What Does Job Applicants' Body Art Signal to Employers?

Stijn Baert, Jolien Herregods and Philippe Sterkens ()
Additional contact information
Jolien Herregods: Ghent University
Philippe Sterkens: Ghent University

No 16311, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: In this study, we present a state-of-the-art scenario experiment which, for the first time in the literature, directly measures the stigma surrounding job candidates with tattoos and piercings using real recruiters. We find that job candidates with body art are perceived as less pleasant to work with, less honest, less emotionally stable, less agreeable, less conscientious and less manageable. This goes hand in hand with lower hireability for men with body art but not for women. Compared to candidates who reveal obesity, a characteristic we also randomise, those with body art score better overall in terms of hireability and rated personality, similar in terms of rated taste to collaborate but worse in terms of rated direct productivity drivers.

Keywords: taste discrimination; hiring; personality; stigma; obesity; body art; statistical discrimination (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 J24 J71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 32 pages
Date: 2023-07
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp, nep-hea and nep-lma
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Published - published in: Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2024, 217, 742 - 755

Downloads: (external link)
https://docs.iza.org/dp16311.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Journal Article: What does job applicants’ body art signal to employers? (2024)
Working Paper: What does job applicants' body art signal to employers? (2023)
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:iza:izadps:dp16311

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
IZA, Margard Ody, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA) IZA, P.O. Box 7240, D-53072 Bonn, Germany. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Holger Hinte ().