Why do I like people like me?

Manuel Bagues and María José Pérez Villadóniga

DEE - Working Papers. Business Economics. WB from Universidad Carlos III de Madrid. Departamento de Economía de la Empresa

Abstract: In many dimensions the ability to assess knowledge depends critically on the observer's own knowledge of that dimension. Building on this feature, this paper offers both theoretical and empirical evidence showing that, in those tasks where multidisciplinary knowledge is required, evaluations exhibit a similar-to-me effect: candidates who excel in the same dimensions as the evaluator tend to be ranked relatively higher. It is also shown that, if races or genders differ in their distribution of ability, group discrimination will arise unless evaluators (i) are well informed about the extent of intergroup differences and (ii) they may condition their assessments on candidates' group belonging.

Keywords: Statistical; discrimination; Evaluation; biases (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D82 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-hpe and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

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Journal Article: Why do I like people like me? (2013)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cte:wbrepe:wb080601

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