Factors Underlying the Psychological and Behavioral Characteristics of Office of Strategic Services Candidates: The Assessment of Men Data Revisited

Abstract

During World War II, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the forerunner of the Central Intelligence Agency, sought the assistance of clinical psychologists and psychiatrists to establish an assessment program for evaluating candidates for the OSS. The assessment team developed a novel and rigorous program to evaluate OSS candidates. It is described in Assessment of Men: Selection of Personnel for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS Assessment Staff, 1948). This study examines the sole remaining multivariate data matrix that includes all final ratings for a group of candidates (n = 133) assessed near the end of the assessment program. It applies the modern statistical methods of both exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis to this rich and highly unique data set. An exploratory factor analysis solution suggested 3 factors underlie the OSS assessment staff ratings. Confirmatory factor analysis results of multiple plausible substantive models reveal that a 3-factor model provides the best fit to these data. The 3 factors are emotional/interpersonal factors (social relations, emotional stability, security), intelligence processing (effective IQ, propaganda skills, observing and reporting), and agency/surgency (motivation, energy and initiative, leadership, physical ability). These factors are discussed in terms of their potential utility for personnel selection within the intelligence community.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I thank Charles Pinck of The OSS Society of Falls Church, VA, for his gracious assistance in facilitating access to former members of the OSS. I thank former members of the OSS for their time and energy in providing valuable insights regarding their experiences in the OSS. I thank John Harding, PhD (late), and Urie Bronfenbrenner, PhD (late), former members of the assessment staff at Station S, and John L. Behling, PhD, former OSS officer, for helpful discussions. I am also grateful to L. Morgan Banks, PhD, for helpful comments on an early version of this article.

Notes

¹ Not all of those who served in the OSS were processed through the assessment protocol described here even after it was established at Station S and other locations. Some members were recruited directly into the OSS from within active combat zones without completing an assessment. Such recruits needed only to secure a release from their previously assigned unit to move into the OSS (John Behling, PhD, personal communication, January 30, 2013).

² “Motivation for assignment” was thought to consist of two distinct variables throughout most of the OSS assessment program's duration; namely (a) desire to accomplish an assignment in the OSS, and (b) level of energy and initiative in relation to achieving goals (see OSS Assessment Staff, 1948, p. 233). At some points in the program, the two variables were treated as a single composite for some candidate classes. This can be seen, for example, in the rating sheet displayed in Figure 1, which contains only a “motivation” category, which merged the two variables. However, for most of the time, motivation for assignment and energy and initiative were assessed and considered separately at Station S. Importantly, the data used in this study were derived from a period in the OSS assessment program where these two variables were unambiguously separated. This allows for motivation for assignment and energy and initiative to be treated as two distinct variables in the statistical analyses in this report.

³ In considering the potential utility of these models in terms of their constituent constructs and how these constructs might be of use today in assessing and selecting individuals for intelligence services (including clandestine operations) and special operations, one should clearly consider the possibility that the relationship of the factors in these models to success in performance might be nonlinear. That is, it might be that there is a best fit on each (or an optimal combination of the three) factor(s) that is related to success in functioning in target roles. This important observation was generously shared by an anonymous reviewer of this article.