The intercultural hiring interview: Applying uncertainty reduction theory to the study of nonverbal behavior between Indian applicants and United States interviewers

This study employed the theoretical perspective of uncertainty reduction (Berger & Calabrese, 1974) to examine the effects of the similarity/dissimilarity of interviewers' and interviewees' nonverbal behaviors exhibited during an intercultural hiring interview on interviewers' perceptions of and hiring decisions about interviewees. Mock hiring interviews were conducted between 15 male Indian graduate student interviewees and 2 male Caucasian U.S. professionals who participated as interviewers. The procedures attempted to replicate real-life interviews as closely as possible. Videotapes of the interactions were rated by trained coders with respect to the amount and similarity of the nonverbal behaviors displayed by research participants. Interviewers completed questionnaires (after each interview) rating their level of attributional confidence and the perceived hireability of the applicant. Regression analyses showed that across the interviewers, attributional confidence was a significant predictor of interviewees' hireability and, at the individual interviewer level, some nonverbal behaviors (facial expressions, eye contact, and forward lean) predicted hireability to some degree but not attributional confidence. The results have implications for organizations attempting to increase the diversity of their workforce and for future communication research on intercultural hiring interviews.