IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/woemps/v30y2016i3p535-546.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Using social media content for screening in recruitment and selection: pros and cons

Author

Listed:
  • Debora Jeske

    (Edinburgh Napier University, UK)

  • Kenneth S Shultz

    (California State University, San Bernardino, USA)

Abstract

The article considers the arguments that have been made in defence of social media screening as well as issues that arise and may effectively erode the reliability and utility of such data for employers. First, the authors consider existing legal frameworks and guidelines that are present in the UK and the USA, as well as the subsequent ethical concerns that arise when employers access and use social networking content for employment purposes. Second, several arguments in favour of the use of social networking content are made, each of which is considered from several angles, including concerns about impression management, bias and discrimination, data protection and security. Ultimately, the current state of knowledge does not provide a definite answer as to whether information from social networks is helpful in recruitment and selection.

Suggested Citation

  • Debora Jeske & Kenneth S Shultz, 2016. "Using social media content for screening in recruitment and selection: pros and cons," Work, Employment & Society, British Sociological Association, vol. 30(3), pages 535-546, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:woemps:v:30:y:2016:i:3:p:535-546
    DOI: 10.1177/0950017015613746
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0950017015613746
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/0950017015613746?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
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Smith, William P. & Kidder, Deborah L., 2010. "You've been tagged! (Then again, maybe not): Employers and Facebook," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 53(5), pages 491-499, September.
    2. Leigh Clark & Sherry Roberts, 2010. "Employer’s Use of Social Networking Sites: A Socially Irresponsible Practice," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 95(4), pages 507-525, September.
    3. Vesselkova, Alexandr & Riikonena, Antti & Hämmäinena & Heikki, 2015. "Evolution of mobile handset feature dependences," 26th European Regional ITS Conference, Madrid 2015 127192, International Telecommunications Society (ITS).
    4. Talayeh Aledavood & Eduardo López & Sam G B Roberts & Felix Reed-Tsochas & Esteban Moro & Robin I M Dunbar & Jari Saramäki, 2015. "Daily Rhythms in Mobile Telephone Communication," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(9), pages 1-14, September.
    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. Hosain Md Sajjad & Liu Ping, 2020. "The Role of Social Media on Talent Search and Acquisition: Evidence from Contemporary Literature," Journal of Intercultural Management, Sciendo, vol. 12(1), pages 92-137, March.
    2. Sharma, Sujeet Kumar & Sharma, Manisha, 2019. "Examining the role of trust and quality dimensions in the actual usage of mobile banking services: An empirical investigation," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 44(C), pages 65-75.
    3. Chan, Tysun & Gountas, Sandra & Zhang, Luyuan & Handley, Brian, 2016. "Western firms' successful and unsuccessful business models in China," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 69(10), pages 4150-4160.
    4. Rebecca Chunghee Kim & Akira Saito & V. Mohan Avvari, 0. "Interpretation and integration of “creating shared value” in Asia: implications for strategy research and practice," Asian Business & Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 0, pages 1-28.
    5. Gui, Jun & Zheng, Zeyu & Fu, Dianzheng & Fu, Yang & Liu, Zhi, 2021. "Long-term correlations and multifractality of toll-free calls in China," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 567(C).
    6. Matthieu Manant & Serge Pajak & Nicolas Soulié, 2019. "Can social media lead to labor market discrimination? Evidence from a field experiment," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 28(2), pages 225-246, April.
    7. Jun Gui & Zeyu Zheng & Dianzheng Fu & Zihao Yang & Yuan Gao & Zhi Liu, 2020. "Dynamics of calling activity to toll-free numbers in China," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(3), pages 1-16, March.
    8. Kosec, Katrina & Wantchekon, Leonard, 2020. "Can information improve rural governance and service delivery?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 125(C).
    9. Federico Botta & Helen Susannah Moat & Tobias Preis, 2020. "Measuring the size of a crowd using Instagram," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 47(9), pages 1690-1703, November.
    10. Chiu, Chao-Min & Cheng, Hsiang-Lan & Huang, Hsin-Yi & Chen, Chieh-Fan, 2013. "Exploring individuals’ subjective well-being and loyalty towards social network sites from the perspective of network externalities: The Facebook case," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 33(3), pages 539-552.
    11. Md Arman, 2023. "The Advantages of Online Recruitment and Selection: A Systematic Review of Cost and Time Efficiency," Business Management and Strategy, Macrothink Institute, vol. 14(2), pages 220-240, December.
    12. Michelle Richey & Aparna Gonibeed & M. N. Ravishankar, 2018. "The Perils and Promises of Self-Disclosure on Social Media," Information Systems Frontiers, Springer, vol. 20(3), pages 425-437, June.
    13. Tal Ariana Emanuela, 2018. "The Impact of Social Media on Recruitment," Ovidius University Annals, Economic Sciences Series, Ovidius University of Constantza, Faculty of Economic Sciences, vol. 0(2), pages 537-541, December.
    14. Konrad, Kai A., 2020. "Attacking and defending multiple valuable secrets in a big data world," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 280(3), pages 1122-1129.
    15. Liana Stanca & Cristina Felea & Ioana Pop & Chiº Sebastian & Horea Greblã & Lacurezeanu Ramona & Buchmann Robert, 2010. "Mathematical Model Of Optimizing Decision Making For Work Force Integration In The Knowledge Society," Interdisciplinary Management Research, Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek, Faculty of Economics, Croatia, vol. 6, pages 928-937.
    16. John R. Drake, 2016. "Asking for Facebook Logins: An Egoist Case for Privacy," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 139(3), pages 429-441, December.
    17. Federico Botta & Charo I del Genio, 2017. "Analysis of the communities of an urban mobile phone network," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(3), pages 1-14, March.
    18. Wilcox, Annika & Damarin, Amanda K. & McDonald, Steve, 2022. "Is Cybervetting Valuable?," OSF Preprints f52a7, Center for Open Science.
    19. Samawiya Aqeel & Danish Ahmed Siddiqui, 2019. "The Effect of Social Media Following on Recruitment in Service Industries of Pakistan," Business Management and Strategy, Macrothink Institute, vol. 10(1), pages 41-77, December.
    20. David Agogo, 2021. "Invisible market for online personal data: An examination," Electronic Markets, Springer;IIM University of St. Gallen, vol. 31(4), pages 989-1010, December.

    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:sae:woemps:v:30:y:2016:i:3:p:535-546. 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: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.britsoc.co.uk/ .

    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.