DETECTING FAKERS ON A PERSONNEL TEST - RESPONSE LATENCIES VERSUS A STANDARD VALIDITY SCALE

Test-item response latencies and a traditional validity scale were com pared for their relative abilities to identify fakers on a personnel i nventory. In this experiment, unemployed persons actively seeking work were randomly assigned either to respond honestly or to fake good. Te st-item response latencies performed as well in detecting fakers as th e putatively best traditional validity index. Item response times, sta ndardized in accordance with a schematic model of valid responding, co rrectly identified over 64% of individuals as either responding honest ly or as faking. Results were consistent with previous studies that us ed this model of test-item response dissimulation. Advantages of using test-item response latencies are discussed.