Predictors of missionary job success: a review of the literature and research proposal.

Cousineau, Amy E. ; Lewis Hall, M. Elizabeth ; Rosik, Christopher H. 等

Missionary and expatriate attrition is a costly affair in terms of finances, strained relations with host countries, and the emotional toll on the sojourner him or herself (Zeira & Banai, 1985). The cost of relocating an expatriate has been estimated to range from $60,000 (Dolainski, 1997) to $1,000,000 (Shannonhouse, 1996). Harrison, Chadwick, and Scales (1996) also noted that "unsuccessful" expatriates are marginally effective at best, indicating costs that extend beyond the purely financial. Anecdotal evidence suggests expatriate failure leads to frustration, disappointment, marital stress, and even demotion subsequent to repatriation (Swaak, 1995; Sypher, Shwom, Boje, Rosile, & Miller, 1998). Bochner (2006) reported estimates of the rate of expatriate failure at 20 to 50 percent. In spite of the aforementioned risks, multinational corporations continue to send significant numbers of employees overseas. There were an estimated 250,000 expatriates overseas as of 1997 (Dolainski, 1997).

Sending employees abroad will continue to be a priority within the Christian community as well, given the explicit directive within the biblical text to spread the gospel throughout the world. Unfortunately, the failure rates for missionaries are significant. The cost of a missionary returning from the field early is estimated at 2V2 times the yearly salary (Lindquist, 1982). Taylor (1997) put the attrition rate for missionaries at 5.1% per year, 71% of which was preventable. These numbers are unacceptably high, especially given the extremely tight budgets under which most mission agencies operate.

Clearly, the issue of expatriate/missionary attrition, and thereby selection, warrants further attention and research. Lindquist (1982) noted that when the Peace Corps implemented assessment and training programs, the rate of early return was reduced to .7%. Compared to the cost of attrition, work in the area of assessment seems well worth the investment.

This summary of the need for effective missionary screening tools should not be construed to mean that no assessment batteries are currently in use. In fact, it seems that each mission organization has its own set of assessment tools that they use to screen for missionary effectiveness (Ferguson, Kliewer, Lindquist, Williams & Heinrich, 1983). Some agencies use very brief measures that yield little information. Other agencies employ personality tests. There appears to be no uniform battery of tests, or consensus as to what should be assessed for or even the purpose of assessment.

This highlights several concerns over the use of psychological assessment in this process. It is common practice for tests to be administered in very different ways than specified by the test manuals. It is also common for tests to be used for purposes other than those for which they were intended. This does not seem to be indicative of a willful disregard of ethical principles. Rather, it speaks to the dearth of research, lack of consensus regarding uses and purposes of assessment in missionary screening, and the scattered nature of the efforts to find and develop tools that are effective to predict job success. Job success has been variously defined as satisfaction (Andrews, 1999; Schubert & Gantner, 1996; Cousineau, Hall, Rosik, & Hall, 2007), attrition (Dillon, 1983; Haynes, Tan & Baker, 1990; Kailing, 1995; Wilcox, 1995), job performance and effectiveness, and various personal characteristics (Adams, 2008; Britt, 1983; Kennedy & Dreger, 1974). Although cultural adjustment can also be the focus of pre-field assessments, and is considered part of the job description by some (e.g., Hall & Sweatman, 2002), research investigating cultural adjustment in missionaries will not be included in this review of the literature.

Hall and Sweatman (2002) called attention to the need to evaluate how assessment is currently conducted in light of ethical issues. First, the test used must have a satisfactory degree of validity; that is, it should be able to predict behavior. Many assessment instruments used in the assessment of missionaries predict pathology, and not job performance or the ability to adjust to living in a different culture. The goal of the mission agency is to assess the candidate's fit for placement and it is often the case that the candidate is assessed for psychopathology, instead. This is problematic for several reasons. It gives an incomplete assessment of the candidate's fitness for placement in that it omits strengths as well as non-pathology based weaknesses. Also, according to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, employers cannot discriminate against qualified individuals due to a disability (including mental illness). Under this set of laws, medical examinations, including psychological tests when administered by a psychologist, can only be conducted after an offer of employment has been made.

Second, psychological tests should be interpreted only on the populations for which they were normed. The purpose behind this is to not over- or underestimate pathology in a given sample. This becomes problematic, for example, when a pathology-seeking test such as the MCMI-III (which was normed on a clinical sample) is administered to a non-clinical population, such as missionary candidates.

When Lindquist (1983) outlined a rationale for conducting assessments with missionaries, he added a few more considerations. First, the mission agencies are asking for help, looking for solutions to both attrition and missionary ineffectiveness. Second, as members of the religious community, Christian professional psychologists are mandated to be concerned for other members of that community and to desire to help in any way they are equipped. Third, there is a pressing need for cutting unnecessary costs for agencies that constantly struggle to acquire sufficient funds. Fourth, assessment has the potential to prevent future problems, sparing both the agencies and their missionaries unnecessary emotional and financial distress. While attrition rates have received much attention from the psychological and human resources communities, the effort is unfortunately fractured and a comprehensive and highly effective assessment tool has yet to be developed.

Previous Studies

In this section, the literature relevant to predicting missionary job success will be reviewed. The first set of studies discussed address the question of predicting missionary job success empirically. The final five studies discussed present suggestions for future research in this area.

Empirical Studies

Given the multiplicity of ways in which job success is operationalized, the following studies will be grouped according to the operationalization used.

Satisfaction. Andrews (1999) conducted a study with 245 married career missionaries to examine the possible relationships between spiritual life satisfaction, family life satisfaction, and vocational satisfaction. The researcher designed the Missionary Family Profile (MFP) to assess satisfaction with family life, ministry role, being a missionary, and spiritual life. Although this measure was pretested by several participating mission agencies, no other standardization procedures were done. In addition to the MFP, participants completed the Family of Origin Image (FOI), another scale designed by Andrews. No standardization, validity, or reliability statistics were reported. Andrews also utilized the Spiritual Life Inventory (SLI), an instrument she designed with no statistics reported. A fourth scale used in this battery was the Family Adaptability and Cohesion Scales (FACES II). Reported reliability for this scale was satisfactory. The participants also took the Enriching and Nurturing Relationship Issues, Communication and Happiness (ENRICH) with relatively well-established standardization.

Andrews (1999) found that the more missionaries were satisfied with their spiritual lives, the more likely they were to be satisfied with their ministry. More specifically, satisfaction with ministry was correlated with the supporting relationships in the missionary's spiritual life. Satisfaction with being a missionary was correlated with personal devotions and spousal relationship quality. Finally, the sense of being "called" to missionary work contributed to all areas of satisfaction, including ministry satisfaction. Unfortunately, this study is limited by the lack of standardization for the majority of the tests used.

Attrition. Attrition appears to be the most widely-used construct for assessing job success. Dillon (1983) examined the profiles of 827 missionaries to test for differences between missionaries that persevere and those that do not. The participants were given the MMPI either as part of the application process or during the furlough medical examination. The independent variable was whether or not the missionary fulfilled his or her commitment to a career as a missionary. He found that missionaries who persevered scored significantly lower on the Lie (L) scale and higher on the Infrequency (F), Psychasthenia (Pt), and Control (Cn) scales than nonpersevering missionaries. Before these results can be interpreted as persevering missionaries being less defensive, more likely to report problems, and so on, it is important to examine the actual numbers reported. Unfortunately, it is unclear which scores were reported by Dillon. The mean scores indicated in the article are not T scores from the MMPI. It appears that the mean scores reported are raw scores. If it is the case that the mean scores reported are indeed raw scores, this considerably changes the picture painted by the results. On the L, F, and Pt scales, the difference between persevering and nonpersevering missionaries is only one item endorsement. The difference on the Cn scale is slightly larger at two item endorsements. Furthermore, these differences are all within normal ranges, with the Cn scores being quite low. Although there is a statistical difference between these two groups, there is not a significant clinical difference.

Wilcox (1995) conducted a descriptive study of 394 staff members of overseas schools for missionaries' children to determine what factors predict whether or not they intend to extend their period of service. The author utilized the Affective Commitment Scale (ACS) and the Continuance Commitment Scale (CCS) to measure organizational commitment and intent to continue service. He utilized the Minnesota Satisfaction Scale (MSS) to assess job satisfaction (used in this study as a predictor, rather than an outcome variable). He designed a family stressors measure, a spousal work role satisfaction measure, and a motive for service scale. He found that affective commitment to the organization, years worked overseas, and being married were most influential in extending service. The primary limitation of this study is the number of researcher-developed measures. The family stressors measure was designed specifically for this study based on interviews. The only data provided are a Cronbach's alpha of .684, which is generally considered to be lower than would be hoped for to establish consistent reliability. The other two measures were derived from previously studied measures, but standardization data are lacking for the modified versions.

Haynes, Tan, and Baker (1990) administered the MMPI, 16PF, and Myers Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) to a group of 64 missionaries. They found that the N (privateness) and Q2 (self-reliance) scales predicted the missionaries' likelihood of continuing service. The missionaries who continued tended to be more private and self-reliant.

Similarly, Pelo (2005) examined the predictive validity of the MMPI, the 16PF, and the Big Five in predicting perseverance in 302 missionaries from an evangelical mission agency. The MMPI and 16PF were completed as part of the pre-field assessment process; Big Five scores were calculated using 16PF data. None of the MMPI scales predicted perseverance, nor did the Big Five trait scores. Contrary to expectations, perseverers exhibited higher levels of anxiety (16PF Factor Q3) than non-perseverers (though scores were in the average range for both groups), and male perseverers exhibited significantly higher levels of shrewdness (16PF Factor N). However, the author cautions against the use of these results in applied settings, given the poor specificity of the resulting statistical models. The use of the original MMPI, and the lack of information regarding the version of the 16PF used, are limitations of this study, as similar research with current measures may be required in order to verify that similar results are obtained with the updated measures. In addition, the sample contained only a small number of non-perseverers, limiting the power of the analyses.

Kailing (1995) examined the predictive ability of the Marital Satisfaction Inventory, to see whether it distinguished between missionaries who had prematurely left the field and subsequently entered psychological treatment, and those who persisted on the mission field. MSI scores gathered during the missionary assessment process were used to predict group membership for 63 missionary couples (22 in the premature departure group, and the remaining 41 in the persevering group) from a variety of Protestant mission agencies. The average amount of time between pre-field assessment, and group assignment was just over four years (SD = 2 years). Results indicated that the Affective Communication subscale predicted group membership in wives, and the Problem-Solving Communication subscale predicted group membership in husbands. These results indicate that perseverance on the mission field is associated with greater satisfaction with affective communication in wives, and with problem-solving communication in husbands. Unfortunately, lack of clarity in the reporting of the study limits its usefulness. In particular, it is unclear how subsequent administrations of the MSI during furloughs were used in combination with the pre-field MSI results in predicting group membership.

Job performance and effectiveness. Adams (2008) evaluated the 16PF and MMPI in terms of its ability to predict supervisor ratings of interpersonal problems and effectiveness on the mission field. A sample of 101 denominational missionaries serving in a variety of countries in six world regions completed these instruments prior to going to the mission field. Supervisor assessments were conducted an average of 7.63 years (SD= 3.24) later. Longer amount of time on the mission field and higher scores on the MMPI Sc scale were associated with lower supervisor ratings of interpersonal problems on the mission field, while higher scores on the MMPI Ma scale was found to be a predictor of higher supervisor ratings of interpersonal problems, perhaps due to a more task-oriented approach. The author suggested that the relationship between higher Sc scores and decreased interpersonal problems may indicate that missionaries with more creative thought processes have better strategies for conflict resolution, resulting in better interpersonal relationships. It should be noted that both the Ma and the Sc scores were within the normal range. Longer amounts of time on the mission field were associated with higher supervisor ratings of effectiveness, which should be no surprise, since both longevity and effectiveness have been used as indicators of job satisfaction in this literature. However, no scales on the 16PF or the MMPI predicted supervisor ratings of effectiveness. As with other studies using archival data, this study used the original MMPI, and the version of the 16PF used was not specified. Consequently, further research is needed to verify that the results can be applied to current versions of these instruments. In addition, the supervisor ratings were completed by the head of personnel of the mission organization, and so relied on missionary self evaluations, field director and regional director organizations, as well as less formal sources of information, to complete the ratings. This likely limited the accuracy of the ratings.

Personal characteristics. Britt (1983) conducted a study to investigate predictors of missionary success that included the 16PF, structured interviews, and open-ended references. The participants in his study were 153 adult overseas field staff for the Agape Movement of Campus Crusade for Christ. Job success was measured by a success inventory that was derived from the mission agency's rating system. Success was defined as personal, emotional, social, and spiritual maturity. He found that the "undisciplined vs. controlled" (the ability to bind anxiety) construct on the 16PF accounted for most of the variance in job success. Successful missionaries had better work habits, preferred to keep their emotions under control, and were organized. In addition to identifying predicting variables from the 16PF, he found that successful missionaries reported feeling less moodiness.

Kennedy and Dreger (1974) began work on the Missionary in Action--A Descriptive Check List (MINA) to "establish criteria for effective overseas missionaries" (p. 70). The MINA was given to 137 missionaries and 430 peers responding regarding the missionaries. The MINA consists of 155 items on a 5-point Likert scale that were evaluated by "experts in the field." The factors that emerged as indicative of successful missionaries were understanding/ accepting of differences, ability to cope with social/professional situations, organization, openness to/acceptance of change, ability to integrate life philosophy with personal/professional activities, leadership abilities, ability to share Christ with others, humility/dedication, capacity to adjust to demands, absence of special needs (e.g., physical handicaps), and quality of family relationships. This study has the important benefit of matching missionary responses to how their peers and supervisors rate their job performance. Unfortunately, no further studies have been conducted to develop this promising assessment instrument.

Multiple outcome measures. Schubert and Gantner (1996) conducted a study examining the predictive value of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) for missionary performance. They collected data from 193 MMPIs given to missionaries. The first author evaluated these protocols and classified them according to whether or not the individual would perform adequately on the job. They were each assigned to a "yes," "no," or "maybe" category. The MMPIs were assigned based on specific MMPI variables that had previously been shown to have predictive value for this population in a previous study done by Schubert (1993). Another researcher then scored each missionary on the Mission Assessment Scale (MAS) according to the missionaries' records on the field. The MAS assesses seven areas: job satisfaction, attrition, met assignments, good team member, worked well under authority, productivity, and moral uprightness. Each of these areas is measured by one question answered on a five-point Likert Scale. The specific criteria used to assign these scores were not reported. The researchers found a significant correlation between the MMPI classification and the MAS score. The specific MMPI variables that correlated significantly with the measure of performance were: any two clinical scales (except Masculinity-Femininity) > 65, any two subscales or research scales (except ego strength) > 65, ego strength < 55, K scale > 65, scale 4 (Psychopathic Deviate) > 65, more than eight critical items, scale 9 (Hypomania) > 65, and scale 3 (Hysteria) > 65. They also found that younger missionaries tended to have an easier time adapting than did older missionaries.

There are several limitations to this study. First, from a methodological standpoint, both the MMPI classifications and the MAS scores were assigned by only one researcher each. This lack of cross-validation potentially limits the validity of these scores. Other methodological issues needed clarification. For example, it is unclear whether the author outlined the criteria for how the protocols were assigned to the MMPI categories. It is also unclear whether the MMPI itself is correlated with the MAS, or whether it is the researchers' individual interpretations of the scores that are related. Second, the researchers used the first edition of the MMPI due to it being the edition that was available at the time of the original assessments. While there is no ethical problem with using old editions of tests for research purposes, they cannot be used for clinical purposes. This research would need to be replicated with the current version of the MMPI in order to be applied in selection processes.

Finally, the measure the authors used to operationalize missionary performance, the MAS, appears to be structurally weak. The seven domains are measured by seven items that utilize a 5-point Likert scale. For example, a score of 1 indicates "high job satisfaction" and a score of 5 indicates "low job satisfaction." However, several items seem to measure different constructs across the Likert scale. For example, on item VI a score of 1 indicates "did work without need for supervision," a score of 3 indicates "moderately productive," and a score of 5 indicates "was not accountable (did not do what was expected)." Therefore one is not sure if this item is measuring independence, productivity, or accountability, which complicates the interpretation of the score.

Cousineau, Hall, Rosik, and Hall (2007) evaluated the 16PF and Marital Satisfaction Inventory (MSI) in terms of their ability to predict missionary success. A sample of 158 missionary candidates from a large, evangelical mission agency completed these instruments as part of the application process to become career missionaries. Term End Evaluations were filled out on each missionary by his or her supervisor, providing information on job performance, job satisfaction, and the supervisor's recommendation for return to the team. In addition, attrition data were provided by the mission agency on each missionary. Significant correlations were found between supervisors' recommendations for return to the team and group-orientation on the 16PF. Attrition was related to the trait of enthusiasm on the 16PF, with more enthusiastic missionaries being more likely to remain on the field. Job performance was related positively to the trait of group-orientation on the 16PF and negatively to marital distress and dissatisfaction with time spent together on the MSI. Job satisfaction was positively related to the traits of being cool and reserved, and conservative on the 16PF. There were several limitations to this study. Due to the nature of archival data, the data were collected on the first edition of the 16PF, rather than the current fifth edition. Research will need to be conducted to verify that the findings of this study also apply to the revised version of the 16PF. An additional limitation of the study involves the Term End Assessment. The narrative format of this measure required the development of a coding system, and left the instrument vulnerable to significant variability in the level of detail with which supervisors responded.

In summary, the research indicates a number of personal traits that are related to job success, broadly defined. Some of these traits have to do with mental health; others to non-clinical personality characteristics, spirituality, skills, social support, and demographics. With respect to mental health, general missionary job success was related to the ability to manage anxiety (Britt, 1983; Dillon, 1983) and to moderately high levels of anxiety (Pelo, 2005), to decreased levels of moodiness (Britt, 1983), and to low numbers of pathology indicators on the MMPI (Adams, 2008; Schubert & Gantner, 1996), though higher Sc scores within the normal range may be adaptive (Adams, 2008). With respect to personality characteristics which are not generally considered clinical, unrealistic self-presentation and self-control (Dillon 1983), privateness and self-reliance (Haynes, Tan, & Baker, 1990), affective commitment to the mission organization (Wilcox, 1995), understanding/ accepting of differences, ability to cope with social/professional situations, openness to/acceptance of change, humility/dedication, capacity to adjust to demands (Kennedy & Dreger, 1974), enthusiasm, group-orientation, being cool and reserved, and conservative (Cousineau, Hall, Rosik, & Hall, 2007), shrewdness (Pelo, 2005) and exhibiting less task-orientation and more creative thought processes (Adams, 2008) were all related to facets of success.

Spiritual variables that explained some of the variance were missionaries' satisfaction with their spiritual lives, personal devotions, and a sense of being "called" to missionary work (Andrews, 1999). Several findings reflected abilities and habits on the part of the missionaries, with success related to better work habits and organizational abilities (Britt, 1983), the ability to integrate life philosophy with personal/professional activities, leadership abilities, and the ability to share Christ with others (Kennedy & Dreger, 1974). Finally, social support in the form of spousal relationship quality (Andrews, 1999; Cousineau, Hall, Rosik, & Hall, 2007; Kailing, 1995; Wilcox, 1995), and quality of family relationships (Kennedy & Dreger, 1974), and the demographic variables of age (Schubert & Gantner, 1996), years worked overseas (Adams, 2008; Wilcox, 1995), and absence of special needs (e.g., physical handicaps; Kennedy & Dreger, 1974) were also predictive of success.

Suggestions for Future Research

In addition to the studies surveyed above, several articles have been written suggesting future directions for research in order to develop effective assessment tools for predicting missionary success. Schubert (1999) proposed a realistic and effective screening process for missionary selection. She also indicated that certain qualities may predict missionary success, including a spiritual match between mission agency and missionary candidate and a match between the candidate and the job location.

Powell and Andrews (1993) surveyed a group of 180 adult missionary kids (MKs) who attended boarding school, parents of MKs in boarding school, and MK boarding school personnel in order to assess the qualities desired in MK boarding school personnel. They distributed five-item, open-ended questionnaires regarding what constitutes effective boarding school personnel, essential skills required, personality traits, training, and a description of an effective boarding school employee that the respondent knows. The themes that emerged were that ideal boarding school personnel are professional, spiritual, integrated (faith, values, and Christian ideals), community-oriented, and have a sense of being "called" to this profession. More specifically, boarding school administrators should have effective communication skills, a sense of identification with the values of the organization, confidence and acceptance, and previous experience as both an administrator and a teacher. Boarding school teachers should have basic credentialing and knowledge of subject matter, knowledge of the mission field, an attitude of service, "deep Christian character," prior experience teaching in both Christian and secular schools, and the ability to integrate Christian faith into the subject matter. Houseparents should have a strong commitment to children, the ability to communicate at an emotional level, the capacity to build relationships, a high degree of marital satisfaction, exposure to psychology courses, experience in child care, and a willingness to try new things.

Foyle (1986) wrote an essay on how to choose the "right" missionary. Among her recommendations, she posited that the successful missionary is not overly rigid, immature, overly aggressive, or hypermystical. The successful missionary possesses insight, adaptability, and humility. She lists extramarital sexual activity, singleness, marital problems, previous drug involvement, the recent demise of a relationship, and occult experiences as areas of concern in the missionary candidate. Ferguson (1983) included the qualities of adaptability, teachability, flexibility, maturity, humility, sincerity, and willingness to work with others as characteristics of effective missionaries. In talks he had with missionaries, they suggested additional characteristics such as showing respect, sensitivity and control.

Cureton (1983) surveyed 44 participants in a workshop on "identifying criteria for missionary success" overseas. This workshop was conducted during the annual Mental Health and Missions conference. The participants were mental health professionals, missionary personnel, and mental health professionals with missionary experience. The subjects completed the Scales of Worker Functions (SWF), the Successful Employment Profile (SEP), and the Osgood Semantic Differential (OSD) to describe skills competence, personality traits, and interpersonal skills of the hypothetical successful missionary. The SWF is an adaptation of the Functional Job Analysis Scales originally designed for the US Employment Service. Standardization statistics were not provided for this adaptation. The SEP was researcher developed, and no standardization statistics were reported. Statistics were also not indicated for the OSD. Cureton found a great degree of agreement among the participants that the successful missionary acts his or her own age, possesses tranquility, and is emotionally stable when problem-solving. They also agreed that 18 of the 20 items on the OSD differentiated between successful and unsuccessful missionaries. While the author provided a list of these items, he did not specify how the successful vs. unsuccessful missionaries scored. Finally, he listed the task performance skills the subjects felt a successful missionary must possess. These include persuasive speaking, data collection, ability to operate equipment, basic math competency, language and writing proficiency, and practical problem-solving abilities.

Ferguson et al. (1983) surveyed 39 mission agencies that are members of the Evangelical Foreign Mission Association (EFMA). The purpose was to investigate selection procedures, number of applications received vs. number accepted, reasons for non-acceptance, average length of time a candidate worked, and importance of selection factors. The selection factors in question were training experience, personal resources, validation (applicant's credibility), and background/ status items. According to the agencies surveyed, the three main reasons for attrition were physical health, emotional adjustment, and marital adjustment. The other primary reason for missionaries leaving the field was retirement. The top ten factors for selection are depth of Christian commitment, knowledge of the Bible, past performance in church work, overall emotional stability, ability to relate to persons in other cultures, flexibility/adaptability, motivation for choice of foreign missions activity, general educational level, marriage status, and letters of reference. These factors were listed in order, beginning with the most important. These factors were rated between 5.4 and 6.7 on a Likert scale of 1 - 7.

Conclusions and Recommendations

In summary, missionaries, mission agencies, and mental health professionals experienced in working with missionaries have articulated a number of missionary characteristics that they feel are important to success. These are in addition to the missionary characteristics that have emerged through empirical research that were reviewed in the previous section. These characteristics, based on a wealth of accumulated practical wisdom, await the next step of operationalization and empirical verification of their usefulness in screening.

Taken together, the articles reviewed above highlight an important problem--the lack of systematic research in this area. Many of the authors cited above have pursued interesting assessment hypotheses based on extensive personal experience. However, there are methodological problems with most of the research and the efforts are fragmented. Several assessment instruments have been investigated in only one study; replication of results is rare. Potentially promising research programs have not been pursued.

Given this situation, and in order to advance the effectiveness of psychological assessment in the screening of missionary candidates, several recommendations are made regarding a research agenda for effective missionary assessment. These recommendations conceptualize missionary assessments within the framework of an employee selection or fit-for-placement process. The Industrial/Organizational personnel selection literature deals directly with these issues, and the standards for practice that have been developed in this subfield represent a cumulative body of knowledge that could greatly benefit the missions community. Cureton (1983) advocated the use of this framework over 25 years ago (see also Kliewer, 1983). However, because most practitioners in the area of missionary assessment are trained in clinical psychology or other mental health specialties, the "default" assessment framework has been that of a mental health evaluation.

In summary, a personnel selection approach advocates: (a) a job analysis in order to identify relevant job elements and the corresponding candidate characteristics, (b) identification or construction of appropriate instruments that address these criteria, (c) establishment of criterion-related validity of the instruments, and (d) formulation of a strategy for selection decisions (Cureton, 1983; Kaplan & Saccuzzo, 2005). The following recommendations address the issues of job analysis and the selection of instruments.

Job Analysis

Two job domains relevant to the missionary "job" were identified by Hall and Sweatman (2002; see also Kliewer, 1983): "(a) the specific job or task that will be performed by the missionary, with its attendant job skills and personality characteristics as well as the spiritual characteristics necessary for the spiritually representative nature of the missionary role; and (b) the task of adapting cross culturally" (p. 246). Some of the specific job requirements will vary greatly by assignment; specific job analyses should be done to identify the characteristics necessary to successfully complete the job. For example, translation assignments will require specific skills in linguistics.

Other aspects of the missionary "job" are common to most assignments. In general, missionary life is stressful (Carter, 1999; Gish, 1983), requiring stress resilience and the absence of certain psychopathologies which might be exacerbated by prolonged stress, could interfere with other aspects of the job, or might require treatment not available in certain overseas settings. This justifies the assessment of mental health and resiliency factors relevant to these job requirements in missionary candidates. Cross-cultural adaptability is also a job requirement. It has received substantial attention in the larger psychological literature, due to the number of secular companies and organizations that send employees overseas (for a summary, see Sam & Berry, 2006). The research in this area has led Kosic (2006) to conclude that the findings are contradictory, and that personality factors overall explain only a low percentage of the variance in acculturation. In addition, this research has been done primarily with immigrants who may differ from sojourners such as missionaries in important respects.

Because of the "unbounded" nature of the missionary job--in that the job encompasses all of a missionary's life, rather than being a 40-hour-aweek job--attempts to do job analyses could quickly get out of hand, seemingly identifying the qualities necessary for being an "ideal human being," rather than the essential qualities necessary specifically for missionary success. For example, if the literature reviewed above were to be taken as a rough "job analysis," the successful missionary possesses qualities that encompass numerous social skills, job skills, multiple facets of maturity, spirituality, education, and so on. While every employer wishes to hire the ideal human being, it is important to avoid becoming bogged down in the minutia of utilizing every possible positive attribute to predict job success. It will be of far more use to parse out the essential characteristics that predict missionary success.

Hopefully, more research will be done to refine (and reduce) the rather long list of desired characteristics identified in this review of the existing research in missionary assessment. Identifying specific job domains could be helpful in organizing and providing boundaries to these qualities. For example, a potential list of qualities that appear to be related to cultural adaptability could be empirically studied to see if they are, in fact, related to this job requirement, in order to narrow down the list of potential variables. Additionally, the relationships among relevant variables could be examined statistically to see if a large portion of the variance is captured by a smaller group of variables. This process is similar to the process through which McCrae and Costa (1997) arrived at the Big Five personality traits; they began with a long list of traits, which were reduced to five underlying factors which accounted for a substantial portion of the variance.

Instrument Selection

Once the targeted job domains are identified, relevant instruments can be selected and evaluated for their ability to predict job success. Criterion-related validity is necessary to establish the usefulness of an instrument. Criterion-related validity refers to a test's ability to predict an individual's behavior. In this specific context, it refers to the ability of the instruments to predict the desired outcomes in the missionary. This type of validity is established by comparing performance on the test with the desired goal, that is, the criterion. Much of the existing research has attempted, with varying degrees of success, to establish criterion-related validity (e.g., Britt, 1983 Schubert & Gantner, 1996), although (with the exception of Cureton, 1983; and Graham, 1988) they have been done without the benefit of a preliminary job analysis. However, it could be argued that many of the characteristics operationalized in the instruments which have been studied, would in fact emerge during a job analysis. For example, it has been argued above that mental health/resilience and cross-cultural adaptability variables are necessary for the missionary "job."

In doing this kind of research, it is necessary to first establish the desired outcomes or criteria for success. The most commonly used criteria are longevity, effectiveness and well-being/satisfaction. When possible, these should be evaluated in conjunction; while longevity and well-being are desirable, no mission agency wants missionaries who are happy and satisfied overseas, but are not effective! However, in practice the variables appear to be interrelated. The most comprehensive meta-analysis of the relationship between job satisfaction and job productivity to date, for example, suggests that there is a moderate (r = .30) correlation between the two (Judge, Thoresen, Bono, & Patton, 2001). In order to facilitate criterion-related research on assessment instruments, researchers should work in conjunction with mission agencies. Specifically, researchers should work toward gathering useful data, by suggesting promising instruments to include in the selection process, and by working with agencies to develop evaluation processes which would produce psychometrically sound information on effectiveness and satisfaction.

The above review of the literature suggests specific instruments which have shown promising results. These should be targeted for further study. For example, Kennedy and Dregers' (1974) work on the MINA should be followed up. Reported reliability coefficients ranged from .93-.73 for the individual factors and Pearson product-moment correlation coefficients ranged from .289-.025. Unfortunately, no further work has been done on this test.

In conclusion, there is a great deal of work to be done in the area of predicting missionary job success. If researchers in this area consolidate their efforts, ideas, and expertise, in order to conduct studies that are methodologically sound and conceptually focused, there is a great deal of potential to provide valuable assistance to mission organizations in both hiring potentially successful missionaries, as well as providing ongoing support for missionary job success. It is hoped that this review of the existing literature and brief research proposal will provide a starting point for experienced researchers to collaborate with mission agencies in this important task.

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Amy E. Cousineau

M. Elizabeth Lewis Hall

Biola University

Christopher H. Rosik

Link Care Center

Todd W. Hall

Biola University

Correspondence regarding this article should be addressed to Liz Hall, Ph.D., Rosemead School of Psychology, Biola University, 13800 Biola Ave., La Mirada, CA 90639; liz.hall@biola.edu

Authors

Amy E. Cousineau (Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Rosemead School of Psychology) is the Assessment Program Manager at Hillsides, a nonprofit foster care and treatment center. Dr. Cousineau's interests include assessment of children, childhood trauma and abuse, and Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders.

M. Elizabeth Lewis Hall (Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Rosemead School of Psychology) is Professor of Psychology at Biola University and a licensed psychologist. She received her degree in Clinical Psychology from Rosemead School of Psychology, Biola University. Research and specialty areas include women and work, missions and mental health, and psychodynamic theory and practice.

Christopher H. Rosik (Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Fuller Graduate School of Psychology) is a psychologist and Director of Research at the Link Care Center (Fresno, CA) and a clinical faculty member at Fresno Pacific University. Dr. Rosik's interests include member care, the dissociative disorders, and human sexuality.

Todd W. Hall (Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology, Rosemead School of Psychology) is Professor of Psychology at Rosemead School of Psychology, Biola University, and Director of The Institute for Research on Psychology and Spirituality (IRPS) at Rosemead. He is also the Editor of the Journal of Psychology and Theology. His research interests include relational spirituality, religious measurement, and faith development among college students.