camara & Schneider, 1994, p. 113).
Scope of the APA Study and Test Administration Standards
The APA study evaluated 37 instruments, voluntarily solicited from 30 separate publishers who responded to the APA's request for data. The majority of the tests relied on computer scoring by the test publisher and required no specialized education on the part of test administrators, most of whom were employers rather than trained testing professionals. "Only 5% of the publishers required either a graduate degree or specialized licensure or certification for test users," and only 64% screened purchasers for qualifications (Camara & Schneider, 1994, p. 114).
Validity, Reliability, and the OTA Comparison
The APA also reviewed the validity and reliability studies of the test instruments themselves. A 1989 Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) study commissioned by Congress on integrity testing reviewed only nine such studies. "OTA decided that these reports were inconclusive in supporting or dismissing the assertion that integrity tests can reliably predict dishonest behavior in the workplace. [But] APA's task force reviewed nearly 300 studies using a wide spectrum of validity designs" (Camara & Schneider, 1994, p. 114). The APA found that few of the reliability and validity reviews met their standards, but among those that did, unstructured interviews of candidates as a means of testing integrity scored lower on reliability and validity than the computer-scored integrity tests. For broader context on validity and reliability in psychological assessment, these distinctions carry significant practical weight.
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