Racial Discrimination in Hiring Remains Entrenched

A new study led by a researcher at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, found no change in rates of discrimination against African-Americans in field experiments of hiring from 1990 to 2015.

The authors examined 28 different studies representing 55,842 job applications submitted for 26,326 positions. They found that since 1989, Whites receive on average 36 percent more callbacks than African Americans and that this rate remained constant over the period.

“It is often suggested that prejudice and discrimination are fading out over time through a gradual process of liberalization of attitudes,” said Lincoln Quillian, senior author of the study and professor of sociology in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern. “But we found striking stability in discrimination against African-Americans.”

The full study, “Meta-analysis of Field Experiments Shows No Change in Racial Discrimination in Hiring Over Time,” was published on the website of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It may be accessed here.

Related Articles

1 COMMENT

  1. I am not attempting to trivilize the black woman’s plight. I know they are suffering as well. But, I believe the hiring discrimination practices effect black masculine heterosexual males more. It is due to the perceived threat of being a black man.

    Moreover, I wish this study went deeper investigating if homosexual black males face the same obsticles. I hypothesize that it is properly not to the same extant.

Leave a Reply

Get the JBHE Weekly Bulletin

Receive our weekly email newsletter delivered to your inbox

Latest News

Black First-Year Student Enrollment Plummets at Harvard Law

This academic year, only 19 Black students enrolled in Harvard Law's first-year class. This is the lowest number of Black first-year law students at Harvard since 1965.

Recent Books of Interest to African American Scholars

The Journal of Blacks in Higher Education regularly publishes a list of new books that may be of interest to our readers. The books included are on a wide variety of subjects and present many different points of view.

While Diversity Among College-Educated Adults Increases, Diversity in the Teacher Workforce Lags Behind

A new study has found that while diversity has grown among America's college-educated adults , diversity in the country's teacher workforce is lagging behind.

Soyica Diggs Colbert Appointed Interim Provost at Georgetown University

A Georgetown faculty member for more than a decade, Dr. Colbert has been serving as the inaugural vice president for interdisciplinary studies and the Idol Family Professor in the department of Black studies and the department of performing arts.

Featured Jobs