Increasing airport security using the X-Ray ORT as effective pre-employment assessment tool

X-ray screening is a demanding task. Threat objects can be superimposed by other objects, they can be difficult to recognize in cluttered bags, or when depicted from an unusual viewpoint. For improving airport security screening, it is essential to develop tests for pre-employment assessment in order to identify those people who are well-suited for the x-ray screening task. The X-Ray Object Recognition Test (X-Ray ORT) has been developed to measure how well people can cope with x-ray images in which threat items are superimposed by other objects, placed in cluttered bags, or depicted from unusual viewpoints. In this study, the X-Ray ORT was used in pre-employment assessment to select the 50 percent best performing candidates. These candidates(n=101) were then tested one year later using a standardized x-ray image interpretation test containing different types of prohibited items (X-Ray PIT). Detection performance of these screeners was significantly better than the performance of the other screening personnel (n = 453), that was not selected based on the X-Ray ORT. Additional analyses showed good reliability and validity of this test, indicating that the X-Ray ORT is a very useful tool for pre-employment assessment in order to increase the x-ray screening performance.