Digital Natives and Signaling in Employment Interviews: An Inquiry into the Acceptance and Perceived Fairness of Different Interview Modes

Abstract

The paper investigates the signaling behavior of digital natives in employment interviews and analyses how applicant reactions differ in face-to-face versus video-mediated contexts. The social presence within the interview setting and the possibility to employ impression management tactics are of particular interest to understand the subjective acceptance and perceived fairness of the two types of selection procedures. The analyses of novel primary data from a German survey with 513 valid responses reveals that digital natives, similar to older applicants, appreciate signaling to lower information asymmetries. Regardless of interview mode, social presence and impression management are strong positive drivers of acceptance and perceived fairness. While members of the generational cohort still accept face-to-face interviews more than those mediated by videoconferencing technology, they perceive the former as less fair. This result, which may be explained by the specific characteristics of digital natives, contradicts the findings of studies that have investigated preceding generations. Hence, the paper complements the literature on applicant reactions by focusing on two younger generational cohorts, namely Generation Y and Z. Furthermore, the adoption of the signaling framework in this context reveals that the beneficial effects of signaling may stand vis-à-vis feelings of unfairness, which can be interpreted as additional psychological costs that are driven by moral considerations.