Language and Prejudice in the Online Job-Matching Process

• In Event: 589 - Regular Session. Gender Bias, Segregation, and Opportunities at Work

Abstract

Research on gender segregation has tended to focus extensively either on the role of employers’ preferences during the hiring of employees or the role of job seekers’ choices during their job search. Far less understood, however, is how interactions between recruiters and job candidates may also operate to influence gender inequality even before formal job applications are submitted. Here, we identify and test three interactional mechanisms—job gendering, gender stereotyping, and in-group gender preference—that may influence how job seekers behave at the very first phase of the job-matching process. Using unique data from a field study (Study 1) and an audit study (Study 2) of online job postings, we first investigate the job gendering mechanism by testing whether the words recruiters use to advertise jobs (masculine and/or feminine words) vary systematically in agreement with their gender. Second, we investigate the gender stereotyping mechanism by testing whether the masculine and/or feminine words recruiters use to describe jobs to candidates differentially affect female and male job seekers’ interests in applying. Finally, we investigate the in-group gender preference mechanism by testing whether job seekers are more likely to inquire about jobs when the gender of the recruiter is similar to their own. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for the study of employment practices regarding job postings—particularly, who (male versus female recruiter), how (use of masculine and/or feminine language) and where (online platform where gender is revealed) jobs are advertised may sustain gender segregation in today’s labor markets.

Authors

• Hye Jin Rho, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

• Emilio J. Castilla, Massachusetts Institute of Technology