Faking on personality assessments in high-stakes settings: A critical review

Faking—deliberately self-presenting in an overly favorable light—is a persistent challenge for personality assessments in high-stakes contexts such as personnel selection. This review examines recent research on the impact of faking, strategies for its prevention and detection, and future directions...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Dunlop, Patrick, Xia, Mengting, Anglim, J.
Format: Journal Article
Published: Elsevier 2025
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/97884
Description
Summary:Faking—deliberately self-presenting in an overly favorable light—is a persistent challenge for personality assessments in high-stakes contexts such as personnel selection. This review examines recent research on the impact of faking, strategies for its prevention and detection, and future directions. Meta-analytic evidence supports the theory of validity declines from faking, but meaningful predictive utility remains. Research on prevention has grown, covering approaches such as forced-choice formats, neutralized items, warnings, gamified, and implicit measures. However, many methods involve practical or psychometric trade-offs. Although the literature is substantial, we encourage research involving larger samples, real applicants, and within-subjects designs. Finally, novel assessment methods, including those using generative artificial intelligence, warrant further investigation both as potential solutions and as tools for faking.