The goal of focal articles in Industrial and Organizational Psychology: Perspectives on Science and Practice is to present new ideas or different takes on existing ideas and stimulate a conversation in the form of comment articles that extend the arguments in the focal article or that present new ideas stimulated by those articles. The two focal articles in this issue stimulated a wide range of reactions and a good deal of constructive input.
The Current Issue
In our first article, Lievens and Motowidlo build the case for reconceptualizing the situational judgment test (SJT) as a measure of general domain knowledge that underlies effective behavior in various work situations. Personality, cognitive ability, and experience are delineated as antecedents to this knowledge domain and not directly captured by the SJT. The authors argue that this reconceptualization of the SJT allows for a cleaner specification of the targeted constructs and more accurate insights in predicting individual differences. Twelve comment articles take a range of positions on the focal article, from suggesting additional knowledge domains be included to challenging whether general domain knowledge is in fact an appropriate focus for SJT research and design. A number of practical suggestions derive from these commentaries for future research and practice.
In our second article, Bergman and Jean argue that accumulated knowledge in the top industrial and organizational (I-O) psychology journals is not reflective of the relevant labor market, and this has created a biased understanding of a large segment of the workforce. The authors contend that this underrepresentation causes the I-O field to miss critical phenomena of interest, creates an inaccurate picture of workplace experiences, reduces the utility of the published literature, and inhibits our ability to improve organizational functioning. Several different themes emerge from the 15 comment articles. The first set of commentaries extends Bergman and Jean's argument by highlighting additional understudied groups that further skew I-O research and offers a variety of strategies for addressing this issue. The second set of commentaries points out that sample representation is necessarily tied to the particular purpose and hypotheses of an I-O research study, and it is therefore inappropriate to generalize about underrepresentation without taking these factors and the content area of interest into account.
It would not be possible to publish this journal without the hard work of talented reviewers. I appreciate the help and input of Mike Burke, Herman Aguinis, Satoris Culbertson, Jose Cortina, Jeff Johnson, Jerry Kehoe, and Hannah Rothstein.
