Abstract

Much research focuses on religious bias and in particular the marginalization of Muslims in America. What initially surprised post 9-11 researchers is that participants typically rank atheists lower than Muslims in the areas of private and public trust. Further research is needed to continue to understand the nature and extent of religious-based bias. The present study explores whether a job candidate's religion impacts perception of the candidate's "hireability" and source credibility, including elements of trustworthiness, expertise and attractiveness. Participants were randomly assigned to review an identical version of a resume in which only the implied religion of the candidate was manipulated. One line of the candidate's resume suggested that the candidate was Christian, Muslim, Scientologist, Atheist or no religion was indicated. Participants then rated the candidate using a 3-question Hireability Index (Rudman & Glick, 2001) and the Source-Credibility Scale (SCS: Ohanian, 1990). The SCS contains 3 subscales measuring Attractiveness, Expertise and Trustworthiness. In this study, attractiveness emerged as a variable influenced by the religion of the candidate. Trends in the data also suggest that the candidate's religion may influence the candidate's overall Hireability Index score as well. The results suggest that religion may influence variables related to hireability but seem to more strongly influence personal variables such as ratings of attractiveness when the ratings are made by participants who are young and educated.

Notes

If this is your Honors thesis, and want to learn how to access it or for more information about readership statistics, contact us at STARS@ucf.edu

Thesis Completion

2013

Semester

Spring

Advisor

Mottarella, Karen

Degree

Bachelor of Science (B.S.)

College

College of Sciences

Degree Program

Psychology

Subjects

Dissertations, Academic -- Sciences;Sciences -- Dissertations, Academic

Format

PDF

Identifier

CFH0004368

Language

English

Access Status

Open Access

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Document Type

Honors in the Major Thesis

Download

Included in

Psychology Commons

Share

COinS