Biodata

Biodata is a commonly used term in industrial and organizational psychology for biographical data. Biodata is defined as “...factual kinds of questions about life and work experiences, as well as to items involving opinions, values, beliefs, and attitudes that reflect a historical perspective.” Since the respondent is limited to replying to the questions posed to them, there are elements of both biography and autobiography. The basis of biodata’s predictive abilities is the axiom that past behaviour is the best predictor of future behaviour. Biographical information is not expected to predict all future behaviours but it is useful in personnel selection in that it can give an indication of probable future behaviours based on an individual’s prior learning history. Biodata instruments have an advantage over personality and interest inventories in that they can capture directly the past behaviour of a person, probably the best predictor of his or her future actions. These measures deal with facts about the person’s life, not introspections and subjective judgements.