Costly mistakes: Why and when spelling errors in resumes jeopardise interview chances

Philippe Sterkens, Ralf Caers, Marijke De Couck, Victor Van Driessche, Michael Geamanu and Stijn Baert

PLOS ONE, 2023, vol. 18, issue 4, 1-20

Abstract: The analysis of hiring penalties due to spelling errors has been restricted to white-collar occupations and error-laden resumes. Moreover, the mechanisms underlying these penalties remained unclear. To fill these gaps, we conducted a scenario experiment with 445 recruiters. Compared to error-free resumes, hiring penalties are inflicted for error-laden resumes (18.5 percent points lower interview probability) and resumes with fewer errors (7.3 percent points lower interview probability). Furthermore, we find heterogeneity in penalties inflicted. Half of the penalty can be explained by the perceptions that applicants making spelling errors have lower interpersonal skills (9.0%), conscientiousness (12.1%) and mental abilities (32.2%).

Date: 2023
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0283280 (text/html)
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id= ... 83280&type=printable (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Costly Mistakes: Why and When Spelling Errors in Resumes Jeopardise Interview Chances (2021)
Working Paper: Costly Mistakes: Why and When Spelling Errors in Resumes Jeopardise Interview Chances (2021)
Working Paper: Costly Mistakes: Why and When Spelling Errors in Resumes Jeopardise Interview Chances (2021)
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:plo:pone00:0283280

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0283280

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in PLOS ONE from Public Library of Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by plosone ().