Event related brain electrical and magnetic activity: toward predicting on-job performance

Personnel assessment has depended on paper and pencil tests. These tests are able to predict academic performance fairly well, but have been criticized for their ineffectiveness in predicting on-job performance. Research on brain function which emphasizes "process" rather than "content" variables, may be able to predict on-job performance better than traditional tests. Relationships have been found between event related brain potentials (ERPs) and performance in fighter aircraft and on a sonar simulator, as well as enlistees promotions and attrition. Research has suggested that ERP records are better able to discriminate and classify performance groups than paper-and-pencil test scores. Biomagnetic data are described from heart and brain. These data suggest increased sensitivity to individual differences, and may offer greater opportunity for improving prediction of on-job performance, than ERP records or paper-and-pencil tests.