Unit 13: Industrial-Organizational Psychology
How psychology gets applied to hiring, evaluating, motivating, and designing safe, usable workplaces for the people inside them.
8 topics · 27 questions
Each topic is a path, not a menu: work down it in order and every question builds on the one above. Click any of them to watch the answer draw itself.
13.1 What Industrial-Organizational Psychologists Actually Do
- How it worksHow does I-O psychology split into an industrial side focused on the job and an organizational side focused on the people?
- Going furtherWhat kind of problem gets handed to an I-O psychologist instead of a clinical one?
- Common mistakeWhy isn't an I-O psychologist the same thing as a human resources manager?
Your turn1 of 2
One I-O psychologist focuses on redesigning a factory assembly line to reduce errors and boost efficiency. A different I-O psychologist at the same company focuses on improving employee morale, teamwork, and leadership development. What split within I-O psychology does this best illustrate?13.2 Job Analysis and Employee Selection Tests
- How it worksHow does a job analysis break a role down into the specific tasks and skills it actually requires?
- How it worksWalk me through how a structured interview predicts job performance better than an unstructured one.
- Worked exampleFind why a selection test with strong validity but weak reliability still ends up being a poor predictor of job performance.
- Common mistakeWhy isn't an unstructured job interview as predictive of performance as a structured one asking every candidate the same questions?
Your turn1 of 2
A new employee selection test shows a validity coefficient (correlation) of 0.479 with actual job performance. Using r-squared as the proportion of shared variance, what percentage of the variation in job performance is statistically explained by scores on this test?13.2 Performance Appraisal Methods
- How it worksHow does a 360-degree feedback appraisal combine ratings from a worker's boss, peers, and subordinates?
- Going furtherWhat bias creeps into a performance rating when a manager rates every employee based on one recent incident?
- Common mistakeWhy isn't a single annual performance review usually enough to accurately capture a year of someone's work?
Your turn1 of 2
Instead of relying only on a single supervisor's opinion, a company's performance appraisal process collects ratings of each employee from their supervisor, their peers, and the people who report to them. What is this appraisal method called, and what is its main advantage?13.3 Job Satisfaction and Organizational Commitment
- How it worksHow do factors like autonomy, feedback, and task variety each raise or lower job satisfaction?
- Going furtherWhat happens to a company's turnover rate as average job satisfaction across its employees rises or falls?
- Worked exampleFind which factor, pay or a sense of autonomy, more strongly predicts long-term job satisfaction according to I-O research.
Your turn1 of 2
Before a company improved job satisfaction initiatives, its annual employee turnover rate was 35 percent. After implementing changes that raised average job satisfaction, turnover dropped to 14 percent. By how many percentage points did turnover fall?13.3 Leadership Styles and Employee Outcomes
- How it worksHow does transformational leadership motivate employees differently than transactional leadership does?
- Going furtherWhat happens to a team's performance when a transactional leader relies only on rewards and punishments?
- Common mistakeWhy isn't the most charismatic leader automatically the most effective one?
- Worked exampleFind which leadership style, transformational or transactional, better fits a manager who inspires a struggling team with a shared vision for change.
Your turn1 of 2
A manager at a struggling company inspires the team with a compelling shared vision for turning things around, encouraging employees to see themselves as part of something bigger than their individual tasks. Which leadership style does this best represent?13.3 Team Dynamics and Organizational Culture
- How it worksHow does an organization's culture shape behavior even when no explicit rule requires it?
- How it worksWalk me through how social loafing reduces individual effort as a team's size grows larger.
- Going furtherWhat happens to social loafing when each team member's individual contribution is made clearly visible?
Your turn1 of 2
A solo person pulling a rope exerts a baseline of 100 units of force. When 6 people pull together as a team, the total force exerted is only 217 units. What is the average force exerted per person, as a percentage of the 100-unit solo baseline?13.4 Human Factors and Designing Controls People Won't Misread
- How it worksHow does human factors psychology redesign a control or display around how people actually perceive it?
- How it worksWalk me through why grouping related dials together on a panel reduces the errors an operator makes reading them.
- Going furtherWhat changes about an error rate when a warning light is replaced with a warning sound instead?
- Worked exampleFind why shaping an airplane's landing gear lever like a small wheel reduced pilots confusing it with the flap lever.
Your turn1 of 2
After a series of accidents where pilots confused the landing gear lever with the flap lever, aircraft designers changed the landing gear lever's handle to feel like a small wheel, distinct from the flap lever's different shape. Why did this design change reduce pilot errors?13.4 Workplace Safety and Reducing Human Error
- How it worksHow does human factors psychology redesign a task or environment to make the safe action the easy one?
- Worked exampleFind why color-coding and shape-coding airplane cockpit switches reduced the rate of pilots grabbing the wrong control.
- Going furtherWhat changes about accident rates in a factory once fatigue and shift length are factored into the schedule design?
Your turn1 of 2
After introducing distinct colors and shapes for different airplane cockpit switches, previously easy to confuse when they looked nearly identical, researchers found the rate of pilots grabbing the wrong control dropped significantly. What does this finding illustrate about reducing human error?