A selection from Stockholm University publication database

• Is there a rating bias of job candidates based on gender and parenthood? A laboratory experiment on hiring for an accounting job

  2023. Anni Erlandsson, Magnus Bygren, Michael Gähler. Acta Sociologica

  Article

  Biased practices by employers have been suggested as one possible cause for the observed gender disparities in labor market outcomes. While US-based laboratory experiments show a clear motherhood penalty in recruitment, European laboratory experiments on the topic are to our knowledge lacking. We conducted a laboratory experiment with 228 university students to study a potential gender bias in the evaluation of (fictitious) job candidates for an accounting manager position, and how recruitment decisions are made. We explore two dimensions of decision-making, that is, evaluators’ individual ratings and collectively made ratings. The results show a statistically significant gender bias in job applicant ratings in favor of female applicants. Thus, female job applicants are more often than male applicants rated as the top candidates, regardless of their parental status. Also, we find no motherhood penalty in the applicant ratings. Moreover, there is a statistically significant pro-female bias in applicant ratings made by female evaluators individually and by all-female evaluation groups.

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• Gendered ethnic discrimination and the role of recruiter gender: A field experiment

  2023. Anni Erlandsson. Acta Sociologica

  Article

  Relying on data from a large-scale field experiment in Sweden, this article studies discrimination in recruitment on the basis of gender and ethnicity combined with recruiter gender. The study includes 5641 job applications sent in response to advertised vacancies, and the employer callbacks to these. Gender and either a Swedish or a foreign-sounding name were randomly assigned to the applications, and recruiter gender was documented whenever available. Based on the callback rates, there is evidence of ethnic discrimination against foreign-named job applicants by both male and female recruiters. Also, male applicants with foreign-sounding names are discriminated more than female applicants with foreign-sounding names. Thus, the results show gendered ethnic discrimination in the Swedish labor market, and this does not appear to depend on recruiter gender in general. However, the patterns for gendered ethnic discrimination by recruiter gender vary across occupational categories.

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• Gender, Parenthood, Ethnicity and Discrimination in the Labor Market: Experimental Studies on Discrimination in Recruitment in Sweden

  2022. Anni Erlandsson.

  Thesis (Doc)

  This dissertation uses experimental methods to study hiring discrimination based on gender, parenthood and ethnicity in the Swedish labor market. Also, the role of recruiter gender for gender and ethnic discrimination is studied. Three of the four empirical studies (Study I, Study II and Study IV), are based on field experiment data using a correspondence testing method. This involves fictitious job applications sent to announced jobs, and the employer responses to these. Signals of applicant characteristics such as gender, parenthood status, and ethnicity are randomly assigned to the job applications whereas qualifications are held constant (within occupations). Study III is based on a laboratory experiment in which (fictious) job candidates are evaluated.

  Study I does not show any evidence of discrimination based on gender or parenthood, or any combination of these, in the first step of the hiring process, neither in highly nor less qualified occupations. Study II shows that male job applicants are favored by male recruiters, especially in gender-balanced occupations.

  Study III shows a statistically significant gender bias in job applicant ratings in favor of female applicants in a laboratory setting. This is particularly the case for female evaluators. Moreover, Study III shows no motherhood penalty in the applicant ratings.

  Study IV presents evidence of ethnic discrimination against foreign-named job applicants by both male and female recruiters. Further, there is evidence of gendered ethnic discrimination, i.e., male applicants with foreign-sounding names receive considerably fewer positive responses than female applicants with foreign-sounding names. While female recruiters favor foreign-named female applicants over foreign-named male applicants, particularly in highly qualified occupations, male recruiters appear to prefer foreign-named females over foreign-named males in male-dominated occupations.

  To summarize, the findings from this dissertation provide little support for the notion of discrimination in recruitment as an important mechanism behind gender inequalities in the Swedish labor market. However, the results indicate that discrimination in the recruitment process contributes to the labor market inequality of ethnic minorities, and of ethnic minority men in particular. Moreover, the findings suggest that recruiter gender matters for the success of male and female job candidates, and in particular for foreign-named men and women, at least in some occupational contexts.

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• Do Men Favor Men in Recruitment? A Field Experiment in the Swedish Labor Market

  2019. Anni Erlandsson. Work and occupations 46 (3), 239-264

  Article

  Utilizing a field experiment design, this article examines whether discrimination based on any combination of job applicant gender and recruiter gender occurs in the first stage of the recruitment process, that is, selecting applicants to be contacted. This study includes 1,643 job applications in the Swedish labor market. Overall, based on the callbacks received, male recruiters, unlike female recruiters, are found to contact male applicants more often than female applicants. The results show a pro-male bias by male recruiters in gender-mixed occupations, whereas no significant gender differences in callbacks by recruiter gender are found in male- and female-dominated occupations.

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• Do Employers Prefer Fathers? Evidence from a Field Experiment Testing the Gender by Parenthood Interaction Effect on Callbacks to Job Applications

  2017. Magnus Bygren, Erlandsson Anni, Michael Gähler. European Sociological Review 33 (3), 337-348

  Article

  In research on fatherhood premiums and motherhood penalties in career-related outcomes, employers’ discriminatory behaviours are often argued to constitute a possible explanation for observed gender gaps. However, there is as yet no conclusive evidence of such discrimination. Utilizing a field experiment design, we test (i) whether job applicants are subject to recruitment discrimination on the basis of their gender and parenthood status, and (ii) whether discrimination by gender and parenthood is conditional on the qualifications required by the job applied for. We applied for 2,144 jobs in the Swedish labour market, randomly assigning gender and parenthood status to fictitious job applicants. Based on the rate of callbacks, we do not find that employers practise systematic recruitment discrimination on the basis of the job applicants’ gender or parental status, neither in relation to less qualified nor more highly qualified jobs.

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• Child Home Care Allowance and the Transition to Second- and Third-Order Births in Finland

  2017. Anni Erlandsson. Population 36 (4), 607-630

  Article

  Using register data from the Finnish Census Panel, this paper studies the relationship between the use of the child home care allowance and second and third births among women aged 20-44 in Finland during the period 1992-2007. Discrete-time event-history analysis is applied to examine (i) whether women taking up the child home care allowance while their previous child was under the age of 3 have a higher risk to proceed to subsequent childbearing, (ii) whether these women proceed to a further birth more quickly, and (iii) whether the risk to proceed to a subsequent birth is related to educational level. The results show that women using the allowance have a higher risk of having a second and a third birth than women not using it. The risk of having a second birth is higher than that of having a third birth. Also, women using the allowance get their subsequent child sooner than women not using the allowance. No large educational differences in the effect of allowance use are found for second or third births.

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• Gendered Relationship of Childbearing with Earnings Accumulated by Midlife in Two Nordic Welfare States

  2024. Jessica Nisén, Anni Erlandsson, Marika Jalovaara. Journal of Family and Economic Issues

  Article

  The Nordic welfare states are considered advanced in terms of gender equality, but even in these countries women still take longer family leave and have lower earnings than men. This study provides new insights by assessing the differences in accumulated midlife earnings associated with childbearing between women and men in Finland and Sweden. We pay particular attention to the size of the gender gap in accumulated earnings across groups. We hypothesize that the gender gap will be larger among those with a larger number of children, among those with a lower level of education, and overall in Finland. The study is based on complete population register data, with highly accurate measures of earnings over decades. Our results show that by the age of 44, women born in 1974–1975 in Finland and Sweden had earned on average 32% and 29% less than men, respectively. Childbearing strongly modifies the gender gap, especially in Finland, and the highly educated have moderately smaller gaps in both countries. Our results show that, even the Nordic welfare states, despite their strong policy emphasis on gender equality and their success in achieving high levels of female labor force participation, are far from closing the gender gap in earnings accumulated over the first half of the life course. Our results also suggest that governments seeking to achieve gender equality should be cautious about providing long family-related leave with flat-rate compensation.

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Show all publications by Anni Erlandsson at Stockholm University