Measuring Beliefs: Accept no Substitutes

Abstract

Ever since Hambrick and Mason suggested that external individual characteristics can be used as substitutes for individuals' cognitive bases, management researchers have been using these characteristics as proxies for cognition. However, the actual evidence for a relationship between cognitive bases and individual characteristics is equivocal at best. My study of 91 managers showed a relationship between some of the most cited characteristics and beliefs, but I argue that such a finding does not support substituting characteristics for cognition.