ANALYSIS AND UTILITY OF SEVERAL PSYCHOLOGICAL INSTRUMENTS UTILIZED IN INFORMATION SYSTEMS RESEARCH.

• Author: Nyaanga, Solomon G.

INTRODUCTION

The basic thrust fronted by Jung (1971) in early decades has not left the building, not yet! Additionally, the work by notable researchers as Myers and Myers (1980; 1995) have encouraged current and future researchers to think twice and outside the box before they come out with new ideas, and indeed that is the crime we are about to commit although not exactly. According to Nielson (1993), the term usability refers to whether the systems satisfy and meets the end users' objectives, in other words, usability in the IS refers to how users interact with the technology and how satisfying the technology is in task accomplishments.

Jung (1971) postulated that human beings have two ways of seeing things, through physical senses and through intuition, both of which have varied and notable processes and solution implications. Despite these psychological instrumentation challenges, IS research practices and validation processes can be improved by researchers providing well-tested and validated measuring techniques.

However, any instrument that is designed to deliver objectively designed end user systems development projects must capture and incorporate all the essential human-related instruments that can be perceived essentially as drivers in enhancing end user applicability, value, satisfaction, and usability. More often, practitioners have tendency to deploy instruments that far too long only deliver mixed results that fail to address and deliver the much-needed solutions to the project-related problems. Therefore, it is important to note that well-tested instruments must be those that have human psychological and cognitive type dynamics.

The purpose of this study is to discuss the analysis of comparability and limitations of several psychological instruments commonly used to classify individuals in IS research. The analysis from this current study indicates that IS researchers need to consider several factors when using these psychological instruments. Research, as reported in this study, provides evidence that some psychological measurement techniques utilized the IS may be of marginal validity and utility for IS research.

Furthermore, such issues as the gender problem with the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the use of the Torrance Tests of Creative Thinking with adults, and the correlation problem between intelligence and the Group Embedded-figures Test provide further support for the premise that students may not be proper surrogates for professionals in the IS field. Therefore, it is imperative to reflect on an emergent approach that can be integrated into the application and analysis of the nature and representation of IS workforce relative to the general population. Therefore, the overarching purpose of this analysis is to delineate a more practical best practice and standard to deliver a more cogent system that validates consistent performance outcomes than relying on ad hoc metrics that are based on untested assumptions.

This study compared the intercorrelations between several psychological measurement instruments commonly used in IS research and examined the relationships that cognitive style measurement instruments have with cerebral dominance (laterality). IS' researchers have adapted several instruments, primarily from the field of psychology and career counseling, for their research (Kinley et al, 2014; Bachari, Abdelwahed & Adnani, 2012; Mehigan & Pitt, 2012; Gunduz & Ozcan, 2010). Unfortunately, insufficient empirical research exists to establish the validity and applicability of the majority of these instruments for use in IS cognitive style research.

BACKGROUND OF THIS STUDY

The Myers-Briggs Type

Prior research has hypothesized that a relationship exists between the intuition and feeling and sensing and thinking scales of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and with cerebral dominance (Myers & McCally, 1985). In this study, no significant correlations existed between the above physiological measures; significant correlations did; however, exist with the Human Information Processing Survey scales and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. Significant relationships existed between gender and the NF scale. No relationships existed for any of the demographic/situational variables and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator scales. It has been an accepted relationship with females typically classified as feeling types and males as thinking types (Taggart, Robey & Kroeck, (1985)). IS' researchers needed and need to be cognizant of this gender relationship or their research conclusions can be misleading.

One of the notable Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and IS research study by White (1984) focused on maximizing human resources to increase productivity by stressing team effort. The study evaluated the development activities of two Management Information Systems (MIS) project teams that comprised two personality types (thinkers and feelers). The first team comprised only thinkers and the second team comprised thinkers and 50% feelers. The empirical evidence gathered from interviews with MIS personnel and key end users in terms of the strengths and weaknesses of the two information system projects teams was perplexing at best. Surprising enough, end user satisfaction on the final team projects was much higher with project team two (thinkers and 50% feelers) than straight project team (thinkers).

The final analysis confirms unequivocally that there is a void personality types and styles in the use of untested assumptions specifically as it relates to information system project team one (thinkers). The paradox inherent in these empirical findings calls for more refined and well tested assumptions, rigorous instrumentation, and measurement research to better understand the personality (human interactions) in group settings to validate the complimentarily in personality types and improve IS research projects (Myers & Myers. 1980).

The Group Embedded Figures Test

Researchers in the IS have used the Group Embedded-figures Test to classify individuals into categories of high analytic or low analytic (Massa & Mayer (2006)). Other researchers have hypothesized that high scores on this instrument are indicative of left hemisphere dominance (Mehigan & Pitt, 2010). Cognitive style instruments should measure an individual's cognitive style and not be dependent on one's general intelligence (Kramer, Rosenberg, & Thompson, 2009). The strategy that is employed in the processing of information should not necessarily be influenced by one's general intelligence. Thus, field independence and field dependence should be classifications not related to cognitive ability. However, researchers have criticized the Group Embedded-figures Test for showing a direct correlation with intelligence (Felder & Brent 2005).

This study provides further support for this criticism. This reported relationship between the Group Embedded-figures Test and cognitive ability has implications for IS and other researchers. If studies utilizing the Group Embedded-figures Test have samples that are biased toward individuals with lesser cognitive abilities, the results could indicate a higher percentage of field dependent individuals than would be normally reported. Thus, without the researcher's knowledge, the distribution of field dependents and independents would be distorted due to the cognitive ability effect.

The lack of a statistically significant relationship between the Group Embedded-figures Test and cerebral dominance is meaningful in that it casts doubt upon the hypothesis that the field independence style is localized in either hemisphere as measured by these instruments. Several studies have investigated this relationship with conflicting results. It remains unclear as to what the Group Embedded-figures Test is actual measuring. The Group Embedded-figures Test should not be used to classify individuals into analytical and cerebral dominance categories, which has been a primary application by IS researchers as it is one of many measures of mental ability and not cognitive style.

In the context of learning, cognitive style describes various ways people adopt for perception, organization, analysis, or recollection of information and experience including the preferred ways people process information to address work- related problem situations. The validity of Group Embedded-figures Test concluded that feeling and intuition learners are introverts (like to work alone are aloof whereas, sensing and thinking learners are extroverts (sociable and prefer group working set up). Therefore, it would be logical to conclude that performance scores on the Group Embedded-figures Test are just indicators of one's ability in the visual spatial domain and not style measures (Demick, 2014).

Human Information Processing Survey

Several significant relationships existed between the Human Information Processing Survey and the other instruments used in this study. As stated earlier, expected relationships existed between the Human Information Processing Survey and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and sensing and thinking scales. The results indicated that intuitive scored higher on the right scale of the Human Information Processing Survey than did the sensing types. Researchers have classified intuitive individuals as right brain...