Brody's Notes... Harvard Study Shows Discrimination Against Gay Job Applicants

András Tilcsik

By Brody Levesque | CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS -- In an audit study conducted by Harvard researcher András Tilcsik, published this week in the American Journal of Sociology, its results showed that males seeking employment in the southern and Midwestern United States were less likely to be hired if they appeared to be gay, versus applicants who displayed stereotypical heteronormal characteristics.

Tilcsik's research team sent a pair of résumés to 1,769 employment listings for office or managerial positions in seven states. One résumé listed relevant job experience as a treasurer for a university LGBTQ society, the other résumé in each pair was randomly assigned experience in a control organization.

The results revealed that the résumé without the gay reference had an 11.5 per cent chance of the applicant called in for an employment interview. Conversely, the résumé listing the gay society expereince had only a 7.2 per cent chance. The difference amounted to a 40 per cent higher chance of the heterosexual applicant getting a call.

The researchers discovered that there were minimal differences found in typical employer interest and callback ratios for the for Western and North-Eastern states, however states in the South and Midwest – Florida, Ohio and Texas – had the largest differences in callback rates.

“The results indicate that gay men encounter significant barriers in the hiring process because, at the initial point of contact, employers more readily disqualify openly gay applicants than equally qualified heterosexual applicants.

It seems, therefore, that the discrimination documented in this study is partly rooted in specific stereotypes and cannot be completely reduced to a general antipathy against gay employees,” Mr Tilcsik wrote.