Gm. Ostrognay et J. Langanfox, MODERATING EFFECTS OF PROCESSING OBJECTIVE, QUESTION ORDER AND DELAY ON MEMORY AND JUDGMENT, International journal of selection and assessment, 4(4), 1996, pp. 195-214
The performance appraisal process makes many demands on a manager's co
gnitive abilities as there are a number of competing requirements. For
instance, recalling performance information after a long period of ti
me, determining training needs, ascertaining future objectives, etc Th
e processing objective present at the time of observation may also inf
luence whether evaluations are made 'on-line' or are 'memory-based'. S
ome research has found that the rating instrument may moderate memory
and judgement by making certain information salient (Ilgen, Barnes-Far
rell, and McKellin 1993; Lichtenstein and Srull 1987; Woehr and Feldma
n 1993). While some studies have investigated both rating and recall o
rder and processing objective, none have investigated both of these fa
ctors in relationship to time delay and the influence of impressions t
hat were not directly related to performance. It has been suggested th
at the tendency to recall impressions of others rather than specific b
ehaviour that lead to these impressions increase over time (DeNisi, Ca
fferty and Meglino 1984; Kozlowski and Ford 1991; Murphy and Baiter 19
86). This study sets out to examine the influence of three variables,
information processing objective, order of recall and rating and time
delay on the relationship between memory and judgement and the various
models important to these processes (DeNisi, Cafferty and Meglino 198
4; Woehr and Feldman 1993; Hastie, Park and Weber 1984; Williams, Caff
erty and DeNisi 1990). The experiment was a 2x2x2 between subjects fac
torial design with three independent variables with 187 students from
various disciplines. Support was found for the model of performance ap
praisal by DeNisi et al. (1984) in that overall evaluations influenced
dimensional ratings when a time delay was introduced. However, the hy
pothesized effect of recall/rating order was in the opposite direction
to that expected, indicating that there were additional factors that
influenced the relationship between memory and judgement.