What is in the name? How can the names of the names bias the employment decisions

Imagine that you are employing a person in a job that requires a nice, acceptable and cooperative person. You have two candidates and all you know about their names: Rene and Greta. Who do you think will be better?

If you are like people in Our modern study When contracting the rulings, you may choose Rene. We have found that the most easy names like Rene had preferred to reach more harsh names like Greta for certain types of jobs.

The idea that the sound of the word can make it better suitable for meanings or qualities known as healthy symbolism. It indicates that even a small thing like audio in the name can carry a sudden weight in how people are judged.

Symbolism

The best known example of vocal symbolism is the effect of Bouba/Kiki. Through languages ​​and culturesPeople tend to match the word “Bouba” in round and “kiki” shapes with that thorny.

Why is this still discussed. Various interpretations Existing, including Physical feeling From pronouncing words or method Tradition features Tour against thorny objects.

Several years ago, we tested whether the effect of Bouba/Kiki Spread beyond the words that were invented into real first names. In one part of that study, we showed silhouettes of the participants who were either round or thorny and asked them to match them with names.

Not only do people link names like Bob with circular silhouette and kirk with a thorny silhouette, But people also link these names with different personal characteristics.

More smooth names such as Liam or Noelle were judged as more acceptable and emotional, while the names of Sprlett like Tate or Krista were judged as more separate.

More importantly, this does not mean that the interface was actually more acceptable than Tates. In fact, when we looked at more than 1,000 people, we found no sign of the existence of these patterns in the real world. However, people still make associations based on the voices of names.

Names and employment decisions

In our The latest studyWe were curious to find out how these associations could affect the rulings in the context of the real world: employment. Of course, employers usually have a lot of name, but there are many cases in which candidates are examined based on limited information only.

There is also a lot of evidence that social and demographic signals in the name race and age– It can affect someone who gets a call response. The sound of the name itself can be another possible source of bias.

We designed job ads that looked for a high candidate in one of Six personal factors: Honesty, emotion, diastole, consensus, conscience (how a person organizes or works hard) and openness to experience. For example, he read one advertisement looking for an acceptable candidate: “The organization is looking to employ a new employee. The perfect applicant must be for this job: cooperative, calm, non -aggressive.”

Then a sample of adults who was recruited online was given a pair of names and asked them to decide who seemed to be suitable for this job. One name in the husband contained the so -called “Sonorant” (L, M, N) that looks special and particularly continuous.

The other contained the so -called “cesspits without sound” (P, T, K), which looks particularly surprising. For example, they may have to choose between Liam and Tate.

In our study, people took decisions for many pairs of different names, and the general conclusion in three experiences was that the most smooth names, such as Liam and Noelle, were judged as better functions to search for a high person in a state of sincerity, passion, compatibility and openness.

When more information is available

We also tested what is happening when providing additional information. For example, what if the participants watched Liam in a picture or saw a video of him answering questions about himself?

We found that when people saw pictures of the candidates (randomly associated with names), the effect of the name’s voice decreased. When people watched an interview recorded on a video of job candidates, the name of the name no longer has an effect on the provisions of their personality.

We also asked the participants about the quality of a specific name for the video candidate in the video. When people felt that a suitable name for a candidate – is not besieged of the sound – the candidate was judged more positively in almost every action, including warmth and efficiency.

In other words, it seems that there is a benefit from having a name that suits it, although it has not yet known why the names of some people seem to suit them better than others.

Combined, these results show that the name of the name may be an additional source of bias in employment decisions. When people do not have many details about the candidate, there seems to be a lot.

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