IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/soceco/v108y2024ics2214804323001581.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Gender, personality, and performance

Author

Listed:
  • Minehan, Shannon N.
  • Wesselbaum, Dennis

Abstract

This paper studies the effect of personality on performance by gender. We investigate this relationship in the academic labor market for Economists. We build a unique and novel data set from individual CVs of 2,471 faculty members employed at the Top 100 US University Economics Departments and use the facial Width-to-Height ratio (fWHR) to proxy for personality traits. We are interested in the marginal effect of personality on performance after accounting for the common drivers of variations in academic performance. We find that non-dominant females and dominant males achieve better outcomes. This effect, to some degree, is driven by the accumulation of non-cognitive skills, e.g. networks. While our data does not allow to investigate whether this is a result of choice, our results are in line with discrimination based on violation of gender norms.

Suggested Citation

  • Minehan, Shannon N. & Wesselbaum, Dennis, 2024. "Gender, personality, and performance," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:108:y:2024:i:c:s2214804323001581
    DOI: 10.1016/j.socec.2023.102132
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214804323001581
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.socec.2023.102132?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Marianne Bertrand, 2018. "Coase Lecture – The Glass Ceiling," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 85(338), pages 205-231, April.
    2. Hamermesh, Daniel S & Biddle, Jeff E, 1994. "Beauty and the Labor Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(5), pages 1174-1194, December.
    3. James J. Heckman & Tomas Jagelka & Tim Kautz, 2019. "Some Contributions of Economics to the Study of Personality," Working Papers 2019-069, Human Capital and Economic Opportunity Working Group.
    4. Bertrand, Marianne, 2011. "New Perspectives on Gender," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 17, pages 1543-1590, Elsevier.
    5. Shawn N Geniole & Thomas F Denson & Barnaby J Dixson & Justin M Carré & Cheryl M McCormick, 2015. "Evidence from Meta-Analyses of the Facial Width-to-Height Ratio as an Evolved Cue of Threat," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(7), pages 1-18, July.
    6. Richard B. Freeman & Wei Huang, 2015. "Collaborating with People Like Me: Ethnic Coauthorship within the United States," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 33(S1), pages 289-318.
    7. Motty Perry & Philip J. Reny, 2016. "How to Count Citations If You Must," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2722-2741, September.
    8. Heather Sarsons & Klarita Gërxhani & Ernesto Reuben & Arthur Schram, 2021. "Gender Differences in Recognition for Group Work," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 129(1), pages 101-147.
    9. Francine D. Blau & Lawrence M. Kahn, 2017. "The Gender Wage Gap: Extent, Trends, and Explanations," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 55(3), pages 789-865, September.
    10. Andreoni, James & Petrie, Ragan, 2008. "Beauty, gender and stereotypes: Evidence from laboratory experiments," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 73-93, February.
    11. Abbasi, Alireza & Altmann, Jörn & Hossain, Liaquat, 2011. "Identifying the effects of co-authorship networks on the performance of scholars: A correlation and regression analysis of performance measures and social network analysis measures," Journal of Informetrics, Elsevier, vol. 5(4), pages 594-607.
    12. Besancenot, Damien & Huynh, Kim & Serranito, Francisco, 2017. "Co-authorship and research productivity in economics: Assessing the assortative matching hypothesis," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 61-80.
    13. George A. Akerlof & Rachel E. Kranton, 2000. "Economics and Identity," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(3), pages 715-753.
    14. Daniel S. Hamermesh, 2013. "Six Decades of Top Economics Publishing: Who and How?," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 51(1), pages 162-172, March.
    15. Azmat, Ghazala & Petrongolo, Barbara, 2014. "Gender and the labor market: What have we learned from field and lab experiments?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 32-40.
    16. Kerwin Kofi Charles & Jonathan Guryan & Jessica Pan, 2018. "The Effects of Sexism on American Women: The Role of Norms vs. Discrimination," NBER Working Papers 24904, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Francine D. Blau & Janet M. Currie & Rachel T. A. Croson & Donna K. Ginther, 2010. "Can Mentoring Help Female Assistant Professors? Interim Results from a Randomized Trial," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 348-352, May.
    18. David Card & Ana Rute Cardoso & Patrick Kline, 2016. "Bargaining, Sorting, and the Gender Wage Gap: Quantifying the Impact of Firms on the Relative Pay of Women," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(2), pages 633-686.
    19. Kelly Bedard & Maxine Lee & Heather Royer, 2021. "Using Longitudinal Data to Explore the Gender Gap for Academic Economists," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 111, pages 69-73, May.
    20. David Blackaby & Alison L Booth & Jeff Frank, 2005. "Outside Offers And The Gender Pay Gap: Empirical Evidence From the UK Academic Labour Market," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(501), pages 81-107, February.
    21. Matthew RE Symonds & Neil J Gemmell & Tamsin L Braisher & Kylie L Gorringe & Mark A Elgar, 2006. "Gender Differences in Publication Output: Towards an Unbiased Metric of Research Performance," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 1(1), pages 1-5, December.
    22. Shulamit B. Kahn, 1995. "Women in the Economics Profession," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 9(4), pages 193-206, Fall.
    23. David Blackaby & Alison L Booth & Jeff Frank, 2005. "Outside Offers And The Gender Pay Gap: Empirical Evidence From the UK Academic Labour Market," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(501), pages 81-107, February.
    24. Muriel Niederle & Lise Vesterlund, 2007. "Do Women Shy Away From Competition? Do Men Compete Too Much?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 122(3), pages 1067-1101.
    25. Lorenzo Ductor & Marcel Fafchamps & Sanjeev Goyal & Marco J. van der Leij, 2014. "Social Networks and Research Output," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 96(5), pages 936-948, December.
    26. Lorenzo Ductor & Sanjeev Goyal & Anja Prummer, 2018. "Gender & Collaboration," Working Papers 856, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    27. Amanda Bayer & Cecilia Elena Rouse, 2016. "Diversity in the Economics Profession: A New Attack on an Old Problem," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 30(4), pages 221-242, Fall.
    28. Michael P Haselhuhn & Elaine M Wong & Margaret E Ormiston, 2013. "Self-Fulfilling Prophecies as a Link between Men’s Facial Width-to-Height Ratio and Behavior," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(8), pages 1-7, August.
    29. Ilse Lindenlaub & Anja Prummer, 2021. "Network Structure and Performance," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 131(634), pages 851-898.
    30. Azmat, Ghazala & Petrongolo, Barbara, 2014. "Gender and the labor market: What have we learned from field and lab experiments?," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 32-40.
    31. Benjamin F. Jones, 2021. "The Rise of Research Teams: Benefits and Costs in Economics," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 35(2), pages 191-216, Spring.
    32. Biddle, Jeff E & Hamermesh, Daniel S, 1998. "Beauty, Productivity, and Discrimination: Lawyers' Looks and Lucre," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 16(1), pages 172-201, January.
    33. Claudia Goldin & Sari Pekkala Kerr & Claudia Olivetti & Erling Barth, 2017. "The Expanding Gender Earnings Gap: Evidence from the LEHD-2000 Census," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(5), pages 110-114, May.
    34. Bowles, Hannah Riley & Babcock, Linda & Lai, Lei, 2007. "Social incentives for gender differences in the propensity to initiate negotiations: Sometimes it does hurt to ask," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 84-103, May.
    35. Rachel Croson & Uri Gneezy, 2009. "Gender Differences in Preferences," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 47(2), pages 448-474, June.
    36. Kasey Buckles, 2019. "Fixing the Leaky Pipeline: Strategies for Making Economics Work for Women at Every Stage," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 33(1), pages 43-60, Winter.
    37. Hannah Druckenmiller & Solomon Hsiang, 2018. "Accounting for Unobservable Heterogeneity in Cross Section Using Spatial First Differences," Papers 1810.07216, arXiv.org, revised Aug 2019.
    38. Lorenzo Ductor, 2015. "Does Co-authorship Lead to Higher Academic Productivity?," Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics, Department of Economics, University of Oxford, vol. 77(3), pages 385-407, June.
    39. Xianjie He & Huifang Yin & Yachang Zeng & Huai Zhang & Hailong Zhao, 2019. "Facial Structure and Achievement Drive: Evidence from Financial Analysts," Journal of Accounting Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(4), pages 1013-1057, September.
    40. John M. McDowell & Larry D. Singell & Mark Stater, 2006. "Two to Tango? Gender Differences in the Decisions to Publish and Coauthor," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 44(1), pages 153-168, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Dennis Wesselbaum, 2023. "Understanding the Drivers of the Gender Productivity Gap in the Economics Profession," The American Economist, Sage Publications, vol. 68(1), pages 61-73, March.
    2. Benjamin Artz & Amanda H. Goodall & Andrew J. Oswald, 2018. "Do Women Ask?," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 57(4), pages 611-636, October.
    3. Christine L. Exley & Muriel Niederle & Lise Vesterlund, 2020. "Knowing When to Ask: The Cost of Leaning In," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(3), pages 816-854.
    4. Drupp, Moritz A. & Khadjavi, Menusch & Riekhof, Marie-Catherine & Voss, Rudi, 2020. "Professional identity and the gender gap in risk-taking. Evidence from field experiments with scientists," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 418-432.
    5. Karen Mumford & Cristina Sechel, 2017. "Pay, Rank and Job Satisfaction amongst Academic Economists in the UK," Discussion Papers 17/17, Department of Economics, University of York.
    6. De Paola, Maria & Lombardo, Rosetta & Pupo, Valeria & Scoppa, Vincenzo, 2021. "Do Women Shy Away from Public Speaking? A Field Experiment," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(C).
    7. Anne‐Sophie Bruno & Nathalie Greenan & Jeremy Tanguy, 2021. "Does the Gender Mix Influence Collective Bargaining on Gender Equality? Evidence from France," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(4), pages 479-520, October.
    8. Kiessling, Lukas & Pinger, Pia & Seegers, Philipp & Bergerhoff, Jan, 2024. "Gender differences in wage expectations and negotiation," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C).
    9. Sarah Louise Jewell & Giovanni Razzu & Carl Singleton, 2020. "Who Works for Whom and the UK Gender Pay Gap," British Journal of Industrial Relations, London School of Economics, vol. 58(1), pages 50-81, March.
    10. Maria De Paola & Michela Ponzo & Vincenzo Scoppa, 2017. "Gender differences in the propensity to apply for promotion: evidence from the Italian Scientific Qualification," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(4), pages 986-1009.
    11. Estrella Gomez-Herrera & Frank Müller-Langer, 2019. "Is There a Gender Wage Gap in Online Labor Markets? Evidence from Over 250,000 Projects and 2.5 Million Wage Bill Proposals," CESifo Working Paper Series 7779, CESifo.
    12. Joyce Guo & María P. Recalde, 2023. "Overriding in Teams: The Role of Beliefs, Social Image, and Gender," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 69(4), pages 2239-2262, April.
    13. Lorenzo Ductor & Sanjeev Goyal & Anja Prummer, 2018. "Gender & Collaboration," Working Papers 856, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    14. Claussen, Jörg & Czibor, Eszter & van Praag, Mirjam C., 2015. "Women Do Not Play Their Aces: The Consequences of Shying Away," IZA Discussion Papers 9612, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    15. Céline Piton, 2022. "The labour market performance of vulnerable groups: towards a better understanding of the main driving forces," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/352519, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    16. Petrongolo, Barbara & Ronchi, Maddalena, 2020. "Gender gaps and the structure of local labor markets," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    17. Claudia Olivetti & Barbara Petrongolo, 2016. "The Evolution of Gender Gaps in Industrialized Countries," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 8(1), pages 405-434, October.
    18. Katrien Stevens & Stephen Whelan, 2019. "Negotiating the Gender Wage Gap," Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 58(2), pages 141-188, April.
    19. Carlsson, Fredrik & Kataria, Mitesh & Lampi, Elina, 2024. "Sexual objectification of women in media and the gender wage gap: Does exposure to objectifying pictures lower the reservation wage?," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 108(C).
    20. Cortes, Patricia & Pan, Jessica & Pilossoph, Laura & Zafar, Basit, 2021. "Gender Differences in Job Search and the Earnings Gap: Evidence from Business Majors," IZA Discussion Papers 14373, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Academic performance; Gender; Labor market outcomes; Personality;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • A14 - General Economics and Teaching - - General Economics - - - Sociology of Economics
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:soceco:v:108:y:2024:i:c:s2214804323001581. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/620175 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.