Development of placement tests for firefighting: a long-term analysis by race and sex

This study summarises 16 years of data on simulated firefighting tasks used to select firefighters in the City of Chicago, Illinois. Four issues related to firefighter applicant testing are analysed: (1) test reliability; (2) test specificity; (3) racial/ethnic aspects of performance; and (4) sex-related aspects of performance. The findings indicated that the tests were moderately reliable but considerable day-to-day improvement was observed particularly among females. With respect to test specificity, simulated firefighter tasks do not appear to be highly correlated to traditional physical performance tests. Little difference was observed between the black, white and hispanic subjects tested. There were large differences between males and females on the physical performance tests and this difference appeared to be, in part, due to differences in size and body composition between sexes. This finding was consistent with other studies.