Candidates Impression Management Examiner For Impact Assessment Study

Impression management is a sort of common social phenomenon that one wants to influence the attitude of others by controlling the information he leaves for others. It means anybody tries to glorify himself and forbid blemishing himself. Impression management consists of stable styles and flexible tactics. According to the cause and the function of impression management tactic, it could be divided into assertive impression management and defensive impression management.It is widely assumed that the selection interview is an important setting for impression management. Three studies are presented. The first, to investigate whether applicants of different styles differ in using defensive impression management tactics. The second, to determine whether certain types of defensive impression management tactics produced by applicants are more likely to convey a positive impression to interviewers. The third, to explore whether interviewer impression management style influences his rating of applicants.Study 1 found that applicants of inactive self-presentation style prefer all defensive impression management tactics more than active ones and that the applicants of active self-presentation style select more controllable attributions for past negative events while inactive ones more like to make uncontrollable attributions. In study 2, ten personnel managers from government and company were arranged to serve as simulant interviewers to rate all of the applicants' answers. It sticks out a mile that applicant impression management tactics have a significant effect on interviewer rating. Interviewers evaluate internal attributions for past negative events are much better than external attributions. In last study, the paper went on with the relationship between interviewer impression management style and his rating of applicants. Two marked conclusions were drawed. The ratings from diverse interviewers differ each other. The interviewers of high self-monitoring style more prefer the responses of applicants of the same style type.Briefly, the paper discussed whether and how the impression management of both applicants and interviewers influences interviewer rating and selection decision, which is significantly meaningful for selection interview practice.