Grade inflation works – in schools and in the workforce, study finds

Los Angeles Times:

Pop quiz: Two senior managers at different hair gel companies apply for a top management position at Aveda. Manager A’s division increased sales by 15% in a growing company, while Manager B’s group increased sales by 10% in a company with no growth. Who gets to attend the Aveda Christmas party next year (and what time does Train C arrive in Chicago)?

Through a series of experiments, Samuel Swift and his colleagues determined that what matters most for getting into school or getting that promotion is your final performance record, regardless of how difficult it was to succeed.

The tendency to attribute an outcome solely to ability, without considering context, is called correspondence bias, and psychologists have been studying it for 45 years, Swift said. But despite its prevalence in academic circles, it has rarely been tested using real-world data. Swift wanted to know how common it was in school admissions and in the workforce.

Read the whole story: Los Angeles Times