Predicting integrity with the HEXACO personality model: Use of self- and observer reports

Transcription

1 147 Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology (2008), 81, q 2008 The British Psychological Society The British Psychological Society Predicting integrity with the HEXACO personality model: Use of self- and observer reports Kibeom Lee 1 *, Michael C. Ashton 2, David L. Morrison 3, John Cordery 3 and Patrick D. Dunlop 3 1 University of Calgary, Canada 2 Brock University, Canada 3 University of Western Australia, Australia Recent research has suggested that a six-dimensional model of personality called the HEXACO framework may have particular value in organizational settings because of its ability to predict integrity-related outcomes. In this series of studies, the potential value of the HEXACO factor known as Honesty Humility was further examined. First, the empirical distinctness of this construct from the other major dimensions of personality was demonstrated in a high-stakes personnel selection situation. Second, Honesty Humility was found to predict scores on an integrity test and a business ethical decisionmaking task beyond the level of prediction that was possible using measures based on a traditional Big Five model of personality. This finding was also observed when Honesty Humility was assessed by familiar acquaintances of the target persons. The applicability of the HEXACO model within industrial and organizational psychology was then discussed. Research on personality remains an important topic in industrial and organizational (I/O) psychology. Numerous primary and meta-analytic studies investigating the role of personality traits in various work-related outcomes have been conducted since the 1990s, when personality re-emerged as an important focus after the dark ages of the 1970s (Hogan, 2005). As Hogan and Roberts (2002) pointed out, the comeback of personality in I/O psychology is owed, at least in part, to the advent of the Big Five or Five-Factor Model (B5/FFM) of personality structure. According to this model, the diverse array of human personality traits can be effectively summarized by the five broadly independent dimensions that are generally labelled as Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Emotional Stability and Intellect/Imagination (or Openness to Experience). This taxonomic framework has facilitated a * Correspondence should be addressed to Dr Kibeom Lee, Department of Psychology, University of Calgary, Calgary, AB T2N 1N4, Canada ( Kibeom@ucalgary.ca). DOI: / X195175

2 148 Kibeom Lee et al. standardization of the conceptualization and measurement of personality traits, which in-turn has facilitated the systematic cumulation of data regarding the relations of personality traits with diverse organizational variables. Despite the important contribution of the B5/FFM to I/O psychology, this framework does not necessarily represent the optimal structural model for human personality variation. Recently, an alternative six-dimensional personality framework has been proposed on the basis of cross-cultural research on personality structure (Ashton, Lee, Perugini et al., 2004; Lee & Ashton, 2004). In this article, we describe this new model called the HEXACO framework and assess the criterion validity of the proposed sixth factor, Honesty Humility. A six-dimensional structure of personality variation The B5/FFM originated from the findings of lexical studies of personality structure, in which self- or peer ratings on a comprehensive set of personality-descriptive adjectives are factor analysed (see Goldberg, 1993). In lexical studies involving the English language, the five factors collectively named the Big Five have been consistently observed in five-factor solutions (e.g. Goldberg, 1990). Subsequent lexical studies of personality structure involving other languages have generally (but not always) recovered variants of the Big Five factors within the five-factor solutions. A recent review by Ashton, Lee, Perugini et al. (2004) showed, however, that more remarkable convergence can be observed in the six-factor solutions obtained from these lexical studies. Since that review, the cross-language six factors have subsequently been observed in a recent large-scale English lexical study (Ashton, Lee, & Goldberg, 2004) as well as in reanalyses of lexical data from the Turkish, Croatian and Greek languages (see Ashton & Lee, 2007). In contrast, no consistent seven-factor solution was recovered across these investigations. Thus, the cross-cultural evidence strongly suggests that a cross-culturally generalizable model of personality structure should be organized around a set of six robust factors. On the basis of these results, a new model of personality structure has been proposed (Ashton & Lee, 2007; Lee & Ashton, 2004), and this model was labelled the HEXACO model, using an acronym suggesting the number and names of the dimensions contained by the model: Honesty Humility, Emotionality, Extraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience. The HEXACO Personality Inventory (HEXACO-PI) was subsequently developed to measure the six dimensions (Lee & Ashton, 2004, 2006). In the following sections, we provide a brief description of the nature of the six factors measured by the HEXACO-PI and we summarize some findings obtained from previous investigations that have used this inventory. The HEXACO personality model Three of the HEXACO-PI factor scales specifically, Extraversion, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience are very similar in content to measures of the corresponding factors of the B5/FFM. Consistent with this similarity of content, scores on those three HEXACO-PI scales are highly correlated with scores on scales measuring the same-named factors in the B5/FFM (see Lee & Ashton, 2004; Lee, Ashton, & de Vries, 2005; Lee, Ogunfowora, & Ashton, 2005). For this reason, we do not provide here any detailed description of those factors. However, the other three factors in the HEXACO

3 HEXACO model 149 model do not map isomorphically onto any B5/FFM dimensions, and thus require some explication. First, the HEXACO factor called Honesty Humility has no direct counterpart in the B5/FFM. This dimension has been found to correlate strongly and negatively with existing personality constructs involving exploitation and entitlement. For example, Lee and Ashton (2005; Lee, Ogunfowora, & Ashton, 2005) found that HEXACO-PI Honesty Humility correlated significantly with such variables as Primary Psychopathy (Levenson, Kiehl, & Fitzpatrick, 1995), Machiavellianism (Christie & Geis, 1970) and Narcissism (Raskin & Terry, 1988), as well as the Manipulativeness and Integrity scales of the Supernumerary Personality Inventory (SPI; Paunonen, Haddock, Forsterling, & Keinonen, 2003). Furthermore, the above-mentioned correlates of Honesty Humility have been found to be relatively weakly correlated with the B5/FFM factors (e.g. Jakobwitz & Egan, 2006). The other two factors of the HEXACO model Agreeableness and Emotionality do not have one-to-one relations with B5/FFM Agreeableness and Emotional Stability, but instead represent rotated variants of those factors. HEXACO Agreeableness includes such traits as gentleness, flexibility and patience vs. anger, hostility and aggression. The inclusion of content related to anger and hostility at the low pole of HEXACO Agreeableness constitutes an important departure from B5/FFM Agreeableness, whose low pole does not include these traits. (Recall that anger-related traits belong to the low pole of Emotional Stability in the B5/FFM system.) Finally, HEXACO Emotionality is defined by such content as sentimentality, dependence and anxiety vs. bravery and toughness. Therefore, in contrast to Big Five Neuroticism (vs. Emotional Stability), the Emotionality factor is rather neutral in social desirability, having a mixture of desirable and undesirable content at both of its poles. For example, at the high pole, anxiety tends to be socially undesirable, whereas sentimentality is socially desirable; conversely, at the low pole, fearlessness tends to be socially desirable whereas insensitivity is socially undesirable. The label Emotionality is applied to this dimension both to describe the factor content more accurately and to avoid the negative connotations associated with the names Neuroticism or low Emotional Stability (see Ashton, Lee, Perugini et al., 2004). The HEXACO Agreeableness and Emotionality dimensions match the dimensions repeatedly observed in lexical studies of personality structure (Ashton, Lee, Perugini et al., 2004), and are also associated with a parsimonious theoretical framework (Ashton & Lee, 2001, 2007). In sum, the HEXACO personality model incorporates the cross-language six factors; three of the factors (Extraversion, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience) are similar to the corresponding factors in the B5/FFM, and two of them (Agreeableness and Emotionality) represent a re-rotation of B5/FFM Agreeableness and Emotional Stability (vs. Neuroticism). Finally, the last factor, named Honesty Humility, is largely a newly added dimension, only a fraction of whose variance is present in the B5/FFM space. The HEXACO personality inventory and its use in organizational studies Lee and Ashton (2004) developed an inventory assessing the six factors in the HEXACO personality model described earlier. This inventory includes 24 lower order facet scales that each load chiefly on one of the six higher order factors (i.e. four facet scales per factor). Initial evidence of the construct validity of the HEXACO-PI scales appears to be promising. Lee and Ashton (2006) recently examined the psychometric properties of the self- and observer rating versions of the HEXACO-PI using samples of university

4 150 Kibeom Lee et al. students ðn ¼ 1; 681Þ and community adults ðn ¼ 734Þ: Internal consistency reliabilities of the factor-level scales were all close to.90 and those of the facet-level scales fell mostly above.70 with a mean of.80. Moreover, across all samples and all rating sources, all 24 facet scales loaded primarily on their designated factors, therefore supporting the factorial validity of the HEXACO-PI. In addition, the six HEXACO-PI factor-level scales correlated only modestly with each other, with the highest intercorrelation typically in the.30s or.40s. The levels of the independence of the higher order factors are comparable with those observed in other B5/FFM measures, such as the NEO-PI-R (Costa & McCrae, 1992) and the International Personality Item Pool (IPIP) Big Five (Goldberg, 1999). Due to the recency of the introduction of the HEXACO model of personality structure, only a few studies have investigated relationships between organizational variables and the HEXACO personality variables. Early investigations, however, have produced interesting findings, particularly in relation to the Honesty Humility factor. For example, Lee, Ashton et al. (2005) compared the HEXACO model and the B5/FFM in predicting organizational delinquency (Ashton, 1998) and overt integrity test scores (Ryan & Sackett, 1987). They administered the short form of the HEXACO-PI and three different measures of the B5/FFM to four different samples from three different countries (Australia, Canada and the Netherlands). Across the different samples and the different measures of the B5/FFM, the HEXACO model outperformed the B5/FFM in predicting organizational delinquency and overt integrity test scores. The multiple correlations with the organizational delinquency measure, as achieved by the HEXACO and the B5/FFM variables, respectively, were.56 and.46 in the Australian sample,.63 and.47 in the Canadian sample, and.52 and.41 in the Dutch sample. The multiple correlations with the overt integrity test, which was examined in the other Canadian sample, were.61 for the HEXACO model vs..43 for the B5/FFM. Subsequent analyses showed that Honesty Humility was largely responsible for the predictive superiority of the HEXACO-PI over the measures of B5/FFM. The findings described earlier indicate that the predictive advantage of the HEXACO model over the B5/FFM in I/O settings can be primarily attributed to the addition of the Honesty Humility factor. Accordingly, the present research was conducted to shed further light on the criterion validity of the Honesty Humility factor. Specifically, the past research showing the predictive advantage of the HEXACO model over the B5/FFM regarding integrity and delinquency (Lee, Ashton & de Vries, 2005) has been based only on self-reports, which may leave some doubt as to whether such findings will be observed when common rating source effects are controlled. In the present research, therefore, we investigated the criterion validity of peer reports on the Honesty Humility scale (and the other HEXACO-PI scales) with respect to integrity-related variables. Before examining this issue, however, we first examined a heretofore unresolved issue concerning the construct validity of the Honesty Humility factor. We note that evidence of the criterion validity of Honesty Humility in the industrial/organizational context remains hypothetical until it can be demonstrated that this construct can be reliably and validly measured in personnel selection settings. In fact, a failure to demonstrate this would seriously undermine the usefulness of the Honesty Humility construct in personnel selection, and would negate the importance of its criterion validity evidence shown in previous studies. Therefore, in the present study, we first examined whether the Honesty Humility construct can be distinguished empirically from the other personality dimensions when measured in a high-stakes personnel selection setting. To address this question, we revisit the issue of the factor structure of

5 HEXACO model 151 the HEXACO-PI in data from a sample of real job applicants, before returning in a second investigation to the issue of the criterion validity of peer reported Honesty Humility. STUDY 1: HONESTY HUMILITY IN HIGH-STAKES TESTING CONTEXTS An issue that has attracted much attention from researchers is the question of whether or not the factor structures of personality inventories based on the B5/FFM would remain unchanged under high-stakes testing contexts. Most studies investigating this issue have produced quite consistent results. For example, Montag and Levin (1994) factor analysed 935 applicants ratings on the Hebrew version of the NEO Personality Inventory-Revised (NEO-PI-R; Costa & McCrae, 1992) and obtained five factors that are highly congruent with those found in samples of non-applicants in North America (see also Tsaousis & Nikolaou, 2001). Although previous research has demonstrated robust stability in factor structure of the B5/FFM measures in applicant samples, it is also of interest to determine whether or not these findings will generalize to the HEXACO-PI. Specifically, it is of interest to determine whether, in such situations, the new dimension of Honesty Humility is empirically separable from the remaining dimensions of personality. Indeed, some of the traits that define the Honesty Humility factor (e.g. trustworthiness) have been considered as being among the most desirable characteristics of employees and of leaders in organizations (see Emler & Cook, 2002). Therefore, one might suggest that measures of the Honesty Humility factor could be particularly vulnerable to applicants conscious attempts to present a favourable impression, attempts that could compromise the fidelity of those measures in high-stakes selection settings. As such, it is plausible that, in such settings, scores on self-reported Honesty Humility might be so heavily saturated with variance due to socially desirable responding that the factor might no longer be differentiated from other socially desirable dimensions, such as Conscientiousness or Agreeableness. Therefore, one aim of this study was to investigate the extent to which the HEXACO-PI constructs are distorted in applicant samples, by factor-analysing applicants scores on the HEXACO-PI facet-level scales. The failure to find a clear empirical separation of Honesty Humility from the other personality dimensions would potentially undermine the usefulness of this factor in personnel selection contexts. Method Participants The present sample includes 1,105 job applicants seeking employment in the role of fire fighter in Western Australia. The vast majority of the job applicants were male (95%) and to allow easier comparisons between applicant and non-applicant samples, we conducted the subsequent analyses based on data from male respondents only. Of the 1,042 male applicants, the mean age was 28.7 years ðsd ¼ 5:9Þ. All job applicants also completed a series of aptitude tests as a part of the selection process. Measures Job applicants completed the 192-item version of the HEXACO-PI, which assesses the 24 facet scales that are comprised by the six higher order factors. Psychometric properties of this inventory obtained in non-applicant samples can be found in Lee and Ashton

6 152 Kibeom Lee et al. (2004, 2006). All items on the HEXACO-PI are short descriptive statements, and applicants were asked to indicate the extent to which they agreed that each statement described them, using a 5-point scale (1 ¼ strongly disagree; 5 ¼ strongly agree). In this applicant sample, internal consistency reliabilities (coefficient a) ranged from.81 to.88 for the six higher order factor-level scales and from.59 to.82 (with a mean of.72) for the 24 facet-level scales. Results and discussion We factor-analysed the facet-level scales using the method of principal axis factoring. Note that we applied this exploratory technique instead of conducting Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), because the latter method is not always usefully applied to omnibus personality inventories, given the often substantial departures from simple structure which are exhibited by personality variable sets. For example, a large-sample study of the NEO-PI-R scales by McCrae, Zonderman, Costa, Bond, and Paunonen (1996) showed that the robustly replicated five-factor solution did not provide an acceptable fit to the data even when moderate secondary loadings were introduced in the model. Table 1 shows the varimax-rotated six-factor solution from a principal axis factor analysis. The six HEXACO factors were clearly recovered in this applicant sample, as all the facet scales showed their highest loadings on the designated factors and generally weak secondary loadings on other factors. When we computed congruence coefficients between the present factor loading matrix and that obtained from the male university student sample (Lee & Ashton, 2006), the corresponding congruence coefficients all exceeded.90, a value commonly used to indicate a high level of factor congruence (Barrett, 1986). The above results indicate that the factor structure of the HEXACO-PI was not greatly distorted in this job applicant sample. The recovery of the structure from this sample is noteworthy given that the self-reports were obtained in a high-stakes setting from applicants who were likely to have self-selected on several personality characteristics relevant to the job of firefighter. 1 Thus, despite what might have been expected to be important influences of the setting and the sample on the factor structure of the HEXACO-PI, the Honesty Humility factor was still clearly differentiated from the other dimensions of personality. The findings of this first investigation have established that Honesty Humility can be distinguished from other personality factors even in the high-stakes setting of personnel selection. However, although the results suggest the possibility that Honesty Humility could potentially contribute some predictive validity beyond that provided by the remaining dimensions of personality, those results do not address this question directly. We now examine the issue of the predictive utility of Honesty Humility, examining its relations with integrity-related criterion variables that are relevant to the workplace. 1 This applicant sample produced higher means than did a male university student sample (from previous data of Lee & Ashton, 2006, N ¼ 738; mean age ¼ 22.2 years) for the following scales: Conscientiousness ðd ¼ 1:35Þ; Honesty Humility ðd ¼ 1:26Þ and Agreeableness ðd ¼ 0:94Þ: Although these differences are comparable with those found in previous studies involving comparisons between job applicant and university student samples (e.g. Tsaousis & Nikolaou, 2001), these differences should be interpreted cautiously: the higher scores of the fire fighter applicants might be due to the selfpresentation demands of the job application situation, or to some inherent differences in personality between aspiring fire fighters and university students, or to some combination of these influences. Other psychometric properties of the HEXACO-PI obtained in this applicant sample are available from the authors on request.

7 HEXACO model 153 Table 1. Varimax-rotated six-factor solution of the 24 HEXACO facet scales in the male applicant sample H E X A C O Honesty Humility Sincerity Fairness Greed avoidance Modesty Emotionality Fearfulness Anxiety Dependence Sentimentality Extraversion Expressiveness Social boldness Sociability Liveliness Agreeableness Forgiveness Gentleness Flexibility Patience Conscientiousness Organization Diligence Perfectionism Prudence Openness to Experience Aesthetic appreciation Inquisitiveness Creativity Unconventionality Congruence coefficients Note. N ¼ 1; 041: Absolute loadings of.40 or greater are typed in boldface. H, Honesty Humility; E, Emotionality; X, Extraversion; A, Agreeableness; C, Conscientiousness; O, Openness to Experiences STUDY 2: CRITERION VALIDITY OF HONESTY HUMILITY: USE OF OBSERVER REPORTS In a previous study (Lee, Ashton et al., 2005), it was shown that the HEXACO variables outperformed the B5/FFM variables in predicting both workplace delinquency and an overt integrity test. One limitation of that investigation was that both the personality variables and the criteria were measured by self-report, which introduces possible confounds associated with the common rating source effect. As Podsakoff, MacKenzie, Lee, and Podsakoff (2003) pointed out, respondents have a motive to maintain their consistency in responses on similar questions or a tendency to be consistent with their implicit theories. These tendencies may make certain personality-criterion relations appear to be particularly strong, producing artificially higher correlations than those

8 154 Kibeom Lee et al. that would be found in real-life settings. Likewise, some might argue that the particularly strong correlation previously observed between self-reports of Honesty Humility and of delinquency/integrity (i.e. Lee et al., 2005) may have been substantially exaggerated by such response tendencies. In Study 2, we wished to examine whether or not the predictive advantage of HEXACO-PI Honesty Humility over the B5/FFM dimensions in predicting integrityrelated variables can be generalized even to the case in which Honesty Humility is assessed by a different rating source from that which is used in assessing the outcome variables. In the present research, we examined this issue using two criterion variables that are of relevance to organizational psychology. Overt integrity test Integrity tests are now widely used in personnel selection, and the scientific evidence for the tests validity appears to justify their continued use (Ones & Viswesvaran, 2001; Ones, Viswesvaran, & Schmidt, 1993). It is widely acknowledged that the majority of integrity tests can be classified into one of two types. The first type, known as overt integrity tests, measures one s integrity by directly asking admissions of past wrongdoings as well as attitudes towards those wrongdoings and towards the perpetrators of such acts (Wanek, Sackett, & Ones, 2003). The other type of integrity tests, known as personality-based integrity tests, includes various personality traits that are supposed to be related to counterproductive behaviours (see Wanek et al., 2003, for content of the personality-based integrity tests). The correlation between the two types of integrity tests tends to be quite modest (Ones, 1993, cited in Sackett & Wanek, 1996), thus supporting the notion that overt and personality-based integrity tests do measure somewhat different constructs (see also Marcus, Hoft, & Riediger, 2006). Interestingly, the two types of integrity tests have been known to be differentially related to existing measures of personality. Marcus et al. (2006) found that the B5/FFM variables accounted for the variance in the overt integrity test to a much lesser degree than they did for the personality-based integrity test. Similarly, Murphy and Lee (1994) found that the Hogan Personality Inventory variables were better predictors of a personality-based integrity test than of an overt integrity test (cf. Ones, 1993, for meta-analytic correlations of the Big Five with overt and personality-based integrity tests, as cited in Sackett & Wanek, 1996). From these findings, Marcus et al. (2006) suggested that we should look beyond the B5/FFM to better understand the nature of the construct measured by overt integrity tests. As briefly mentioned earlier, the role of the Honesty Humility factor has recently been examined with respect to overt integrity tests. Lee, Ashton et al. (2005) found that the HEXACO model substantially outperformed the B5/FFM in predicting scores on the Employee Integrity Index (EII, Ryan & Sackett, 1987), an overt integrity test. A subsequent analysis indicated that the predictive superiority of the HEXACO model over the B5/FFM was chiefly attributable to the addition of Honesty Humility within the former model. Consistent with this result, Marcus, Lee, and Ashton (2007) also found that Honesty Humility correlated particularly strongly with two different overt integrity tests. Although the studies described help to clarify the nature of overt integrity tests, by highlighting the relevance of Honesty Humility, these investigations were based exclusively on self-report data, and thus have potential problems associated with the rating source effects described by Podsakoff et al. (2003). In the current study, we attempted to predict scores on an overt integrity test using observer reports of the HEXACO-PI.

9 HEXACO model 155 Ethical business decision-making In addition to overt integrity tests, the other integrity-related variable included in the present study is ethical business decision-making. Unethical decisions made by business people have sometimes led to disastrous consequences for public welfare, health and safety, as well as for the stakeholders of the organizations. As a result, the empirical ethical decision-making process has been one of the most frequently studied areas in the business ethics literature (see O Fallon & Butterfield, 2005). In the empirical ethical decision-making literature, various individual and organizational factors have been examined to understand the process by which moral decisions are made in business contexts (see Rest, 1986; Reynolds, 2006). As O Fallon and Butterfield pointed out, the scenario method remains the most widely used means of measuring constructs in the empirical ethical decision-making literature. Specifically, managers or students were given vignettes describing situations in a business context involving ethical issues and asked whether they can recognize the ethical issues (moral awareness), whether they can identify which course of actions is morally correct (moral judgment), and finally which course of actions they would actually take (moral intention/moral behaviours). Although personality has not been one of the primary emphases in this literature, Machiavellianism has received some research attention. For example, Jones and Kavanagh (1996) found that high scorers on the Machiavellianism scale were inclined to report a willingness to engage in unethical workplace behaviours. Bass, Barnett, and Brown (1998) reported that high-machiavellian salespersons were more likely to endorse unethical sales practices as acceptable, and to express a willingness to follow these practices, than were low-machiavellian salespersons. According to a review by O Fallon and Butterfield (2005), 7 out of 10 studies observed significant negative relations between Machiavellianism and ethical decision-making. Despite some consistency observed in the literature, the degree to which these two variables are correlated tends to be fairly modest (typically correlations of.20s or below) and some studies failed to find any relationship between the two variables (see Razzaque & Hwee, 2002; Schepers, 2003). The weak relations observed between Machiavellianism and ethical decisionmaking can be attributed in part to the low reliability associated with the use in these studies of a single scenario as the criterion variable. In the present study, we wished to obtain a more accurate estimate of the relation between Honesty Humility and ethical decision-making, and we therefore measured the latter variable by aggregating responses across several ethical dilemma scenarios. Given the increased reliability associated with these measures of ethical decision-making, we predicted that Honesty Humility shouldplayanimportantroleinpredicting this criterion. Moreover, we expected that the HEXACO model should again outperform the B5/FFM in predictive validity. We should note that the present research makes two other incidental contributions to the ethical decision-making literature. First, previous investigations of ethical decision-making studies have examined one or two personality variables in isolation, and thus have not readily allowed the integration of findings across studies, as would be facilitated by the examination of the full array of dimensions from a comprehensive personality model. Second, most of the previous studies have been based exclusively on self-ratings both of personality and of moral judgment and behavioural intentions. The present study provides an improvement on both accounts.

10 156 Kibeom Lee et al. Method Participants We recruited pairs of undergraduate students in two Canadian universities through oncampus advertisements. To be eligible for participation, two students of each pair were required to have known each other for at least six months. Each participant completed a series of self-report questionnaires assessing personality and outcome variables, as well as an observer report questionnaire that consisted only of the HEXACO-PI, in which they were asked to respond with reference to the other member of his/her pair. Of the 326 participants recruited in this study, 59% were women, and ages ranged from 19 to 55 with a mean of 22.5 years ðsd ¼ 4:2Þ: The length of time that the participants within each pair had been acquainted ranged from 6 months to 22 years with a mean of 4 years ðsd ¼ 4:0Þ: The average subjective rating by the participants within each pair in response to a question asking how well they know each other was 8.04 ðsd ¼ 1:67Þ on a scale from 0 to 10, with higher numbers indicating better knowledge of the target person. 2 Measures Personality variables The NEO-FFI (Costa & McCrae, 1992) was used to measure the personality factors from the Five-Factor Model. The half-length form of the HEXACO-PI was used in this study because the scales of this version are comparable in length with those of the NEO-FFI. The observer report form of the HEXACO-PI was administered to obtain acquaintance ratings on the HEXACO-PI scales (see Lee & Ashton, 2006). Only self-reports were obtained for the NEO-FFI. Respondents used a 5-point scale for the both inventories (1 ¼ strongly disagree; 5¼ strongly agree). Overt integrity test The Employee Integrity Index (EII; Ryan & Sackett, 1987) was administered to the current sample. The 52-item theft attitudes scale and the 11-item theft admissions scale were included and a mean value for the 63 items was computed to form an overall score for this overt integrity test. Responses were made on a 5-point scale (1 ¼ strongly disagree; 5 ¼ strongly agree) for the theft attitudes items. The anchor description for the theft admissions items varies depending on the item. The coefficient a of the EII was.89 in this sample. Ethical decision-making task An 8-item Ethical Decision-making Task was developed specifically for this study. Participants were given eight different scenarios in business contexts in which an ethical dilemma was involved (see Appendix). Each participant was asked to estimate his/her own likelihood of choosing a course of action that would favour personal or organizational profit despite probably causing harm to other individuals or to the public 2 Psychometric properties of the HEXACO-PI obtained from this sample have been reported elsewhere (Lee & Ashton, 2006). The findings involving other variables included in the present research (the NEO-FFI and two outcome variables) were not provided in the previous report.

11 HEXACO model 157 at large (1 ¼ very unlikely; 4¼ very likely). We scored this measure so that high scores indicate the high likelihood to make ethical decisions (coefficient a ¼ :76Þ: Procedure Each participant attended two sessions 1 week apart, and each session consisted of groups of participants. In the first session, they completed the self-report form of the HEXACO-PI and the NEO-FFI. In the second session, they completed the observer report form of the HEXACO-PI as well as the self-report form of the EII and Ethical Decision-making Tasks. Each participant responded independently to all of the questionnaires; the participants were not permitted to discuss or observe each other s responses during the sessions. Results Table 2 shows correlations among the HEXACO-PI scales (both self- and peer report), the NEO-FFI scales, the Employee Integrity Index and the Ethical Decision-making Task. First, it should be noted that strong self/observer agreements were observed for the six personality scales as measured by the half-length form of the HEXACO-PI, with all convergent correlations in the.50s and.60s. Second, the HEXACO-PI Extraversion, Conscientiousness and Openness to Experience scales showed strong correlations with the same named factors in the NEO-FFI (r ¼ :81 for both Extraversion and Conscientiousness; r ¼ :78 for Openness to Experience), and HEXACO-PI Emotionality and Agreeableness showed less strong correlations with NEO-FFI Neuroticism ðr ¼ :54Þ and Agreeableness ðr ¼ :66Þ; respectively. HEXACO-PI Honesty Humility showed its strongest correlations with NEO-FFI Agreeableness, but even this correlation ðr ¼ :48Þ fell below.50. This pattern of correlations is generally consistent with the descriptions of the HEXACO factors given in the Introduction. To investigate the role of Honesty Humility in predicting the outcome variables, we conducted a series of multiple regression analyses using the Employee Integrity Index and the Ethical Decision-making Task as criteria. Table 3 shows b coefficients and semipartial correlations of personality predictors in each equation and multiple correlations for the analyses for the Employee Integrity Index. Self- and observer reports of the HEXACO-PI variables showed multiple correlations of.48 and.40, respectively. Honesty Humility was the strongest predictor in the two equations (semi-partial r ¼ :36 and.33, respectively, for both p, :01Þ: Self-reports of the NEO-FFI variables showed a multiple correlation of.43, and NEO-FFI Agreeableness was the best predictor (semipartial r ¼ :35; p, :01Þ in that equation. We entered Honesty Humility into the equation involving the NEO-FFI variables to determine whether it contributed to the prediction of EII above and beyond the NEO- FFI variables. First, self-reported Honesty Humility significantly increased the prediction of the EII over and beyond self-reported NEO-FFI variables (semi-partial r ¼ :28; p, :01Þ: As a result, the multiple correlation increased to.52. This finding thus replicates the results of Lee, Ashton et al. (2005), which were based only on self-reports. Interestingly, observer reports of Honesty Humility also significantly increased the prediction of the EII beyond the level that was achieved by self-reports on the NEO-FFI (semi-partial r ¼ :24Þ; and the multiple correlation obtained after the addition of the observer reported Honesty Humility increased to.50. In these two equations involving

12 158 Kibeom Lee et al. Table 2. Correlations among the variables included in Study 2 M SD HEXACO-PI self-reports 1. Honesty Humility Emotionality Extraversion Agreeableness Conscientiousness Openness to Experience HEXACO-PI observer reports 7. Honesty Humility Emotionality Extraversion Agreeableness Conscientiousness Openness to Experience NEO-FFI 13. Neuroticism Extraversion Openness to Experience 16. Agreeableness Conscientiousness Outcome variables 18. Employee integrity index 19. Ethical decision task Note. N ¼ 326: Values in diagonal are internal consistency reliabilities (coefficient alpha). NEO-FFI and Outcome Variables are self-reports.

13 HEXACO model 159 Table 3. Multiple regression analyses results for the Employee Integrity Index HEXACO-PI NEO-FFI b (semi-partial r) b (semi-partial r) Self Observer NEO only NEO þ Selfreports of H H NEO þ Observer reports of H H Honesty Humility.40** (.36).39** (.33) NEO Neuroticism 2.01 (2.01) 2.02 (2.02) 2.03 (2.03) Emotionality 2.01 (2.01).06 (.06) NEO Extraversion 2.07 (2.07) 2.02 (2.02) 2.03 (2.03) Extraversion.04 (.04).00 (.00) NEO Openness.03 (.03) 2.02 (2.02) 2.04 (2.04) Agreeableness.10 (.09) 2.05 (2.05) NEO Agreeableness.37** (.35).20** (.17).26** (.22) Conscientiousness.16** (.16).05 (.05) NEO Conscientiousness.22** (.22).20** (.19).19** (.18) Openness to Experience 2.01 (2.01).03 (.03) HEXACO Honesty Humility.33** (.28).28** (.24) R R Note. N ¼ 326: *p, :05; **p, :01:

14 160 Kibeom Lee et al. Honesty Humility, self-reports of NEO-FFI Agreeableness and Conscientiousness were also significantly and positively associated with the criterion (see the last four columns in Table 3). Table 4 summarizes the results of the analogous set of analyses using the Ethical Decision-making Task as a criterion. As seen in that table, the HEXACO model outperformed the FFM in predicting this outcome variable, regardless of the source of the HEXACO-PI reports. Specifically, self- and observer reports of the HEXACO-PI variables achieved multiple correlations of.65 and.60, respectively, with the Ethical Decisionmaking Task, but self-reports of the NEO-FFI showed only a multiple correlation of.50. As predicted, the inclusion of either self- or observer reports of Honesty Humility to the equation involving self-reports of the NEO-FFI substantially increased the prediction of the criterion over and above the NEO-FFI variables (semi-partial rs were.37 for selfreported Honesty Humility and.33 for observer reported Honesty Humility). Therefore, the resulting multiple correlations increased from.50 to.63 when self-reported Honesty Humility was added and to.60 when observer reported Honesty Humility was added to the set of five NEO-FFI scales. These are essentially the same levels of validity that were achieved by self- or observer reports on the six HEXACO-PI scales, and thus suggest that the predictive advantage of the HEXACO model over the B5/FFM in the present context is largely attributable to the inclusion of Honesty Humility. Discussion The results of Study 2 suggest that both self- and observer reports of Honesty Humility significantly increased the prediction of the two outcome variables above and beyond what the NEO-FFI variables achieved. This result provides evidence against the notion that strong correlations previously observed between Honesty Humility and outcome variables obtained from the same rating source (e.g. Lee, Ashton et al., 2005) can be attributed only to artefactual covariation due to a consistency motif or to implicit theories (see Podsakoff et al., 2003) rather than to actual behavioural co-occurrence. The findings of Study 2 specifically the sizable correlations of both self- and observer reported Honesty Humility with overt integrity and with ethical decisionmaking have important implications for the integrity test literature and also for the empirical literature on business ethics. First, efforts to understand the nature of constructs assessed by integrity tests have been of primary concern for many I/O psychologists (Marcus et al., 2006; Murphy & Lee, 1994). The current findings, together with those of Lee, Ashton et al. (2005) and Marcus et al. (2007) suggest that the nature of overt integrity tests may not be fully understood from the perspective of the B5/FFM, which lacks an Honesty Humility factor. As suggested by Lee et al. (2005) and observed empirically by Marcus et al. (2007), however, Honesty Humility is less likely to be a primary component in personality-based integrity tests. As Marcus et al. (2006) have demonstrated, personality-based integrity tests assess a multifaceted composite that can be best understood by multiple facets in the different personality domains (see also Wanek et al., 2003). Second, empirical ethical decision-making is an important topic in the business ethics literature, and (low) Machiavellianism has been found to be one of the few personality traits that have shown some consistent relations with ethical judgment and behaviours in the literature (see Jones & Kavanagh, 1996). These findings can now be understood within a broader framework of personality structure. Specifically, it is

15 HEXACO model 161 Table 4. Multiple regression analyses results for the Ethical Decision-making Task HEXACO-PI NEO-FFI b (semi-partial r) b (semi-partial r) Self Observer NEO only NEO þ Selfreports of H H NEO þ Observer reports of H H Honesty Humility.46** (.42).49** (.42) NEO Neuroticism.20** (.18).19** (.17).17** (.15) Emotionality.24** (.23).26** (.26) NEO Extraversion 2.01 (2.01).07 (.06).06 (.05) Extraversion 2.03 (2.03).07 (.07) NEO Openness.26** (.25).20** (.19).16** (.15) Agreeableness.05 (.04).02 (.02) NEO Agreeableness.38** (.36).16** (.14).23 (.20) Conscientiousness.05 (.05) 2.02 (2.02) NEO Conscientiousness.12* (.11).08 (.08).07 (.07) Openness to Experience.26** (.25).10* (.09) HEXACO Honesty Humility.44** (.37).38** (.33) R R Note. N ¼ 326. *p, :05; **p, :01.

16 162 Kibeom Lee et al. primarily Honesty Humility that influences such decision-making, although it appears that (high) Openness to Experience, (low) HEXACO-PI Emotionality, (high) NEO-PI Agreeableness also show some appreciable relations with this criterion. In particular, the effect sizes of both self- and observer reports of Honesty Humility in predicting ethical decision-making were considerably larger than those previously observed for self-reports of Machiavellianism in predicting similar criteria. This suggests that business ethics research can benefit from the use of an Honesty Humility scale that is even more highly saturated with exploitation- and entitlement-related traits than is Machiavellianism. The present results also support the suggestion that observer reports of personality traits are of practical utility in terms of providing valid information about the target person s personality that is not captured by self-reports. Indeed, Mount, Barrick, and Strauss (1994) found that aggregating personality reports across self and observers substantially increased the validity of personality in predicting supervisor ratings of job performance. The current findings highlight the potential value of observer reports in personality assessment, and call for more research addressing this important issue in organizational contexts. Limitations and future directions Although the adoption of observer reports of personality constitutes an important contribution of the current study, this investigation relied on self-report measures of the criteria rather than objective measures or supervisor/peer reports. Moreover, although the vast majority of participants in the current study had considerable experience as paid employees (cf. Ashton, 1998), they were mostly young undergraduate students. Future studies, therefore, should examine the predictive validity of Honesty Humility with respect to real-world criteria based on more traditional working samples. We have two recommendations for such studies. First, it would be desirable to obtain co-worker ratings (instead of or in addition to supervisor ratings) of counterproductive or antisocial behaviours at work (see Lee & Allen, 2002). One of the important characteristics in low Honesty Humility is interpersonal manipulation involving flattery and insincere charm, and this may cause somewhat differing views about the target person depending on who (peers or supervisors) rates this person. It will be of some interest to determine whether Honesty Humility correlates differently with peer and supervisor ratings of the same workplace behaviours. Second, it is important to recall that the Honesty Humility factor emerged in lexical studies of personality structure as conducted in diverse languages, rather than from any a priori consideration of the practical prediction of workplace behaviours. Consequently, although some aspects of the lexical Honesty Humility factor are potentially highly relevant to workplace behaviours, others are much less so. For example, whereas employees high on the Fairness facet (i.e. those who avoid fraud and deception) are more likely to receive positive evaluations in the organization, employees high on the Greed Avoidance facet (i.e. those who are disinterested in luxury goods and high social status) may be perceived to be less ambitious and therefore evaluated somewhat less favourably. Therefore, it is important to include facet-level measures in Honesty Humility in future. GENERAL DISCUSSION In this report, we examined several construct validity issues involving the Honesty Humility factor of personality in the context of I/O psychology. First, the six HEXACO factors, including Honesty Humility, emerged as distinct dimensions in a factor analysis

17 HEXACO model 163 involving the 24 facets of the HEXACO-PI using data from a sample of applicants. These findings suggest that the HEXACO-PI constructs can be meaningfully assessed by selfreport even in a high-stakes selection setting. Second, observer reports of the HEXACO- PI variables, in particular Honesty Humility, were found to show a similar pattern of significant relations with outcome variables as did self-reports. These results suggest that previous findings showing that the HEXACO model outperformed the B5/FFM in predicting some organizational variables (Lee et al., 2005) cannot be attributed solely to method effects produced by a common rating source. The HEXACO model vs. the B5/FFM Despite the potential usefulness of the HEXACO model in personnel psychology, some researchers may raise objections to the idea that the B5/FFM needs to be revised. Some of these objections are based on the conviction that there exists overwhelming evidence supporting the universality and validity of the B5/FFM. For example, some I/O psychologists (e.g. Anderson & Ones, 2003) as well as some personality psychologists (McCrae & Costa, 1997) have described the cross-cultural stability of the five-factor structure, as observed in various measures of the B5/FFM, as if this result supports the universality of the model. However, these findings on their own do not constitute evidence for the universality and validity of the B5/FFM. Such studies are based on factor analyses of a set of variables (i.e. the set of NEO-PI-R facet scales) that is designed to measure the hypothesized five-factor structure. Recovering a given factor structure across diverse cultures from the same imported variable set one which is generated with the express aim of producing that structure has little or no bearing on the issue of personality structure. Consequently, the results of those studies can be interpreted only as evidence supporting the construct validity of that measure, but not necessarily of its underlying model. The universality of a personality model can be demonstrated only when a factor analysis is performed on the variable set that is (1) indigenously driven with no a priori hypothesized structure and (2) comprehensive enough to approximate the full domain of human personality attributes. So far, the lexical approach to the personality structure has been the only method that can make a serious claim to producing such a variable set (see Ashton & Lee, 2005). As described earlier, findings from lexical studies involving multiple languages have recovered broadly the same set of six factors, with no consistent recovery of an apparent seventh factor thus far (see Ashton & Lee, 2007). These results support the six-dimensional model of personality structure as an optimal taxonomy of personality traits. Implications of the HEXACO model in personnel psychology Numerous meta-analyses have been conducted in the last 15 years to investigate the relations of personality traits with many organizational variables. In these studies, findings have almost always been summarized with personality variables categorized in terms of the B5/FFM framework and with criterion variables such as overall job performance (e.g. Barrick & Mount, 1991). However, the emergence of the new HEXACO personality model has implications for the ways in which research findings involving the personality variables are cumulated. By summarizing the relations between personality and organizational variables in terms of the HEXACO framework, our understanding of the personality basis of those organizational outcomes is likely to