What Are Situations?

For decades, and without much evidence, psychologists claimed that “situations” were the primary determinant of human behavior. Because aspects of the individual, such as personality, only weakly predicted behavior in any given situation, it was assumed that the situation itself was the source of behavioral variability. This “person–situation” debate was resolved in part by demonstrating that both persons and situations are necessary to understand behavior (Funder, Reference Funder2006). However, the question remains: How do situations affect behavior? Rauthmann, Sherman, and Funder (Reference Rauthmann, Sherman and Funder2015b) proposed that situations consist of three types of information: cues, characteristics, and classes.

Cues refer to raw physical stimuli in the environment. As such, they are objective and easily quantified (e.g., the number of people present; temperature of the room). By definition, cues have no intrinsic meaning and must be perceived to have meaning.

Characteristics refer to psychologically meaningful interpretations of cues that have been processed (either implicitly or explicitly). As such, characteristics are used to describe situations much in the same way that personality dimensions are used to describe persons (e.g., is potentially anxiety inducing). In social-psychological parlance, characteristics fall under the categories of formal rules/laws (e.g., designated nonsmoking areas), norms (e.g., no cutting in line), expectations (e.g., talking is expected on an interview), or threats (e.g., a negative performance review from the manager). Recent empirical work on situation characteristics indicates that everyday human situations might be broadly described by eight dimensions (Rauthmann et al., Reference Rauthmann, Gallardo-Pujol, Guillaume, Todd, Nave, Sherman and Funder2014). The so-called DIAMONDS dimensions are Duty (Does a job need to be completed?), Intellect (Is there aesthetic stimuli?), Adversity (Is someone being criticized or blamed?), Mating (Are potential romantic partners present?), pOsitivity (Is the situation enjoyable?), Negativity (Is the situation stressful?), Deception (Is someone being deceitful?), and Sociality (Is there an opportunity to form close relationships with others?).

Because characteristics require processing and psychological meaning making, they are less objective than are cues. Therefore, self-reports of situation characteristics contain both consensual (i.e., shared interpretations of rules, norms, expectations, and/or threats) and idiosyncratic (i.e., distinct interpretations of rules, norms, expectations, and/or threats) components. Empirically, the data indicate that people largely agree about what situations are like (i.e., consensus is quite high; Rauthmann, Reference Rauthmann2012; Serfass & Sherman, Reference Serfass and Sherman2013) and that individual differences in situation perceptions are related to personality in theoretically predictable ways (Serfass & Sherman, Reference Serfass and Sherman2013; Sherman, Nave, & Funder, Reference Sherman, Nave and Funder2013).

Classes refer to types of situations: constellations or patterns of cues and/or characteristics that frequently co-occur. As such, situation classes are quite useful for quickly conveying broad information about situations. For example, the situation “in a meeting with the manager” provides quick information about what that situation is probably like (i.e., high on Duty). However, classes often leave important characteristics unknown. Is the manager criticizing me (Adversity)? Can I trust what the manager is saying (Deception)? Thus, although situation cues and classes are important, characteristics are the psychologically meaningful interpretations of situations and are the most useful for predicting behavior (Rauthmann et al., Reference Rauthmann, Sherman and Funder2015b).

Situations in Situational Judgment Tests

Items on SJTs contain situation cues (e.g., relevant stimuli present on the job) and classes (e.g., types of situations one experiences while working). For example, an SJT item that presents a problem that might be encountered at the workplace—you noticing a coworker stealing company resources–contains situation cues (e.g., a person; a laptop; a desk; the boss is not present) and situation classes (e.g., a workplace theft situation). Importantly, SJTs also contain situation characteristics, and an individual's perception and interpretation of an SJT item determines his or her response to the item. In the foregoing example, if a person perceives the situation as one in which something is being undermined or sabotaged and perceives that he or she is counted on to do something about it, the person will take action. However, if the person perceives the situation as one that arouses competing motivations and/or as including pressure to conform to the actions of others, then the response will be quite different. Such differential perceptions of situations are predicted by personality (Serfass & Sherman, Reference Serfass and Sherman2013; Sherman et al., Reference Sherman, Nave and Funder2013). Moreover, the foregoing example is consistent with the fact that SJTs retain their predictive validity even when situations are “decapitated” from their respective items (Lievens & Motowidlo). Personality is driving the behavioral responsive irrespective of the situation (cf. Sherman, Rauthmann, Brown, Serfass, & Jones, Reference Sherman, Rauthmann, Brown, Serfass and Jones2015).

What Are Workplace Situations?

What do we know about workplace situations? First, we know that workplace situations impact organizational behavior (Johns, Reference Johns2006). However, such knowledge does not tell us much about how workplace situations impact behavior. What are the psychological characteristics on which workplaces differ? What are the important dimensions of workplace situations? To these questions we would make two points. First, it is essential to distinguish between workplace situations and workplace environments (Rauthmann, Sherman, & Funder, Reference Rauthmann, Sherman and Funder2015a). Workplace situations are concrete, short in duration, and quite unstable and dynamic. A meeting with the manager, a Skype call with a client, and a coffee break with a coworker are all examples of workplace situations. In contrast, workplace environments are abstract, long in duration, and quite stable. An oil rig, a pharmacy, and a retail store are all examples of workplace environments.

Second, the DIAMONDS taxonomy offers a relatively comprehensive account of the most essential dimensions of workplace situations. Meetings with the manager that are characterized by Adversity are quite different from those that are characterized by Sociality. Thus, the DIAMONDS taxonomy may be quite useful for describing differences in workplace situations within a given workplace environment. The DIAMONDS taxonomy may be less useful for describing differences between different workplace environments. For example, nearly every workplace environment is characterized by Duty (i.e., a job needs to be done). Fortunately, the essential taxonomy for characterizing workplace environments—Holland's (Reference Holland1966) RIASEC model—is already well-known. However, because persistent and enduring workplace environments are directly related to workplace situations, there is some expectation that workplace environments as characterized by the RIASEC will inherently include more workplace situations characterized by specific DIAMONDS dimensions. For example, consider a job in the Investigative–Realistic–Enterprising cluster, such as a chemist. A typical workplace situation for a chemist may afford opportunities for working with intellectual stimuli (Intellect) and fewer opportunities for interpersonal interaction (Sociality). In contrast, a job in the Social–Artistic–Conventional cluster, such as childcare worker, affords many opportunities for social interaction (Sociality).