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STRIVING FOR SELF-VERIFICATION DURINGORGANIZATIONAL ENTRY

DANIEL M. CABLELondon Business School

VIRGINIA S. KAYUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

“Self-verification striving” means bringing others to know you for who you really are,which can be difficult during organizational entry. We predict that some individualsplace higher value on self-verification striving than others and that these differencesaffect the organizational entry process. We present results from two samples of 2,673people from 107 countries to show how self-verification striving is independent fromrelated constructs (i.e., self-disclosure, self-monitoring, core self-evaluations) and isrelated to the validity of interviewers’ evaluations, job seekers’ ability to find satisfyingwork, and supervisors’ evaluations of newcomers’ performance.

The only problem was that, having got this man tofall in love with an unauthentic me, I had to keep onnot being myself.

-Gloria Steinem

I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard ofincurring the ridicule of others, rather than to befalse, and to incur my own abhorrence.

-Frederick Douglass

When people join new employers, they get afresh chance to define who they are. From theirinitial interactions with recruiters to meeting theirnew supervisors, newcomers have the opportunityto negotiate their identity through the way they act,the clothes they wear, and the way they describethemselves and their experiences. Thus, the pro-cess called organizational entry is an unusual pe-riod because identity can be negotiated—in con-trast to most of life, when an individual interactswith people who have already agreed to honor theidentities he or she has negotiated with them (Goff-man, 1959; Swann, 1990). Organizational entry re-fers to the process of newcomers’ moving from theoutside to the inside of organizations, a progression

that ultimately results in organizational commit-ment and job performance (Kammeyer-Mueller &Wanberg, 2003; Wanous, 1977). As such, the iden-tity that one fashions during organizational entry isimportant because it casts a long shadow on thefuture. After all, employment relationships gener-ally are not fleeting interactions, and people spendmany of their waking hours working.

What version of their identities, then, will peoplepresent? On one hand, the job search context isfamous for its power to make people present them-selves in the best possible way. In fact, researchshows that many job applicants even pretend tohave better traits, experiences, and abilities thanthey actually possess. Levashina and Campion(2007) found that 80 percent of job candidates en-gaged in “extensive image creation” during em-ployment interviews (e.g., told fictional stories pre-pared in advance to showcase their credentials).Weiss and Feldman (2006) found that 81 percent ofjob applicants admitted lying at least once duringan interview for a job, and the vast majority of lieswere related to self-promotion (46%) and self-en-hancement (51%). Moreover, inflating self-presen-tations in the organizational entry process may beeffective, at least in the short run. Barrick, Shaffer,and DeGrassi’s (2009) meta-analysis revealed thatapplicants’ impression management tactics werepositively related to interviewer ratings.

On the other hand, Gloria Steinem’s opening quotereminds us that it can be problematic when you pre-tend to be someone you are not. Consider a job appli-cant who misrepresents his past successes as a leaderduring his interviews and obtains a job in which he isexpected to lead change in a dysfunctional team. Un-

Much of the data collection for this research was per-formed when Dan Cable was professor at the Universityof North Carolina. This study was awarded the Academyof Management OB Division’s (2010) Award for BestCompetitive Paper and the OB Division’s (2010) McKin-sey Award for Outstanding Practical Implications. Forexcellent feedback on drafts, we thank Margaret Ormis-ton, Constantine Sedikides, Stefan Thau, and DanTurban.

Editor’s note: The manuscript for this article was ac-cepted for publication during the term of AMJ’s previouseditor-in-chief, R. Duane Ireland.

� Academy of Management Journal2012, Vol. 55, No. 2, 360–380.http://dx.doi.org/10.5465/amj.2010.0397

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fortunately, after the glow of being offered the jobwears off, he may find that his actual skills and ex-periences provide a poor fit with the job’s require-ments, resulting in poor performance. Moreover, thehigh expectations he created during the entry processmay provoke anxiety and uncertainty, which may inturn hinder his ability to lead the team. He may investconsiderable cognitive and emotional energy into act-ing like someone he is not, instead of investing theseresources into solving organizational problems. Fi-nally, to the extent that he is not being true to his self,he may find it harder to form trusting relationshipswith colleagues.

Thus, people can make it hard on themselveswhen they misrepresent their self-views to others.In fact, Swann’s (1983, 1987) self-verification the-ory suggests that since self-views represent the lensthrough which people perceive the world and or-ganize their behavior, it is critical that these lensesmaintain some degree of integrity and stability, orpeople lose their means of knowing the world andpredicting others’ responses. Swann and colleagueshave presented strong logic for a basic human needto self-verify, or give an accurate portrayal of one’sself to others, based on both epistemic (e.g., feelingsof psychological coherence) and pragmatic (e.g.,ensuring that interactions proceed smoothly) con-cerns. In short, self-verification theory predicts thatpeople will strive to preserve continuity in theirself-views by bringing others to see them as theysee themselves (e.g., Lecky, 1945; Swann, 1983;Swann, Stein-Seroussi, & Giesler, 1992).

A large and widening stream of research hasshown that people do in fact gravitate toward rela-tionships that provide them with evaluations thatconfirm their self-views, even when those self-views are negative (for reviews, see Swann [1990],Swann et al. [1992], Swann, Polzer, Seyle, and Ko[2004], Swann, Rentfrow, and Guinn [2003]). Infact, when people have negative self-views, theywork to verify them by eschewing positive feed-back in favor of negative feedback (Swann et al.,2003; Swann, Pelham, & Krull, 1989). Likewise, ifpeople end up in marriages in which their spousesperceive them more (or less) favorably than theyperceive themselves, they become less intimatewith them (Swann, De La Ronde, & Hixon, 1994). Inwork settings, individuals with low self-esteem ap-pear to prefer lower raises (Schroeder, Josephs, &Swann, 2006) and lower procedural justice (Wi-esenfeld, Swann, Brockner, & Bartel, 2007).

In this article, we extend past research in two ways.First, we examine self-verification striving in the con-text of organizational entry, a situation that stronglyencourages many people to present overly positiveinformation about themselves. However, even in this

“strong situation,” we predict that some individualsplace a high enough value on the process and out-comes of self-verification striving that they continueto present realistic information about themselves.This perspective contributes to past self-verificationresearch representing implicit or explicit assump-tions that people are equally motivated to self verify.Second, we explore how differences in people’s self-verification striving affect the organizational entryprocess. To this end, we develop a measure of theself-verification striving construct, and we use thisscale to test theoretical predictions about how self-verification affects the organizational entry process.In so doing, we provide initial evidence regarding thevalidity and nomological network of self-verificationstriving. Our findings come from two independentsamples of 2,673 people from 107 countries pursuingemployment in many different organizations andprofessions.

SELF-VERIFICATION STRIVING DURINGORGANIZATIONAL ENTRY

In a seminal paper, Swann described self-verifi-cation as the tendency for people to “promote thesurvival of their self-conceptions, regardless ofwhether the self-conception happens to be positiveor negative” (1987: 1039). Self-verification has beenconceptualized in the literature as a universal hu-man need, since stable self-conceptions “providepeople with a crucial source of coherence, an in-valuable means of defining their existence, organiz-ing experience, predicting future events, and guid-ing social interaction” (Swann et al., 2003: 369).Self-verification theory therefore predicts thatwhen people form long-term relationships withothers, they take pains to present themselves in away that they believe is honest and realistic.

Although the logic for self-verification striving isstrong and well supported, it has not yet been ex-amined in the context of organizational entry,which provides an interesting setting for two rea-sons. First, there is a lot on the line when a personis interviewing for a new job and meeting potentialsupervisors and colleagues. It not only provokesanxiety to be evaluated by others in a competitivesituation, but is also psychologically painful andfinancially impactful to be rejected for a job (e.g.,McCarthy & Goffin, 2004). Second, the organiza-tional entry process is ambiguous because neitherparty typically has extensive, first-hand knowledgeof the other. Because people are more likely topresent themselves positively when it is importantthat others evaluate them positively (Tedeschi &Melburg, 1984), many authors have argued that thisambiguity encourages applicants to skew others’

2012 361Cable and Kay

impressions of them (Higgins & Judge, 2004;Peeters & Lievens, 2006; Stevens & Kristof, 1995;von Baeyer, Sherk, & Zanna, 1981).

The characteristics of organizational entry thusresult in a “strong situation,” since it leads mostpeople to construe component events the sameway, induces uniform expectancies regarding themost appropriate response pattern, and providesadequate incentives for the performance of that re-sponse pattern (Mischel, 1973: 276). As such, or-ganizational entry is a situation in which manypeople forego their natural tendency to promote thesurvival of their honest self-conceptions. To theextent that some job applicants value self-verifica-tion enough that they strive to self-verify despitethe “strong situation,” it suggests individual differ-ences as the explanation of that behavior. As Mis-chel noted, “Person (trait) explanations are invokedwhen the individual’s behavior is ‘distinctive’. . .that is, when it deviates from others’ behavior inthe same situation” (1973: 262).

Our perspective is that the emphasis a personplaces on revealing either accurate or exaggeratedinformation about him- or herself depends on theperson. We propose that some people perceivegreater value in self-verification than others, that peo-ple’s propensity to self-verify is relatively stable overtime, and these individuals strive harder to ensurethat their opportunity structures satisfy their desirefor self-confirmatory feedback (e.g., McCall & Sim-mons, 1966; Swann, 1983, 1987). An individual dif-ferences approach adds an important perspective tothe existing self-verification research stream, becauseit permits theory development about how individualvariation in self-verification striving affects entry intonew social settings. The basic prediction advanced inthis study is that individuals who strive to self-verifyare more likely to enter organizations in which theyare satisfied and successful.

In proposing that self-verification striving shouldlead to better organizational entry, our research alignswith positive organizational scholarship, a field ofscientific inquiry emphasizing the benefits of per-sonal authenticity to both employees and organiza-tions (e.g., Cameron, Dutton, Quinn, & Wrzen-sniewski, 2003; Kernis, 2003). Within humanisticand existential psychology, individual differences inauthenticity have been important to understandinggeneral well-being and freedom from psychopathol-ogy (Rogers, 1980). The core concept of authenticityis that (1) lying within each individual there is a trueinner self that she or he can get in touch with throughintrospection and self-reflection and (2) only by ex-pressing one’s inner self through actions in the exter-nal world can one achieve self-realization and self-fulfillment as an authentic human being (Guignon,

2004). Thus, authenticity has been described as “be-ing one’s true self” (Ilies, Morgeson, & Nahrgang,2005: 374) and as “the unobstructed operation ofone’s true, or core, self in one’s daily enterprise”(Kernis, 2003: 13). Wood, Linley, Maltby, Baliousis,and Joseph’s (2008: 386) review of the literature sug-gested three steps to achieving authenticity: (1) know-ing oneself versus being alienated from oneself (“self-alienation”); (2) behaving and expressing emotionsconsistent with the knowledge of oneself (“authenticliving”); and (3) remaining true to oneself instead ofconforming to the expectations of others (“not accept-ing external influence”). Kernis (2003: 13–14) de-scribed a similar framework, but he emphasized theunbiased processing of self-information as a separateprocess, and he focused on openness in close rela-tionships rather than accepting external influence.

Although conceptually related to authenticity,self-verification striving refers to how important itis for people to promote the survival of their self-conceptions when they enter new social environ-ments. As such, self-verification striving differsfrom authenticity in two ways. First, at its coreauthenticity demands that individuals be open totheir true selves—that they “listen” closely to whattheir true selves are telling them about their values,interests, goals, and feelings. Thus, the concept ofauthenticity emphasizes discovering (becomingaware of) and living out (communicating or actingon) whatever one learns about his or her self. Al-though self-verification striving also emphasizes anawareness of self, it focuses more on trying to holdonto something that one possesses than on self-discovery. Self-verification striving therefore in-volves trying to preserve a sense of coherence aboutoneself, and authenticity is more concerned withthe process of learning who one is. In this sense,self-verification striving might be classified as moredefensive and authenticity as more exploratory.

Second, the concept of authenticity implies aglobal consistency between individuals’ behaviorsand true selves—from the places people decide tolive, to the careers and hobbies they pursue, to therelationships they foster. Self-verification strivingalso implies a consistency between self and behav-ior, but it is considerably more narrow than authen-ticity since the focus is on revealing informationabout self to others in social settings. Thus, a per-son who is living authentically might know herselfquite well, and pursue a career and hobbies that areauthentic, but not be motivated to reveal idiosyn-cratic information about herself when first meetingpeople in a new social environment. In fact, Kernis(2003: 14) suggested, fully authentic individualsmight try on new selves in new social settings aspart of the self-discovery and growth process.

362 AprilAcademy of Management Journal

In the present study, we focus on the more special-ized concept of self-verification striving and how itaffects organizational entry. Specifically, we con-ducted two investigations to provide information onthe meaning and validity of the self-verification striv-ing construct. In Study 1, we developed and testedthe logic for why self-verification striving (1) helpsinterviewers evaluate job candidates and (2) helpsapplicants find work that makes them satisfied. InStudy 2, we examined self-verification striving rela-tive to other constructs in its nomological net (e.g.,self-disclosure, self-monitoring, core self-evalua-tions), and we demonstrate its incremental predictivevalidity when predicting supervisor evaluations.

STUDY 1: THEORY AND HYPOTHESES

Interview Validity

Interviews have long been the most popular selec-tion procedure used in organizational entry (Guion,1976; Posthuma, Morgeson, & Campion, 2002). Oneof the primary goals of the interview process is togather information about applicants so that inter-viewers can identify which applicants have the great-est chances of high future performance. Yet decadesof research have suggested that, despite their wide-spread use, interviews are not very predictive of ap-plicants’ future performance. For example, inter-views appear to be less valid than work samples,cognitive ability tests, and tests of conscientiousness(Schmidt & Hunter, 1998).

One likely reason for interviewers’ low predictivevalidity is that many applicants are not forthrightabout themselves during interviews (Levashina &Campion, 2007). To the extent that an applicant onlypresents enhanced information, an interviewer isforced to base predictions on inaccurate information,which limits the validity of interviewer ratings. Ourpremise is that some applicants are motivated to bemore forthright about themselves than other appli-cants, because they wish others in their new environ-ment to understand both their capabilities and theirlimitations. Since interviewers receive more com-plete and realistic information from self-verifying ap-plicants, they should be able to make better predic-tions about the future success of these applicants.Thus, we hypothesize:

Hypothesis 1. Individuals’ self-verificationstriving moderates the validity of interviewers’evaluations in predicting future success insuch a way that interviewers’ ratings of appli-cants high in self-verification striving are morepositively related to future performance thaninterviewers’ ratings of applicants low in self-verification striving.

Work Attitudes

Many job seekers present embellished selves toobtain jobs. Unfortunately, after these individualsstart working they may find themselves bound toinauthentic identities, which leads to feelings ofisolation, hypocrisy, and dissonance (Morris &Feldman, 1996). We propose that when individualsstrive to self-verify during organizational entry,their future work attitudes should be more positivefor two reasons. First, “high self-verifiers” (peoplewhose level of self-verification is high) make itmore likely that their behaviors will match up withthe expectations they created during the hiring pro-cess with future colleagues. Research suggests thatconsistency between one’s expectations of othersand others’ actual behaviors increases trust, inter-personal attraction, and group acceptance (e.g.,Whitener, Brodt, Korsgaard, & Werner, 1998). Thus,newcomers should experience better group dynam-ics when they strove to self-verify during organiza-tional entry.

Second, high self-verifiers are more likely to lo-cate and join organizations in which their col-leagues confirm their views about themselves(Swann, 1987). Past empirical research has shownthat when people enter relationships with otherswho verify their self-views, they feel more satisfiedwith interactions with those others (Swann et al.,1994; Swann & Pelham, 2002) and experiencegreater group identification (e.g., Polzer, Milton, &Swann, 2002; Swann, Milton, & Polzer, 2000). Atthe extreme, Waterman (1990) described how per-sonal expressiveness can result in a feel of intensealiveness and an engagement that is closely relatedto peak experiences of interest and joy (also seeCsikszentmihalyi, 2003). Extending this research tothe organizational entry context, we propose thatself-verification striving enables individuals to ob-tain jobs and join employers at which they areaccepted for who they really are; such a situationresults in greater job satisfaction and organizationalcommitment.

Hypothesis 2. Compared to individuals low inself verification striving, high self-verifying in-dividuals are more likely to be (a) satisfied withthe jobs they accept and (b) committed to theorganizations they join.

STUDY 1: METHODS

Sample and Procedures

The goal of Study 1 was to examine whetherapplicants’ self-verification striving helps inter-viewers more accurately predict future success


within an organization (Hypothesis 1), and helpsjob applicants locate and join work environmentswhere they are satisfied and committed (Hypothe-sis 2). To this end, we focused on a group of indi-viduals who applied to, joined, and then graduatedfrom the MBA program of a large southeastern uni-versity. We gathered data from three sources at fourpoints in time. First, as part of the MBA admissionsprocess, applicants were interviewed and evalu-ated by one of ten school representatives (inter-viewer identity was unrelated to students’ subse-quent grade point averages). The average interviewlasted 39 minutes. We obtained the interviewerevaluations for MBA applicants from admissionsoffice records. We also acquired applicants’ back-ground data (i.e., age, sex, graduate managementadmission test [GMAT] scores, months of pre-MBAwork experience) to be used as control variables inthe analyses.

Second, 9 months after the matriculated studentshad entered the MBA program, when they werepursuing summer internships, we sent them a sur-vey assessing their self-verification striving. Thistiming seemed ideal since individuals were cur-rently engaged in self-presentation and organiza-tional entry. Of the 285 individuals to whom wesent the survey, 260 completed it (a 91% responserate). Participation was voluntary, and respondentswere entered into a drawing to win a premiereparking spot for one week.

Third, after students graduated from the MBA pro-gram, we obtained their grades from the MBA pro-gram office. The grades were coded along a tradi-tional numeric scale (i.e., 4.0 is the highest possiblegrade). We obtained grades for the entire target pop-ulation. After merging interviewers’ evaluations ofapplicants, MBA students’ demographic information,their self-verification striving scores, and their cumu-lative grade point averages (GPAs), we had a samplesize of 254 for testing Hypothesis 1.

Finally, 4 months after the MBA students hadgraduated and joined their full time employers(15 months after reporting their self-verificationstriving), we sent them a final survey. This surveymeasured the graduates’ job search success (totalnumber of interviews and total number of offers), aswell as their job satisfaction and organizationalcommitment with the firm they joined. Participa-tion was voluntary, and respondents were enteredinto a drawing to win an Apple iPod. Of the 285individuals to whom we sent the survey, 191 com-pleted it (a 67% response rate). None of the vari-ables differed significantly between those who didand did not complete this final survey (i.e., inter-viewer ratings, self-verification striving, grades,age, sex, GMAT scores, months of pre-MBA work

experience), except that white applicants wereslightly more likely to respond than nonwhite ap-plicants (p � .05). Of the individuals who com-pleted the survey, 146 (76%) had accepted full-time positions and had started working when theyreceived our survey. Thus, our complete samplesize was 146 for testing Hypotheses 2a and 2b.

Our overarching goal in timing data collection wasto follow the natural cycles in the environment wewere studying. As such, our research decisions fol-lowed the advice of George and Jones, who noted thatdata collection “should be linked to the way thatorganizational members bracket their experience tomake sense of it and derive meaning” (2000: 662).Thus, we waited until students had completed theiracademic careers as MBAs before assessing theirgrades. In terms of job satisfaction and organizationalcommitment, we waited until people had worked intheir new environment long enough to learn about it,form relationships, and have a sense of their fit intothe new environment. For this reason, we followedpast organizational entry research that has suggestedapproximately three months as a period that shouldallow the entry process to reveal itself. As Bauer,Morrison, and Callister noted in their review, “Au-thors often use 3-month intervals to measure social-ization-related variables, especially outcome mea-sures” (1998: 156).

Measures

Self-verification striving. Given that the existingliterature has assumed self verification to be con-stant across individuals, we could find no studiesthat measured differences in people’s self-verifica-tion striving. To create a measurement scale of thisconstruct, we first generated 16 items using a de-ductive item-generation approach (Hinkin, 1998)based on the existing conceptualization of self-ver-ification striving as presented in the literature (e.g.,“It’s worth it to be truthful with others about myhabits and personality so that they know what toexpect from me”). The response scale ranged from1,“strongly disagree,” to 7, “strongly agree.” Wegave the survey to 265 MBA students of a largesoutheastern university who were all searching forinternships (none of whom were part of our mainstudy). The surveys were handed out in a class, andcompletion was optional.

One hundred thirty-seven MBA students com-pleted the scale (a 52% response rate). On the basisof exploratory factor analysis results, we elimi-nated self-verification striving items that demon-strated low (� � .40) factor loadings. We then elim-inated items that had similar item roots to avoidspurious high reliability (e.g., several items started


with “When interviewing for a job . . .”). We re-tained equal numbers of items focused on generalself-verification striving and work-oriented selfverification striving to ensure adequate represen-tation of the construct, although a comparison ofthe one- and two-factor models using LISREL 8.8indicated a unidimensional construct rather thantwo separate constructs (�2[20] � 31.73 vs.�2[19] � 26.29). The fit statistics of the one-factormodel indicated good model fit (Browne & Cu-deck, 1993; Hu & Bentler, 1999)1 (NFI � .91,IFI � .97, TLI � .95, CFI � .96, RMSEA � .07,SRMR � .06).

For Study 1, we used the resulting eight-itemscale shown in Table 1 to measure self-verification

striving. We used a response scale ranging from 1,“strongly disagree,” to 5,“strongly agree,” and thecoefficient alpha (�) was .85, suggesting robustnessto different response scales. The eight-item scaleresulted in a single factor with all loadings above.50 (average loading � .65), and the fit statisticsfrom the one-factor model again indicated that theone-factor model fit the data reasonably well (e.g.,fit statistics of the one-factor model were NFI � .95,IFI � .97, TLI � .96, CFI � .97, RMSEA � .09,SRMR � .05). Finally, we again examined the di-mensionality of the eight-item scale to ascertainwhether or not work-oriented self-verificationstriving is independent from general self-verifica-tion striving. The difference between the chi-squarefit statistic of the one-factor model of self-verifica-tion and a two-factor model (�2[20] � 105.10;�2[19] � 101.58; ��2[1] � 3.52) did not exceed thecritical chi-square-value (�2[.001, 1] � 10.83), sup-porting a one-factor solution.

Interviewer evaluations. To assess interviewerevaluations, we gathered interviewer ratings fromthe school’s records. Each applicant was evaluatedon four core competencies: communication skills,professional drive, teamwork experience, and abil-ity to accomplish goals. Interviewer ratings of eachcompetency ranged from 1,“unacceptable,” to 5,“exceptional” (top 2%). We used these competencyratings to create a four-item measure of generalinterviewer assessment (� � .75).

Job satisfaction. We measured graduates’ full-time job satisfaction with the three-item scale usedby Edwards and Rothbard (1999) that describesoverall satisfaction with the job (e.g., “All in all, thejob I have is great”). The response format was a

1 Although theory suggests self-verification striving isa considerably more focused construct than authenticity,we examined this relationship empirically. Specifically,we examined responses to the self-verification strivingscale relative to responses to Wood and colleagues’(2008) authenticity scale, which captured the three do-mains of authenticity (self-alienation, authentic living,and accepting external influence). We administeredthese scales to 171 undergraduate students at a South-eastern business school in the United States. Respon-dents averaged 21 years old, and 62 percent were male.As expected, the subfactor with the largest statisticallinkage with the self-verification striving scale was “au-thentic living” (r � .51, p � .01). The correlation ofself-verification striving with self-alienation was –.20(p � .01), and the correlation of self-verification strivingwith “accepting external influence” was –.01 (p � .05).These results confirm that although authenticity and self-verification striving share some conceptual overlap, au-thenticity is considerably broader in meaning, and eventhe most closely related construct is far from unity.

TABLE 1Self-Verification Striving Items and Factor Loadings across Four Studies

Item

Pilot 1 Study 1 Study 2

n � 137 n � 254 n � 146 n � 208 n � 99

1 It’s worth it to be truthful with others about my habits and personalityso that they know what they expect from me.

.68 .77 .73 .67 .78

2 For me it’s better to be honest about myself when meeting newpeople, even if it makes me appear less than ideal.

.53 .79 .73 .79 .83

3 It’s important for an employer to see me as I see myself, even if itmeans bringing people to recognize my limitations.

.67 .67 .72 .67 .81

4 When interviewing for a job, I try to be honest about my personalityand work style.

.62 .68 .69 .55 .78

5 I like to be myself rather than trying to act like someone I’m not. .55 .64 .62 .61 .696 I’d rather have people know who I really am than have them expect

too much out of me..42 .62 .67 .58 .75

7 I’d be willing to take a little less pay in order to work with peoplewho know who I am and what to expect from me.

.41 .55 .54 .53 .49

8 When looking for a job, I work hard to find a place where people willaccept me for who I am.

.52 .51 .48 .38 .45


seven-point scale ranging from 1 � “strongly dis-agree,” to 7 � “strongly agree,” and the coefficientalpha of the scale was .91.

We measured organizational commitment with aten-item affective commitment scale used by Jones(1986) describing feelings of personal attachment toan organization (e.g., “I talk up this organization tomy friends as a great organization to work for”; 1,“strongly disagree,” to 7, “strongly agree”; � � .81).

STUDY 1: ANALYSES AND RESULTS

The means, standard deviations, correlations,and reliability estimates for the Study 1 variablesare displayed in Table 2. We used LISREL 8.8 toconduct a confirmatory factor analysis of all theitems representing our measured constructs (inter-viewer evaluations, self-verification striving, jobsatisfaction, and organizational commitment). Re-sults suggested a reasonably good fit of the overallmeasurement model (NFI � .86, IFI � .93,NNFI � .92, CFI � .93, RMSEA � .07, SRMR � .08),indicating that the measures were suitable forour study.

To examine whether interviewers can better pre-dict future performance when applicant self verifi-cation is high (rather than low), we used hierarchi-cal moderated regression analyses. To providebetter estimates of the hypothesized variables, wefirst input the control variables (i.e., sex, race,scores on the GMAT, and previous employment)because these variables are related to GPA (Bowers,1970). Next, we entered individuals’ self-verifica-

tion striving scores and the interviewer evalua-tions, followed by the interaction of the two. Beforecomputing the interaction term, we centered theself verification striving scores and the interviewerevaluations (Aiken & West, 1991).

Table 3 reports the results for the moderatedregression analyses, where the outcome variable iscumulative GPA. As shown in Table 3, the interac-tion variable was a significant predictor of GPA(p � .05). We plotted the slope of the interactionone standard deviation above and below the mean(see Figure 1) and tested whether each simple slopewas statistically significant (Aiken & West, 1991).Results were consistent with the theoretical predic-tions: when applicant self-verification striving washigh, interviewers’ evaluations were positively re-lated to cumulative GPA (� � .20, p � .05, two-tailed test). When applicant self-verification striv-ing was low, interviewers’ evaluations wereunrelated to cumulative GPA (� � –.07, p � .05,two-tailed test). These results support Hypothesis1, indicating that interviewers can better predictapplicants’ future performance when applicantself-verification striving is high rather than low.

There are two issues to think about when consid-ering these results. First, the field study nature ofthis investigation led to range restriction of somevariables. Many applicants who received low inter-view ratings or low GMAT scores were not selectedand thus were not available for analysis in thestudy. For example, GMAT percentage was lowerand more distributed in the full sample than thesample we analyzed (full sample: mean � 80.9%,

TABLE 2Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations, Study 1a

Variable Mean s.d. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Background (n � 254)1. Sex (male �1) 0.73 0.442. GMAT score 86.60 11.21 .16**3. Previous employmentb 62.35 30.97 .11 .024. Self-verification striving 4.01 0.55 �.03 �.11 .05 .855. Interviewer rating 3.59 0.57 .00 �.05 .15* .14* .756. MBA grade point average 3.27 0.24 .04 .32** .11 .03 .08

Job search (n � 191)7. Numbers of job offers 1.89 1.35 �.05 �.19** �.09 �.06 .12 �.018. Offers/interviews 0.37 0.30 �.18* �.07 �.14 .01 .18* .24** .32**

Postentry (n � 146)9. Job satisfaction 6.15 0.89 .06 .00 �.05 .20* .01 .17* .03 .14 .91

10. Organization commitment 5.24 0.83 .04 .12 .01 .19* �.02 .30** �.09 .20* .66** .81

a Reliabilities are presented on the diagonal in italic. We did not include applicant race in the correlation matrix because none of theseven categories were significantly related to self-verification striving or to the outcome variables.

b In months.* p � .05

** p � .01


s.d. � 16.5%; final sample: mean � 86.6%,s.d. � 11.2%). Likewise, the interviewer evalua-tions were lower and more distributed in the fullsample than the sample we analyzed (full sample:mean � 3.40, s.d. � .79; final sample: mean � 3.59,s.d. � .57). Although range restriction is a naturalelement of selection decisions and reflects the ex-ternal validity of our study, it means our results forinterviewer evaluations are conservative, and itmakes it difficult to directly compare the predictivevalidities of self-verification striving with GMATscores.

Second, results suggested that the interactionterm accounted for an additional 2 percent of thevariance in grade point average. Clearly, there are

many other (unmeasured) variables that affect stu-dents’ success in the program, although a change inR2 of .02 is a reasonable effect size for an interactionanalysis (Aguinis, Beaty, Boik, & Pierce, 2005), andinteractions explaining as little as 1 percent of thevariance may be important (Evans, 1985). The over-all goal in the present study was not to demonstratelarge effect sizes, but to show that the significanttrend of results matches the predictions from self-verification theory.

In the next analysis, we used hierarchical regres-sion to examine whether individuals’ self-verifica-tion striving predicted future satisfaction with theirfull-time jobs and commitment to their future em-ployers. As shown in Table 4, we again entered the

TABLE 3Self-Verification Striving and Interviewer Ability to Predict Grade Point Averagea

Predictors

Grade Point Average Grade Point Average: Hypothesis 1

� p � p

Control variablesSex (male � 1) �.04 .57 �.02 .76Black/African American .10 .17 .10 .17Asian .02 .73 .02 .77Hispanic �.01 .93 .00 .96Multiracial �.03 .64 �.03 .57White/Caucasian .25 .01* .24 .01*Did not report race .04 .65 .05 .56Previous employmentb .10 .09 .09 .13GMAT score .36 .00** .34 .00**

Hypothesized variablesSelf-verification striving (SVS) .07 .26 .05 .46Interviewer evaluation .06 .29 .04 .48SVS � interviewer evaluation .15 .01*

Model R2 .18** .20**�R2 due to interaction .02*

a n � 254.b In months.

* p � .05** p � .01

FIGURE 1Study 1: Simple Slopes


control variables (i.e., sex, race, GMAT scores, andprevious employment) because people’s work atti-tudes may depend on their demographic character-istics and “human capital” (Judge, Cable, Boud-reau, & Bretz, 1995). We also controlled for thenumber of job offers obtained, because individuals’labor market alternatives when choosing jobs canaffect job satisfaction and organizational commit-ment (O’Reilly & Caldwell, 1981). In support ofHypotheses 2a and 2b, results revealed that self-verification striving positively and significantlypredicted future job satisfaction and organizationalcommitment (both p � .05).

Although our investigation focused on the effectsof self-verification striving over the long run oforganizational entry, it also is interesting to exam-ine whether self-verification striving hurts or helpsapplicants in the short run of being offered a job.This is an open question because two countervail-ing processes may exist. On one hand, applicantswho self-verify may be less likely to self-promoteand appear less desirable than other applicants bycomparison. On the other hand, being realisticabout personal limitations may help build authen-tic relationships with interviewers and promoterapport. Thus, we examined two outcomes that of-fer insight into how self-verification striving affectsjob search success: total number of job offers re-ceived, and applicants’ conversion ratio of inter-views to job offers (i.e., total offers received/totalinterviews). Controlling for the other variables in

Table 4, we found no significant relationship be-tween self-verification striving and job searchsuccess (for total number of job offers received,� � –.06, p � .42; for conversion ratio, � � .06,p � .40). These results suggest that although self-verification striving seems to help over the courseof organizational entry, in the short run it does notappear to interfere with job offers.

STUDY 1: DISCUSSION

Study 1 demonstrated that differences in self-verification striving have meaningful effects on theorganizational entry process—that is, the validityof interviewers’ predictions and job seekers’ abilityto find satisfying work. However, Study 1 focusedon MBA students and graduates, raising questionsabout the generalizability of the self-verificationstriving construct outside the MBA environment.Even more importantly, although Study 1 offeredsome evidence for the predictive validity of self-verification striving relative to other applicantcharacteristics (e.g., GMAT scores, work experi-ence), it did not establish the convergent and dis-criminant validity of self-verification striving rela-tive to other conceptually related constructs. InStudy 2, we addressed these issues by first exam-ining self-verification striving relative to relatedself-focused constructs. Then, we examined howself-verification striving is related to organizationalentry and newcomer performance in an interna-

TABLE 4Self-Verification Striving and Future Work Attitudesa

Predictors

Job Satisfaction: Hypothesis 2a Organizational Commitment: Hypothesis 2b

� p � p

Control variablesSex (male � 1) .06 .52 .03 .74Black/African American �.04 .74 �.09 .39Asian .00 .96 �.02 .79Hispanic .02 .87 �.07 .53Multiracial .06 .52 �.03 .69White/Caucasian �.08 .64 �.24 .13Did not report race �.07 .64 �.09 .50Previous employmentb �.09 .27 �.04 .59GMAT score �.05 .67 �.01 .90MBA grade point average .22 .02* .35 .00**Number of job offers .02 .81 �.10 .23

Hypothesized variableSelf-verification striving .19 .03* .18 .03*

Model R2 .09 .16

a n � 146.b In months.

* p � .05** p � .01


tional sample of job applicants for teaching posi-tions in the United States.

STUDY 2: THEORY AND HYPOTHESES

A critical component of construct validation isshowing the discriminant and convergent validity ofa focal construct relative to related constructs, some-times referred to as a nomological net (Cook & Camp-bell, 1979). In other words, one way to understand aconstruct is to examine whether it fits a predictedpattern of relationships between established con-structs. In Study 2, we first examined the conceptuallinkages of self-verification striving with self-moni-toring, self-disclosure, and core self-evaluations. Wethen examined the relationship between self-verifica-tion striving and newcomers’ postentry success aftercontrolling for these constructs.

Self-Monitoring

Self-verification striving is conceptually relatedto self-monitoring, since the fundamental postulateof self-monitoring theory is that “people differmeaningfully in the extent to which they can anddo engage in expressive control” (Gangestad & Sny-der, 2000: 530). Compared to individuals low inself-monitoring, high self-monitors are more awareof and responsive to cues of situationally appropri-ate performances, and they also believe that theyhave greater ability to act in ways that impress andentertain people, depending on the situation (John,Cheek, & Klohnen, 1996; Snyder, 1974, 1979).Thus, both high self-verifiers and low self-monitorsshould focus more on internal than external cueswhen deciding how to act (Snyder, 1974). In fact,self-monitoring has been conceptualized as a mea-sure of self-promotion in past research. In theirmeta-analysis, Day, Schleicher, Unckless, andHiller noted: “At the core of the self monitoringconstruct are individual differences in the propen-sity for impression management involving the con-struction of positive social appearances (Gangestad& Snyder, 2000). A goal of impression managementis to positively influence evaluations of oneself andto win approval from others” (2002: 390).

Conceptually, then, self-verification strivingshould be negatively related to self-monitoring, al-though we expect the negative relationship to bemoderate for two reasons. First, self-monitoringtheory focuses on whether people believe they pos-sess the skills to diagnose and respond to socialcontexts (Snyder & Gangestad, 1986), while self-verification striving focuses on preserving one’sself-concept regardless of context. It is thereforefeasible to be high in self-verification striving and

high in self-monitoring (a man may, for example,know what behaviors a situation demands but in-tentionally presents himself in line with his self-image). Second, even though the self monitoringscale appears to capture a single dimension (Day etal., 2002; Gangestad & Snyder, 2000), many itemsfocus on individuals’ ability to act and entertainothers (e.g., “I have considered being an enter-tainer”), which are orthogonal to self-verificationstriving. Accordingly, we expected self-monitoringand self-verification striving to be negatively re-lated but independent constructs.

Self-Disclosure

Self-disclosure has been conceptualized as anyinformation about her- or himself that a personcommunicates to another person—including de-scriptive and evaluative information—to foster be-longing and intimacy (Collins & Miller, 1994; Jou-rard, 1958). Conceptually, self-disclosure should bepositively related to self-verification striving, sinceboth pertain to sharing personal information. How-ever, self-disclosure is motivated by the develop-ment of close relationships, and self verification ismotivated by a desire to maintain a coherent senseof self and to increase social predictability (Swann& Ely, 1984). From this perspective, self-disclosureis necessary but not sufficient for self-verification,since disclosed information is not necessarily trueand does not necessarily include negative informa-tion. For example, an individual high in self-dis-closure may frequently tell others about his posi-tive characteristics (even those that he does notactually possess). Accordingly, we expect self-dis-closure and self-verification striving to be posi-tively related but independent constructs.

Core Self-Evaluations

Core self-evaluations refer to people’s global ap-praisals of their worthiness, effectiveness, and ca-pability (Judge, Erez, Bono, & Thoresen, 2003). Thekey insight of self-verification theory is that peoplepromote the survival of their self-views even whenthe views are negative, suggesting that core self-evaluations and self-verification striving should beorthogonal. However, past research suggests that itmay be important to control for core self-evalua-tions when examining self-verification striving,since people with low core self-evaluations are lesslikely to present their self-views on specific dimen-sions than are people with high global self-esteem(Bernichon, Cook, & Brown, 2003). In fact, insteadof exposing themselves to the possibility of rejec-tion or criticism, many people with low core self-


evaluations adopt a self-protective approach to life(Baumeister, Tice, & Hutton, 1989). This stream ofresearch implies that self-verification striving andcore self-evaluations should be positively relatedbut independent constructs.

Effects of Self-Verification Striving on NewcomerPerformance

We theorize that, in analyses controlling for theconstructs described above, newcomers will dem-onstrate greater postentry performance when theystrive to self-verify. We conceptualize newcomerperformance both in terms of effectiveness on thejob and citizenship behaviors (i.e., prosocial actsnot specified by a job description that benefit or-ganization as opposed to individual). There arethree main reasons why job effectiveness should begreater when people strive to self-verify. First, ifindividuals do not promise what they cannot de-liver in terms of their skills and abilities, they aremore likely to be selected into jobs they are actuallysuited to perform. In other words, high self-verifi-ers’ signals are less noisy than low self-verifiers’signals, resulting in less problematic selection de-cisions and greater ability to perform.

Second, high self-verifying job applicants shouldpresent a realistic depiction of who they are andwhat can be expected of them. Accordingly, afterentering an organization, these individuals can in-vest more of their energy in their jobs and lessenergy trying to live up to a false expectation theycreated. As Grandey (2003: 89) noted, when peopletry to display a self that is not true to themselves,they create a sense of “alienation from oneself”which increases emotional exhaustion and uses upcognitive resources that could have been focusedon job performance.

Finally, high self-verifiers are more likely to joinorganizations that reflect their own personal valuesand goals, or what Swann and colleagues (2004)referred to as a “self-verifying opportunity structure.”This process also is consistent with Schneider’s(1987) attraction-selection-attrition model, whichsuggests that people and organizations are attracted toone another on the basis of value and goal similarity.Logically, the attraction-selection-attrition cycleshould be particularly robust for high self-verifiers,since they place heavy emphasis on understandingand vocalizing their personal values in new settings.For example, high self-verifiers are less likely to pre-tend to hold values that fit an organization’s culturejust to get a job, and they are more likely to give moreinformation that interviewers can use to deselectthem if they do not match the organization’s core

values and goals (Cable & Judge, 1997; Chatman,1991). As a result, self-verification striving shouldincrease value and goal congruence between employ-ees and employers.

When individuals join organizations that reflecttheir personal values and goals, they find the workmore personally meaningful and intrinsically mo-tivating (e.g., Bono & Judge, 2003; Kahn, 1990; Ra-faeli & Sutton, 1987). This is because intrinsic re-wards (such as self-expression) increase thechances that people attribute their behavior to in-ternal causes, which increases commitment to acourse of action (Shamir, House, & Arthur, 1993).As Kahn noted, “People have dimensions of them-selves that, given appropriate conditions, they pre-fer to use and express in the course of role perfor-mances. To employ such dimensions is to drivepersonal energies into physical, cognitive, andemotional labors” (1990: 700). Thus, we predictthat self-verification striving leads to greater con-gruence between personal and organizational val-ues and goals, which ultimately should result inbetter job performance.

We also theorize that high self-verifiers should bemore likely to engage in organizational citizenshipbehaviors following organizational entry. First, re-search has shown that when members bring the restof their group to see them as they see themselves,they are more likely to feel recognized and under-stood, and the social integration of the group in-creases (Swann et al., 2000). Since high self-verifi-ers work harder to make others see them for whothey really are, they should feel more integrated intheir groups than low self-verifiers, which in turnshould improve group cooperation and increasehelping behaviors (Swann et al., 2004).

Second, as suggested above, self-verifying indi-viduals should be more likely to obtain and acceptpersonally meaningful roles where they identifywith the broader organizational values and goals.Congruent objectives, in turn, make it more likelythat employees do what is best for the organizationwithout close monitoring, because individuals aremore likely to understand and personally believe inthe collective’s objectives (e.g., Ouchi, 1980). Thus,research has shown that value congruence betweenemployees and employers increases trust and good-will (e.g., Enz, 1988) and is related to citizenshipbehaviors (Edwards & Cable, 2009). To the extentthat self-verification striving results in greatervalue and goal congruence, high self-verifiersshould both (1) better understand what behaviorsare most important to helping their employer, evenwhen the behaviors go above and beyond a formaljob description, and (2) experience greater intrinsicmotivation to perform those behaviors.


Thus, we predict:

Hypothesis 3. With self-monitoring, self-disclo-sure, and core self-evaluations controlled, in-dividuals who strive to self-verify during organ-izational entry are more likely to be evaluatedpositively by their supervisors in terms of (a)job performance, and (b) citizenship behaviors.

STUDY 2: METHODS

Sample and Procedures

Our second study focused on a group of interna-tional job seekers who sent their application mate-rials to a clearinghouse whose mission it is tomatch international teachers to school districts inthe United States of America. We gathered data forStudy 2 from five sources at three points in time,and we again based the timing of our data collec-tion on the way that organizational membersbracket their experience (George & Jones, 2000).

First, we acquired from the clearinghouse appli-cants’ background data (i.e., age, sex, previous in-ternational exchange experience) to be used as con-trol variables in the analyses.

Second, immediately after completing the clear-inghouse application process, applicants receivedan e-mail with a link to our survey, where theyreported their self-verification striving, self-disclo-sure, self-monitoring, and core self-evaluations. Re-spondents also reported their conscientiousness,which we used as a control variable in the analyses,since research has shown conscientiousness to be apredictor of job performance (Barrick & Mount,1991), and conscientiousness could be correlatedwith self-verification striving. Participation in thesurvey was voluntary, and applicants were in-formed that their responses would not be used inplacement decisions.

Of the 5,221 applicants who applied, 2,419 com-pleted our survey (a 46% response rate). The averagerespondent was 41 years old; 64 percent were female;and 3 percent of respondents had previous interna-tional teaching experience. In terms of the GLOBEcultural groupings (Javidan, Stahl, Brodbeck, & Wil-derom, 2005), 28 percent of respondents were LatinAmerican, 21 percent were Asian, 16 percent wereAnglo (outside Europe), 6 percent were African, 6percent were Anglo (inside Europe), 6 percent wereLatin European, and 5 percent were Germanic Euro-pean. Additionally, 10 percent of respondents werefrom the Caribbean region.

Third, of the 2,419 applicants who completed ourtime 1 survey, 508 were matched by the clearing-house with a school and a teaching position. Three

months after they began employment (18 months af-ter completing the applicant survey), we sent eachteacher a survey on which they again reported theirself-verification. Participation in the survey was vol-untary; we randomly selected two respondents toreceive $35.00 gift certificates, and 236 teachers com-pleted surveys (a 47% response rate). None of theteacher variables differed significantly between thosewho did and did not complete this second survey(i.e., sex, previous exchange experience, core self-evaluation, self-monitoring, self-disclosure, self-veri-fication striving), except that older teachers wereslightly more likely to respond than younger teachers(mean � 37.6 vs. 39.3; p � .05).

Finally, we sent a survey to each teacher’s prin-cipal to obtain measures of job performance andcitizenship behaviors. We e-mailed a link to anelectronic survey nine months after principals be-gan their employment relationship with the teach-ers, just as they were completing their academicyear. We also mailed a paper copy of the survey tononrespondents after one week. The timing of thissurvey follows the way organizational membersbracket their experience, because after one aca-demic year principals must evaluate the teachersand decide whether to try to hire them again thefollowing year. Participation in the survey was vol-untary. Two hundred eight of 508 principals re-sponded, for a 41 percent response rate.

Measures

For all the measures below, the response formatwas on a scale ranging from 1, “strongly disagree,”to 7, “strongly agree.”

Self-verification striving. We used the sameeight-item scale used in Study 1 to measure self-verification striving. The coefficient alpha of thescale was .77 at time 1 and .85 at time 2; the test-retest reliability (r) over 18 months was .59, whichcompares favorably to the 12 month test-retest re-liability of .55 revealed in Roberts and DelVec-chio’s (2000) meta-analysis of dispositional (e.g.,enduring, cross-situational) variables.

Conscientiousness. To measure applicant con-scientiousness, we used Goldberg’s (1992) ten-itemadjectives scale for the Big 5 personality traits (e.g.,achievement-oriented, efficient, organized). Thecoefficient alpha was .68.

Self-monitoring. We measured self-monitoringwith the 18-item Self-Monitoring Scale (Snyder &Gangestad, 1986). Sample items include “I canmake impromptu speeches on topics about which Ihave almost no information” and “I would proba-bly make a good actor.” The coefficient alpha of the


scale was .73, which is consistent with past re-search that shows average reliabilities to be in the.68–.70 range (e.g., Day et al., 2002).

Self-disclosure. We measured self-disclosurewith the five-item positively worded self-disclo-sure scale (Goldberg et al., 2006; “I am open aboutmy feelings”; � � .81).

Core self-evaluation. We used the 12-item CoreSelf-Evaluations Scale (Judge et al., 2003; “I com-plete tasks successfully”; � � .79).

Job performance. We used Welbourne, Johnson,and Erez’s (1998) four-item scale for in-role jobperformance (e.g., “This teacher performs the tasksthat are expected as part of the job”; � � .97).

Citizenship behaviors. We used Welbourne andcolleagues’ (1998) 13-item scale of extra-role behav-ior (e.g., “This teacher volunteers to do things forthis organization”; � � .97).

STUDY 2: ANALYSES AND RESULTS

To cross-validate the self-verification strivingscale in a non-MBA sample, we first used LISREL8.8 to examine the fit of the eight-item, one-factormeasurement model (Jöreskog & Sörbom, 1996).The fit statistics indicated a good fit between theone-factor model and the data (NFI � .96, IFI � .98,NNFI � .98, CFI � .98, RMSEA � .06, SRMR � .05),and a two-factor solution (with work and generalself-verification) offered no improvement in fit(��2[1] � .06). We also used LISREL 8.8 to conducta confirmatory factor analysis and examine the fit

of the entire measurement model, including boththe predictors and outcomes (self-verification striv-ing, conscientiousness, core self-evaluation, self-disclosure, self-monitoring, job performance, andorganizational citizenship behaviors). Results sug-gested a reasonably good fit of the overall measure-ment model (NFI � .83, IFI � .92, NNFI � .92,CFI � .92, RMSEA � .06, SRMR � .09), indicatingthat the measures were suitable for our study.

Convergent and Discriminant Validity

The means, standard deviations, correlations, andreliability estimates for the Study 2 variables are dis-played in Table 5. Results show that, as expected,self-verification striving correlated positively withself-disclosure (r � .44, p � .01) and core self-evalu-ations (r � .40, p � .01) and correlated negativelywith self-monitoring (r � –.26, p � .01). Although thecorrelation between self-verification striving and self-monitoring was significant, it was relatively small inabsolute terms, which could be due in part to the lowreliability of the scale(s). We also ran a multiple re-gression in which the outcome was self-verificationstriving and the predictors were self-disclosure, coreself-evaluations, self-monitoring, and conscientious-ness. Although all predictors except conscientious-ness were significant (all p � .001), the R2 was .32,suggesting that the conceptually related constructsdid not account for the majority of the variance inself-verification striving. These results providesome evidence for the convergent and discrimi-

TABLE 5Means, Standard Deviations, and Correlations, Study 2a

Variables Mean s.d. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

Job application measures1. Age 38.42 9.082. Sex (male � 1) 0.25 0.44 .083. Exchange experience 0.08 0.28 .19** .074. Hired 0.96 0.20 �.06 �.09 .065. Core self-evaluation 5.69 0.68 �.02 �.12 .01 .02 .796. Self-monitoring 3.71 0.67 �.09 .16* .16* .09 �.04 .737. Self-disclosure 4.89 0.98 �.10 �.07 .02 .10 .32** �.12 .818. Conscientiousness 5.83 0.62 .02 �.24** .10 �.02 .49** �.03 .13 .689. Self-verification 5.82 0.72 .11 .00 �.08 .02 .40** �.26** .44** .26** .77

Supervisor evaluations10. Work performance 5.81 1.48 �.14* �.14* .04 �.02 .02 �.12 .02 �.01 .20** .9711. Citizenship behaviors 5.02 1.35 �.12 �.12 .08 .06 �.03 �.04 �.03 �.02 .12 .79 .97

Employee self-verification12. Self-verification 5.75 0.91 .12 .20* �.09 .09 .10 �.21* .32** �.04 .59** .31** .28** .85

a Reliabilities are presented on the diagonal in italic. n � 208, except for postentry self-verification, where n � 99.* p � .05

** p � .01


nant validity of self-verification relative to theother related constructs.2

Predictive Validity

We used regression analyses to examine the va-lidity of self-verification striving in predicting su-pervisory evaluations after 9 months on the job. Weexamined self-verification striving both as it wasreported when respondents were job applicants

(about 22 months prior to the supervisory evalua-tions) and when they were employees (about6 months prior to the supervisory evaluations). Weinput control variables (i.e., age, sex, previous in-ternational exchange experience, and conscien-tiousness) to provide better estimates of self-verifi-cation striving. We also included the otherconceptually related individual differences (i.e.,core self-evaluation, self-monitoring, self-disclo-sure) to examine the incremental predictive valid-ity of self-verification striving. As shown in Table6, after the controls and the other self-related con-structs had been entered, both preentry and posten-try self-verification striving positively and signifi-cantly predicted newcomers’ work performanceand citizenship behaviors. Thus, Hypotheses 3aand 3b were supported.3

2 We initially did not collect data on individuals’ pro-clivities to self-enhance, because it was unclear if thereshould be a significant relationship with self-verificationstriving. On one hand, self-enhancement might be nega-tively related to self-verification striving, since it is dif-ficult to promote the survival of your self-conceptionwhen you are exaggerating your strengths. On the otherhand, low self-verification striving does not imply highself-enhancement (a person who is uninterested in tell-ing others who he really is would not necessarily exag-gerate his strengths; and even if you do not exaggerateyour strengths, you are not logically required to commu-nicate your weaknesses). We used the sample describedin footnote 1 to examine this issue empirically. We ad-ministered our eight-item scale of self-verification striv-ing, Kumar and Beyerlein’s four-item self-promotionscale (� � .79), and Levashina and Campion’s (2007)four-item image embellishment scale (� � .76). Resultsrevealed that the correlation between self-verificationstriving and image enhancement was –.21 (p � .01), andthe correlation between self-verification striving and self-promotion was –.03 (n.s.). These results suggest low tomoderately negative relationships between self-promo-tion and self-verification striving.

3 Given that our data are nested, with multiple respon-dents being nested within cultures, it is important todiagnose the degree to which the nonindependence isproblematic. To examine the effects of cultural groupingson our dependent variables, we created eight culturalcategories based on the findings of the GLOBE Project(Javidan et al., 2005). We then estimated two separateunconditional means models to provide informationabout how much variation in the dependent variables(employee performance and citizenship behaviors) laywithin cultural grouping and how much lay betweencultural groupings. In each model, our hypothesized pre-dictor was applicant self-verification striving, and wecontrolled for applicant gender, exchange experience,core self-evaluation, self-monitoring, self-disclosure, andconscientiousness. Variance in the dependent variable

TABLE 6Study 2 Supervisor Evaluations Nine Months after Organizational Entrya

Predictors

Preentry Self-Verification Postentry Self-Verification

Job Performance Citizenship Behaviors Job Performance Citizenship Behaviors

� p � p � p � p

Control variablesAge �.21 .00** �.18 .01* �.18 .10 �.06 .57Sex (male � 1) �.16 .03* �.15 .04* �.18 .08 �.10 .33Exchange experience �.14 .06 .16 .03* .15 .17 .17 .12Core self-evaluation �.05 .56 �.07 .42 �.10 .39 �.06 .60Self-monitoring �.07 .32 �.02 .82 �.13 .19 �.07 .51Self-disclosure �.13 .09 �.14 .07 .02 .85 �.06 .57Conscientiousness �.10 .22 �.08 .31 �.19 .08 �.14 .22

Hypothesized variableSelf-verification .32 .00** .26 .00** .35 .00** .33 .00**

Model R2 .12 .09 .20 .13

a n � 208 for preentry self-verification and n � 99 for postentry self-verification.* p � .05

** p � .01


Although we focused our study on the long runof organizational entry, we again examinedwhether self-verification striving hurt or helped ap-plicants in the short run of job search success.Thus, we coded applicants in terms of whether ornot they were matched to a school. After control-ling for the other variables in Table 6, we found thatresults again revealed a null relationship betweenself-verification striving and job placement(� � .01, n.s., n � 2,419). These results confirmwith a new, international sample that although self-verification striving seems to help over the courseof organizational entry, it does not appear to ham-per applicants’ ability to attain job offers.

GENERAL DISCUSSION

Organizational entry represents a strong situationin the sense that it encourages most people to pres-ent an unrealistically positive version of them-selves. In the long run, however, it can be problem-atic when a person pretends to be someone she orhe is not. Our perspective is that despite the strongsituational demands created by the organizationalentry process, some people place even greater valueon bringing others to see them as they see them-selves and are motivated to communicate both theircapabilities and their limitations despite the poten-tial costs.

This logic, combined with our results from twostudies, suggests an individual differences ap-proach to self-verification striving. This perspec-tive represents an important contribution becauseto date, an assumption in the self-verification liter-ature has been that self-verification is a humanneed and that all individuals are equally motivatedto self-verify. Although some past research has ex-amined when self-verification is more likely to oc-cur (e.g., people are more likely to self-verify traitsthey are confident about [Chen, Chen, & Shaw,2004; Swann et al., 2003]), no research has exam-ined whether people differ in their motivation toself-verify in the first place. An individual differ-ences approach to self-verification striving is usefulbecause it allows theory development about suc-cessful entry into new social settings. This ap-proach also shows the power and robust applica-bility of self-verification theory, even in surprisingcontexts generally assumed to operate according tothe logic of self-promotion.

Our initial results confirmed that differences inself-verification striving predicted the fundamentaloutcomes of organizational entry. First, interview-ers were able to make better predictions about thefuture success of applicants who reported higherself-verification striving. Next, high self-verifyingjob applicants found work that resulted in greaterjob satisfaction and organizational commitment af-ter entry. In a different sample of international jobapplicants, self-verification striving predicted new-comers’ work performance as reported by their su-pervisors at the conclusion of their first year ofwork. Moreover, self-verification striving predictednewcomers’ performance after core self-evalua-tions, self-monitoring, self-disclosure, and consci-entiousness had been controlled for, suggesting theunique value and predictive validity of the self-verification striving construct.

Strengths, Limitations, and Future Directions

One strength of this research is integrating self-verification theory into the organizational entrycontext. Most existing self-verification research hasfocused on dyadic interactions in lab studies,roommate selections, spouse relationships, andsmall team formation (for reviews, see Swann et al.[2003] and Swann et al. [2004]). However, self-verification theory clearly is relevant in the organ-izational entry context, and it provides an impor-tant conceptual balance to a literature in whichself-enhancement theory is the prevalent theoreti-cal perspective (e.g., Ellis, West, Ryan, & DeShon,2002; Higgins & Judge, 2004). Moreover, organiza-tional entry is a situation that is well known forcausing even the most humble individuals to pres-ent an unrealistically positive version of their self-conceptions, therefore offering a conservative testof the power of self-verification theory.

A second strength of this research is that, to testour hypotheses, we developed and validated a mea-sure of self-verification striving. Our results fromuse of this scale suggested that self-verificationstriving is a meaningful, unique construct that var-ies between individuals and is consistent over timewithin individuals. With a test-retest reliability of.59 over 18 months, people’s responses to our self-verification striving scale were more consistentover time than responses to many other personalitytraits have been found to be (Roberts & DelVecchio,2000). Finally, results provided evidence for theindependent position of self-verification strivingrelative to other constructs in the construct’s nomo-logical network (e.g., self-monitoring, self-disclo-sure, core self-evaluations), and also demonstratedthe scale’s predictive and discriminate validity.

that could be attributed to cultural grouping was esti-mated to be zero for both dependent variables, suggestingthat group membership does not bias our results (Bliese &Hanges, 2004).


Hopefully, other researchers can use and build onthis scale as they investigate individuals’ entry intonew social environments.

Our methodology represents a final strength ofthe research. To help rule out alternative explana-tions for results, such as priming or mood effects,we gathered different types of data from multiplesources at different times. For example, in Study 1we combined archival records of interviewers’ rat-ings with applicants’ reports of their self-verifica-tion striving, and we predicted their cumulativeacademic performance and work attitudestwo years later. In Study 2, we used applicants’self-verification striving scores to predict supervi-sors’ evaluations of their performance 18 monthsafter reporting their self-verification striving. In ad-dition, we tried to maximize the external validity ofthe results by gathering data from in-role respon-dents—that is, actual interviewers reported appli-cants’ interview performance, principals evaluatedteachers’ performance, and individuals reportedself-verification striving when they were interview-ing for jobs. As such, we hope these studies helpshow the power of self-verification striving as itoperates outside the lab.

Despite the strengths of this article, there aresome limitations that can be addressed in futureresearch. First, in this initial investigation we fo-cused on demonstrating the effect of self-verifica-tion striving in the organizational entry context, butwe did not test the reasons for the effects. In otherwords, we did not test different possible mediatingmechanisms. It is possible that self-verificationstriving creates better organizational entry because(1) people are more likely to be selected into situ-ations where they fit, (2) it helps newcomers formbetter relationships with colleagues, and (3) cogni-tive demands are high when an individual “fakesit” and tries to act “like someone you are not.”Clearly, future research is needed to extend ourincipient research on this topic and offer betterevidence regarding why self-verification strivingleads to better organizational entry.

Next, the hypotheses in Study 1 were tested inthe context of an MBA program. Although we didexamine graduates’ attitudes about their full-timejobs after graduating, it is possible that MBA stu-dents are not representative of the broader popula-tion of organizational newcomers, and future re-search should examine how self-verificationstriving affects the work attitudes of other samples.Relatedly, we examined how self-verification striv-ing moderated interviewers’ abilities to predict fu-ture performance, but we did not control for otherpossible predictor variables such as social “ho-mophily” between the interviewer and applicant

(Rivera, 2009), and as an outcome we focused onGPA and not performance in a work setting. InStudy 2, we examined job performance and citizen-ship behaviors as rated by a direct supervisor, but itnevertheless is possible that supervisors couldevaluate employees more positively if they trustedthem more, or shared a more authentic relationshipwith them. Thus, it would be useful for futureresearch to confirm and extend our initial results.

Third, it is possible that in Study 2, the observedrelationship between self-verification and perfor-mance may be due to unmeasured variables. InStudy 1, we were able to control for individuals’cognitive ability and previous work experience, butunfortunately, we did not have these data for theinternational teachers. For example, if individualspossess higher levels of ability or more relevantknowledge, they may be more likely to self-verify(especially during organizational entry) and alsohave higher levels of performance. Although wedid control for previous international teaching ex-perience, conscientiousness, and core self evalua-tions, it would have been useful to have directlycontrolled for additional human capital variablesin Study 2.

In this article, we only focused on the organiza-tional entry process, but it would be useful to ex-amine how differences in self-verification strivingaffect other interpersonal domains, such as teamformation, relationships with domestic partners,family, and friendship interactions. It is possiblethat some individuals are more likely to self-verifyin some relationships (e.g., friendships) but not inothers (e.g., employment settings). It also is impor-tant to consider whether our self-verification scalemay be more valid for more educated samples,towing to the complexity of survey items measur-ing subtle but powerful concepts such as self-veri-fication. However, our international sample, whosemembers spoke English as a second language, re-sponded well to the scale, suggesting that the lin-guistic difficulty of the scale was not a problem.

Next, we did not examine the basic issue of whysome individuals strive to self-verify more thanothers. Theoretically, people should be more likelyto self-verify during organizational entry, whenwork is an important part of their identity, so thatthe relationship between self-verification strivingand future outcomes should be weaker when workis a relatively unimportant part of identity. Futureresearch also may show that applicants strive hard-est to self-verify elements of their self-views thatare most important to them. Finally, it would beinteresting for future research to examine whetherself-verification striving is a conscious strategy ver-sus an emergent behavior. For example, it is possi-


ble that some people are aware of the situationaldemands of organizational entry and the incentivesto inflate their self-image but nevertheless believethat self-verification is the best approach, but oth-ers strive to self-verify as a matter of course, withless awareness of perceived costs.

Implications

First, our results suggest that in the long term, itmay be advantageous for people to self-verify dur-ing organizational entry, attempting to bring othersto know them for who they really are. Individualswith a strong proclivity to self-verify found theirorganizational entry to be better: they were morelikely to be satisfied with their jobs and committedto their organizations, and their supervisors ratedthem as better employees. These findings are animportant complement to the existing organiza-tional entry literature, which has highlighted thefrequency of self-enhancement. Our general findingmay be counterintuitive to many people, since manyapplicants obviously believe the best strategy is toengage in “extensive image creation” during organi-zational entry (e.g., Levashina & Campion, 2007).

Results from this study also may shed some newlight onto the historically low validity of inter-viewer evaluations. For applicants who strived toself-verify, the validity of interviewers’ ratings waspositive and significant, while interviewers’ ratingswere unrelated to future performance for low self-verifying applicants. Presumably, this finding re-flects the fact that interviewers can only make accu-rate predictions about a candidate’s fit with theenvironment when they have valid data to start with.

Our self-verification approach to organizationalentry also offers a new rationale for why newcom-ers generally perform better when they have beenrecommended by existing employees (Breaugh,1981; Lachnit, 2001). Specifically, it is possible thatnewcomers who are known by insiders are morecompelled to act authentically since they are al-ready bound to an identity, thus increasing theirself-verification. Of course, future research isneeded to examine these speculations from an ini-tial investigation, and it would be interesting toexamine the self-verification rationale relative tothe differential information hypothesis for why re-ferrals produce better hires.

A final implication is that organizations shouldfind ways to persuade job applicants and newcom-ers to act authentically during the organizationalentry process, since it can increase the satisfactionand performance of new hires. For example, ininterviews, it may be advantageous to ask appli-cants directly what skills they feel most strongly

about using and the values that they care aboutshowing the most at work. It also may be useful toengage applicants in less formal selection practicesthan an interview, possibly allowing them toshadow potential peers for a day so that they be-come comfortable and exhibit their true self-views.After entry, research shows that creating a settingin which individuals feel free to express their per-sonal views and values leads to greater innovationand creativity (e.g., Polzer et al., 2002; Swann et al.,2004), in addition to the attitudinal and perfor-mance outcomes demonstrated in the presentinvestigation.

Conclusions

Given the strong incentives to self-promote in theorganizational entry domain, it may surprise manyresearchers and managers that some job applicantsare motivated to communicate self-reflective infor-mation when it is less than ideal. Fortunately, theself-verification research stream offers some bal-ance to the self-enhancement emphasis in the liter-ature, reminding us that people value stability intheir self-views and are motivated to bring others tosee them as they see themselves. The present articlereveals that people differ in their propensity toself-verify and shows that when individuals striveto self-verify, they pave the way for smoother or-ganizational entry.

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Dan M. Cable ([email protected]) is a professor of or-ganisational behavior at the London Business School. Helikes to draw with his daughters, Daisy and Violet. Dan’sareas of teaching and research include culture and valuecongruence, employee engagement, and organizationalentry. He received his Ph.D. from Cornell University.

Virginia S. Kay ([email protected]) is a doctoral candidate inorganizational behavior at the University of North Caro-lina at Chapel Hill. She studies the consequences ofhonesty across a range of organizational tasks, to includeselecting employees, evaluating performance, and lead-ing teams.


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