The use of conjoint analysis in revealing preferences for hiring: The gender bias effect

This study examines if gender bias affects the recruitment process for top managerial positions in Chile. Using conjoint analysis, we evaluate how recruiters, a sample of 114 business postgraduate students, ranked a set of multi-attribute profiles, showing their preferences among profiles and the trade-off among attributes they are willing to do.

Results show that a female prospect is less preferred to a male one, but also that that there are other variables that affect recruitment decisions. Recruiters preferred a married prospect to a single or divorce one, and better if she/he has children. Also, results show that the age of the recruiters is an important variable and affects their preferences. For young recruiters’ job experience is very important, while for elder recruiters age is the most important variable. In contrast to previous research, and surprisingly, our results show that gender is the less important variable in the recruitment process.