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EMPLOYMENT PSYCHOLOGY 
hardly likely to answer: “Oh, the foreman was all 
right. It was all my fault.” Obviously not. If an ap 
plicant is looking for work elsewhere, it is very often 
because there was a hitch in his relations with his previous 
employers. But to stand up for these is to discredit him 
self, and as an ordinary human being, in search of another 
job, it is expecting too much of the loyalty of any individ 
ual to have him cast reflections upon himself. And as for 
the item, poor, but thinks well of us, can an applicant do 
anything but think well of the company with which he is 
trying to find work? Would any applicant be likely to 
say: “I don’t think much of this company, but I need a 
job so badly that I am willing to take it anywhere”? 
Questions of this kind are obviously not worth asking. 
In questions of all kinds, the effect of suggestion cannot 
be overestimated. The interviewer may ask his questions 
in such a way as really to predetermine the answer which 
he shall receive. In the item of sobriety, for instance, the 
interviewer may look sternly at the applicant and ask, 
in an almost threatening voice: “Do you drink?” The 
inevitable answer to a question asked in such a way is a 
horrified: “Oh, no, sir!” There are innumerable ways of 
asking this question. One might ask, following the items 
mentioned: “Are you a hard drinker or a moderate 
drinker?” The inevitable answer to this question will 
naturally be: “Moderate.” And one would hardly ex 
pect an applicant to answer to his detriment the question: 
“Do you get drunk often or only once in a while?” On 
the other hand, if an interviewer asks, with a disarming 
smile: “About how much do you drink?” he may get an 
answer somewhere near the truth. However, even this 
is very uncertain. Where an industry is known to refuse 
all applicants who are anything but total abstainers, the