Proctored or unproctored?

It is well known that job applicants lie in their resumes and at interviews to gain an advantage. In addition, much evidence exists that students cheat and plagiarise. Integrity testing and background checks of job candidates are now an integral part of the selection process. The question is who can you trust not to cheat or lie at the pre-employment stage.

Throw an unproctored or unsupervised online pre-employment test into the mix and you can guess what is going to happen.

The topic of unproctored internet testing is the source of much debate for two reasons. Firstly, because it is possible that job applicants could cheat or get someone else to sit the test, and secondly, because the test items could get stolen

Some organisations have decided the benefits outweigh the risks, and a new study in the June 2008 issue of the International Journal of Selection and Assessment may provide support for their position.

In it, the authors looked at 856 job applicants from nine European countries that took a test of perceptual speed in an unproctored setting, then followed this up with a proctored parallel version. Results? Not only was there no evidence of cheating, they found the opposite effect. People did better in the proctored setting.

Note, a perceptual speed test is difficult to cheat and do well, unless you have someone else do the test. In general, ability tests are the most vulnerable, but this can be overcome with time tests and mixed item types (abstract, verbal and numerical). Personality and integrity tests are difficult to fudge because there are no right answers, although the items can sometimes be printed out and distributed.

Test vendors need to develop secure test platforms that prevent applicant cheating and item theft. Providing alternate test forms and random item selection can help, but are costly. Tracking IP addresses during mass testing can determine if more than one test is being submitted from the same computer. Giving the tests online without proctoring and retesting the successful applicants in a proctored environment is also favoured by some organisations.

However, the problem will not go away quickly, and two things are clear: (1) online assessment is here to stay, and (2) security solutions are needed if online assessments are to be trusted.

Reference

Nye, C. D., Do, B., Drasgow, F. & Fine, S. (2008). Two-Step Testing in Employee Selection: Is score inflation a problem? International Journal of Selection and Assessment, 16, 112–120.

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