Stigma's van minder flexibiliteit en minder technologische kennis verlagen jobkansen voor 50-plussers

Research has shown that hiring discrimination towards older job applicants is a severe problem in Belgium. However, little is known about the reasons for this form of discrimination. In this study, we present a vignette experiment conducted among 193 Flemish HR professionals to empirically investigate which stereotypes and attitudes towards older job candidates explain age discrimination in hiring practices. Each participant assessed five fictitious job candidates on a number of characteristics. This resulted in 965 sets of observations. Our results indicate that recruiters associate an older age mentioned in a CV with lower physical capacities, less technological know-how, lower flexibility, lower trainability and a higher degree of reliability. Additionally, recruiters presume that other employees will be less inclined to collaborate with older job candidates. Of these different age signals, the perceptions of flexibility and technological know-how serve as the main explanations for the negative effect of one's age on one's hiring opportunities. Furthermore, we find that discrimination is more severe in jobs that are associated with high physical effort. This study is socially relevant since the effectiveness of anti-discrimination policies depends on the extent to which these policies respond to the mechanisms and moderators underlying discrimination.