Validation of psychological predictors in the Swedish Enlistment System

A validation study of psychological predictors used at the enlistment of Swedish conscripts was performed. The sample studied (n = 15 200) was conscripts who had been tested with the new computerized Enlistment battery (CAT-SEB), taken in use 1994, and who had completed military service by summer 1997. Their military marks were used as criteria. The CAT-SEB was evaluated in terms of three latent variables: General ability, Verbal ability, and Spatial ability. Assessments of Leadership ability and Psychological functioning, made by psychologists, were also used as predictors. Two different methods of analysis were used, one regressing individual criterion results on individual predictor results. In the other method, the performance of candidate groups, formed by predictor results, was related to mean criterion performance of the groups. The latter method yielded more encouraging and interpretable results concerning the validity of the psychological predictors.