I__. - International Military Testing Association

Continuing Assessment of Cleared Personnel in the Military Services
Michael 3. Bosshardt
David A. DuBois
Personnel Decisions Research Institutes, Inc.
Kent S. Crawford
The Defense Personnel Security Research and Education Center
Problem and Backqround
Examination of recent espionage cases suggests that few spies enter
government service with the intent to commit espionage. Instead, most
individuals become spies as a result of personal and situational factors
that occur after they receive a personnel security clearance. This
suggests that an ongoing program of continuing assessment (CA) for cleared
personnel should be an important component of the personnel security
process.
Two other factors underscore the importance of the CA program. First,
initial clearance screening procedures tend to be costly, involve
conditions of very low base rates, and have unknown validity. Second,
hostile intelligence activities probably focus more effort on currently
cleared personnel than on uncleared individuals.
Despite its importance and the fact that formal CA programs have been in
existence for a number of years, little is known about operational CA
programs (DOD Security Review Commission, 1985). In order to address this
deficiency, a project was initiated to evaluate how well CA programs are
operating in the military services. The principal activities in this
project included a review of regulations and literature related to CA
(DuBois & Bosshardt, 1990), a survey of personnel at 60 Army, Air Force,
Navy, and Marines Corps installations world-wide to obtain detailed
information about CA programs (Bosshardt, DuBois, Crawford, & McGuire,
1990; Bosshardt, DuBois, & Crawford, 1990a), and an analysis of systems
issues related to CA (Bosshardt, DuBois, & Crawford, 1990b).
Objectives
The objectives of this paper are to (1) present some of the key findings of
this survey of CA programs and (2) provide a preliminary assessment of the
effectiveness of these programs.
Approach
The initial step in the study involved a review of regulations and
literature related to CA. We then conducted a series of meetings with
service branch headquarters and adjudication officials to gain a further
understanding of CA policies and programs. Following this, nine military
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