Dissertation Abstract

An Accomplishment Technique for Selection of Radiologic Technology Students.

The present study consisted of the development and initial validation of a selection instrument to predict the clinical performance of radiologic technology students in a two year program. With recent advances in diagnostic and therapeutic radiologic technology, the demands on students and practitioners in this field have increased considerably, but effective predictors of clinical performance are not available. To identify important dimensions of clinical performance, a critical incident job analysis was conducted with staff technologists, who described 400 incidents of effective and ineffective student behavior. A second job analysis was conducted with clinical instructors who identified important competencies and then described the behavior of students who were outstanding and deficient on each. Six performance dimensions were obtained through these job analyses and provided the basis for a behavioral consistency questionnaire and structured interview soliciting illustrations of past effectiveness on each dimension. The dimensions were: organizational skills, relationships with peers and staff, technical skills, relationships with patients, flexibility, and initiative, and the instrument was called the 'Accomplishment Questionnaire and Interview' (AQI).

Concurrent validation was conducted with 53 students in the radiologic technology programs. Twenty-seven applicants also were interviewed. For all participants, traditional admissions information was collected, including points allotted for ACT scores, high school standing, high school GPA, college GPA, prior science and math courses, work experience, and a traditional point total. For students, measures of performance were also obtained. Performance measures consisted of grades given for attainment of clinical objectives, completion of competency exams, and an 'affective domain' evaluation assessing attitudes and behaviors; an overall clinical grade; and a behavior observation scale developed for the study.

Results of the study indicated raters were able to agree on scoring of the new structured instruments, and that scales were not redundant with traditional selection measures. However, correlations with criterion measures were modest. Although the AQI correlated better with performance criteria than did the traditional department interview, when submitted to multiple regression procedures, it did not account for a significant increment in variance over and above traditional academic predictors.

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