The Effect of Gender Expectations and Physical Attractiveness on Discussion of Weakness in Online Professional Recommendations

Rohit Aggarwal (), Vishal Midha () and Nicholas Sullivan ()
Additional contact information
Rohit Aggarwal: David Eccles School of Business, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112
Vishal Midha: College of Business, Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois 61761
Nicholas Sullivan: School of Business Administration, University of Dayton, Dayton, Ohio 45469

Information Systems Research, 2024, vol. 35, issue 1, 87-103

Abstract: In the current professional environment, recruiters are using online professional networks at an increasing rate to find qualified candidates for job openings. Online professional recommendations on these sites can provide valuable information; however, because of the medium by which they are provided, their effectiveness may suffer from lower levels of trust. We theoretically conjecture why including a discussion of a candidate’s weakness (termed, scope of improvement) can lead to a higher likelihood of a recruiter being willing to interview a candidate. We theorize that the effect of scope of improvement will depend on the nature of the weakness discussed and the physical attractiveness of the candidate, which is only relevant in an online context where that information is known. Analysis of the data we collected from industry professionals indicates that for average candidates, scope of improvement has a positive effect when the scope discussed does not counter expectations derived from common gender stereotypes (referred to as gender-expected scope), and a negative effect when it does. For attractive candidates, any discussion of scope has a negative effect. A theoretical contribution is our explaining the process of how different types of scope effect the likelihood of interview across different levels of attractiveness. Another theoretical contribution was the counterfactual performed in a second study to show how reinforcement of gender-expected strengths can attenuate the penalty of gender-expected scope for attractive candidates. Findings indicate that the penalty observed for attractive candidates can be avoided by reinforcing traits commonly associated with their gender. Data for both studies were collected from industry professionals involved in the hiring process, allowing us to offer practical guidelines to users of online professional networks.

Keywords: online professional networks; professional recommendations; gender expectations; physical attractiveness; online trust (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/isre.2021.1032 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:orisre:v:35:y:2024:i:1:p:87-103

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Information Systems Research from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().