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Is Policy Capturing Really More Resistant Than Traditional Self-Report Techniques to Socially Desirable Responding?

Researchers are frequently concerned that people respond to questions on sensitive topics (e.g., those involving money, criminal activity, sexual behavior) in a way that makes them look more socially desirable than they are. For decades, the technique known as “policy capturing” (or “judgment analysis”) has been recommended as a solution to socially desirable responding (i.e., “faking good”). Surprisingly, however, until now, the extent to which policy capturing actually reduces socially desirable responding had not been tested empirically in a comprehensive manner. We examined the importance respondents assigned to several job characteristics, some of which (e.g., pay, schedule flexibility) tend to be susceptible to socially desirable responding. We compared responses obtained from policy capturing to those from four traditional self-report techniques (i.e., Likert-type, forced choice, ranking, and points distribution) across four instructional sets: instructions to respond honestly, warnings not to respond dishonestly, instructions to respond in a socially desirable manner, and no specific instructions. Results from both between-subject and within-subject comparisons indicated that policy capturing was indeed much more resistant than any of the traditional self-report techniques to socially desirable responding.