DECISION-MAKING SKILLS AND HETEROSOCIAL COMPETENCE IN COLLEGE-WOMEN - AN INFORMATION-PROCESSING ANALYSIS

The Inventory of Decisions, Evaluations, and Actions (IDEA) was developed to assess interpersonal problem-solving skills in college women. It consists of 40 items depicting a range of heterosocial problem situations commonly faced by college women, along with item-specific rating criteria based on college men's judgments of response effectiveness. IDEA items were presented via audiotape to 52 women who previously had been identified by sociometric peer ratings as either above average (competent, n = 27) or below average (less competent, n = 25) at solving interpersonal problems with college men. Subjects' audiotaped responses were rated blindly by judges, who showed high interrater agreement. Overall, the competent group earned significantly higher mean ratings on the IDEA than did the less competent group (p < .001). As predicted, subjects with high IDEA scores differed from those with low IDEA scores on several theoretically derived subscales aimed at assessing subcomponents of decision making within McFall's (1982) social information-processing model of competence. Although a few of these component measures failed to show a significant correlation with IDEA performance, in general the correlational evidence indicated that subjects who performed less competently on the IDEA tended to be deficient in their ability to generate, select, and evaluate the optimal responses to problem situations. The study supports the validity of the IDEA and highlights the potential value of a social information-processing analysis of heterosocial competence.