Comparison of Recognition and Recall Responses to Written Test Items for a Fire Captain Promotional Examination

This study compared responses to recognition and recall test items for firefighters who took a written test as part of a promotional procedure for municipal fire captain. The objective of the study was to determine if recall test items would provide additional information for public personnel officers to use in making promotions based on merit. As expected, results showed that the recall test items were more difficult than the recognition items for 72 white subjects and 6 black subjects. There was no difference between whites and blacks on the recognition items, the recall items, or the total scores. However, a significant correlation of .68 was found between the recognition and recall test items for the total group of subjects, suggesting that little benefit is gained from using the recall items for promotional examinations in public employment settings, especially when considering the time and difficulty involved in scoring recall test items.