Employing Ex-Offenders: Hiring Decisions and the Role of Employers' Subjective Beliefs about Offenders' Redeemability

• In Event: Factors Affecting the Desistance Process

Abstract

Current research demonstrates a number of objective factors associated with employers’ unwillingness to hire job applicants with a criminal record. These relate to characteristics of the applicant’s criminal history, the socio-demographic attributes of both the applicant and employer, as well as the organisational context within which hiring decisions are being made. However, social psychologists propose the process of making decisions about others is influenced by both objective factors and subjective beliefs. In response to their proposal, this study applied the principles of ‘belief in redeemability’ to examine whether and how employers’ subjective beliefs about the capacity for offenders to change and desist from crime was instrumental to their hiring decisions. A two phase mixed methods approach was employed. Phase one comprised an online quantitative survey of employers (n=367) in the Toowoomba, Australia region. Follow up face to face interviews were then conducted in phase two with a sample of self-selected respondents (n=45) from phase one. This paper will present some of the integrated results from this investigation as well as the broader implications emerging from this research.

Author

• Suzanne Reich, University of Queensland