Exploring the role of interviewee cognitive capacities on impression management in face-to-face and virtual interviews

Abstract

Interviewees' use of impression management (IM) in job interviews is clearly related to individual differences such as personality. However, research has paid less attention to how interviewee cognitive capacities (i.e., cognitive ability and executive functions) influence IM use, even though interviewees’ cognitive capacities and IM are theoretically linked. The current research aimed to address this research gap through two studies. In Study 1, 166 undergraduate business students participated in mock face-to-face interviews with real recruiters. In Study 2, 294 job-seeking participants recruited through Prolific completed a mock asynchronous video interview. Overall, cognitive ability was negatively related to deceptive IM while perceived incongruency (i.e., a gap between desired and perceived current impressions conveyed to others) was positively related to deceptive IM in both studies. Furthermore, cognitive ability and working memory updating, but not inhibition and shifting nor incongruency, were negatively related to honest IM in Study 2. Additionally, in both studies the relations between personality traits and interview IM were generally in line with findings from prior research. Overall, our findings provide a more comprehensive understanding of how interview IM relates to interviewee individual differences and interview performance in different forms of job interviews.