Design and Development of Persona Persona was designed and developed from 1992 as part of a research programme at Leeds University and Leeds Business School. A central objective of this research was to develop a method for predicting job performance accurately.   Innovatory Test Design   Conventional personality tests use statements or questions. However, there is evidence that the traditional approach reduces the accuracy of the results (eg. (Dunbar et al., 2000; Sinclair and Tetrick, 2000) and also disadvantages some candidates (Mook et al., 1992).   Statements or questions also contain ‘contextual information’ that can easily be misinterpreted (Schmitt et al., 1995) and which make it difficult to develop comparable personality questionnaires for use across cultures and different linguistic groups. To overcome all of these problems, Persona uses single adjectives that can be readily understood and completed by the widest possible range of people. This innovatory approach to test design also means that Persona can be easily translated and standardised in any language.   Unbiased and Fair Assessment   It has always been a moral responsibility to ensure that any assessment is fair, but it is increasingly becoming a legal duty. Persona was developed to ensure complete fairness to everybody no matter what their gender, ethnicity or educational and work backgrounds. We also developed spoken and amplified versions for those with no formal education, a visual impairment or a learning disability. This means you can be sure that Persona provides a completely unbiased and fair assessment.   Accurate Results Every Time   Every Persona personality trait scale exceeds the reliability threshold of 0.70 recommended by the British Psychological Society, with Cronbach’s Alpha ranging from 0.74 to 0.91 and test/retest coefficients of 0.72 to 0.87. Persona measures the traits of the five factor model accurately every time.   Persona also has very high construct validity so you can be certain that the questionnaire is measuring the fundamentals of personality.   Perhaps most importantly of all, Persona predicts job performance more effectively than you might think possible. That means you can rely on a Persona expert assessment system to give you the best results and most accurate information every time.   Please follow these links for further information about the accuracy of Persona , Persona expert systems , the five factor model of personality and the meaning of Persona scores.   For further information about the development, reliability and validity of Persona, please contact us.   Back to Persona Index