Motherhood and Labor Market Outcomes

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SES-0617086Shelley CorrellCornell UniversityThe research focuses on whether working mothers face discrimination when applying for jobs, even when they display extraordinarily high levels of competence and commitment to paid work. The research builds on a decade of scholarship indicating that mothers earn lower wages and generally fare worse in the labor market than other kinds of workers. This penalty holds cross-nationally and remains stable over time. In a prior experimental study, the investigators found that at least part of the penalty that mothers experience arises through status discrimination, which means that evaluators assume that mothers are less competent and committed than non-mothers. In this project, the PIs argue that even when mothers give evidence of high competence and commitment to paid work, they violate widely held cultural beliefs about the appropriate role of mothers. Consequently, the investigators expect evaluators to perceive mothers as less likeable and more interpersonally hostile when they give evidence of competence and commitment, and as a result offer them lower salaries and other levels of organizational rewards than otherwise similar non-mothers. The PIs will test these hypotheses using a laboratory experiment in which participants evaluate resumes that systematically vary on applicants' sex, parent status, and levels of competence and commitment, but are otherwise equivalent. Participants will rate the resumes on a diverse array of measures designed to elicit their thought processes during the evaluation. Broader Impacts: The research has the potential to highlight an important mechanism through which mothers face persistent disadvantages, suggest whether and how policy interventions may affect the motherhood penalty, contribute to the training of undergraduate and graduate students, and help to standardize the experimental setting for distribution and replication.