Page 402 - Discrimination at Work The Psychological and Organizational Bases

15. COMBATING ORGANIZATIONAL DISCRIMINATION
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of the ordinary. Perceptions of qualifications were expected to follow the
same pattern as the gender-based preferential selection inferences.
The packet of materials reviewed by research participants included a
description about the department of "Urban Health Sciences" (a bogus
department chosen to be neutral in sex-type), including the program re­
quirements, opportunities for financial support, admissions criteria, num­
ber of applicants, the range of their test scores and GPAs, and a listing of the
current year's admittees. After reading the departmental information, par­
ticipants reviewed the application of two of the year's eight admittees and
responded to a brief questionnaire. The applications of the two admittees,
modeled after actual graduate school application forms, were designed to
be equivalent forms and were rotated between the target, who was always
rated first, and the other admittee (always of the opposite sex) to ensure
there were no systematic application effects.
Selection policy was manipulated by varying the information on ad­
missions policy contained in the department information; there were three
different statements. The admissions policy indicated that The Department
of Urban Health Sciences: considers diversity, and women and minority
applicants were to be given particular consideration (affirmative action);
only considers merit, and qualifications were to be the only factor consid­
ered (merit); or considers a variety of factors... applicants will be reviewed
on a case by case basis (ambiguous)." Information about solo or nonsolo
status was manipulated by the gender composition of the incoming class.
Either there was one woman and seven men, or there were four women
and four men.
The data yielded the pattern of results predicted. When the admissions
policy was ambiguous, there were different perceptions of the role that
gender had played in the solo and nonsolo female conditions. In the solo
condition, when the admission policy was ambiguous, gender was viewed
as having played as important a role in selection as when affirmative action
was the stated policy. This did not however occur when the admittee was
not the solo woman. Furthermore, there were differences in how qualified
the female admittee was thought to be. When solo (but not when nonsolo),
female admittees in the ambiguous policy condition were rated as poorly
in terms of qualifications as those in the affirmative action condition, and
they were viewed as significantly less qualified compared to others in the
merit condition.
The results of this study demonstrate that when an "unexpected" hire
is made in the absence of a clearly stated selection policy, assumptions of
preferential selection can occur even when there is no apparent reason for
them. Thus, the problems created by affirmative action are not limited only
to those who are definitively designated as affirmative action hires. This