1. Cross-cultural Examination of Applicant
Reactions to the Employment Interview:
An exploratory study
Ioannis Nikolaou
Athens University of Economics and Business, Greece
Talya N. Bauer1, Ana Costa1, Berrin Erdogan1, Julie
McCarthy2, Burcu Rodopman3, Donald Truxillo1
1 Portland State University, USA
2 University of Toronto, Canada
3 Bogazici University, Turkey

2. Previous findings on Applicant Reactions
Work samples
Interviews
Resumes
References
Personal contacts
Integrity tests
Graphology
Psychometric tests
(Personality, Ability)
Biodata
Truxillo, D. M., & Bauer, T. N. (2011). Applicant Reactions to Organizations and Selection Systems. In S. Zedeck (Ed.), APA
Handbook of Industrial and Organizational Psychology. (pp. 379-398). Washington, DC: American Psychological Assn.
Hausknecht, J. P., Day, D. V., & Thomas, S. C. (2004). Applicant reactions to selection procedures: An updated model and
meta-analysis. Personnel Psychology, 57(3), 639-683.

3. Cross-cultural research and applicant
reactions
• Similar findings obtained between countries,
such as US, France, Spain, Portugal, Germany,
S. Arabia, Vietnam, etc.
• Lack of research in cross-cultural applicant
reactions towards specific selection methods
– An issue with important practical and theoretical
implications
Focus on the employment interview

4. Applicant Reactions & Employment Interview
• Employment interview is the most widely used selection method
with the highest face validity among all selection methods, across
countries (Ryan et al, 1999; in preparation)
• Applicants find structured interviews fair, while unstructured unfair.
They also find behavioral & situational interviews equally fair (Day &
Carroll, 2003; Terpstra et al., 1999)
• Reduced use of structured interview in Human Resources
Management practise (Lievens & Paepe, 2004)
• Warmth, sincerity, empathy and good listening skills might explain
applicants’ positive reactions to the employment interview (Nikolaou &
Judge, 2007)
• Applicants’ perceptions of the interviewers were related to their post-
interview attitudes and intentions, although this relationship was
fully mediated by the overall perception of the interview held by the
job applicant (Nikolaou, 2011)

5. Outcomes of positive applicant reactions
• Hausknecht et al.’s, meta-analysis (2004)
demonstrated moderate to large positive
associations between positive applicant
reactions and organizational attractiveness,
intentions to recommend the employer to other
applicants, and offer acceptance intentions.

6. Organizational Attractiveness, POS and
justice perceptions
• Lack of research linking applicant reactions to
organizational attractiveness, POS, justice
perceptions & applicants’ intentions
– Applicants’ positive reactions of the interview
influence their perceptions of the attractiveness of
the organization, the POS of their future employer
and also their behavioral intentions, across
countries.

7. Aims of the study
• To explore the role of interviewer perceptions,
organizational attractiveness, POS, justice
perceptions and alternative job opportunities
on job attractiveness & applicants’ behavioral
intentions
• To explore cross-cultural differences across
four different countries in Europe and Asia

8. Method - Sample
N=238
N=128
N=173
N=131
Sample: Job seekers with at least one recent (<3 months) job
interview experience.

9. Measures
– Interviewer perceptions (Nikolaou, 2011) - 16 items (5-point)
• Interviewer informativeness: “Presented the organization with clarity” (a: 78)
• Interviewer personableness: “I would describe the interviewer as a warm personality” (a: 77)
• Interviewer competence: “S/he asked interesting and job-related questions” (a: 77)
– Justice perceptions (Smither et al., 1993) – 5 items (5-point)
• Overall, I believe that the interview was fair (a: . 85)
– Organizational attractiveness (Highhouse, et al., 2003) – 15 items (5-point)
• This is a reputable company to work for (a: 95)
– Perceived organizational support (Eisenberger et al., 1997) – 8 items (7-point)
• I believe that this organization would really care about my well-being (a: 87)
– Job attractiveness (Harris & Fink, 1987) – 2 items (5-point)
• Overall, how attractive is this job? (a: .84)
– Applicants’behavioral intentions (Nikolaou, 2011; adopted from Liden and Parsons (1986) – 2
items (5-point)
• What are the chances that you will accept the job if it is offered to you?. - (a: .65)
– Alternative job opportunities (Liden & Parsons,1986) - 2 items (5-point)
• Do you think you will have other job possibilities during the next three months? (a: .76)

10. Inter-correlation matrix

11. Initial findings – Hierarchical Regression Analyses
• Job attractiveness is predicted by organizational
attractiveness (β=.61) and POS (β=.15; Adj. R2=.50),
but not from interviewer perceptions, justice
perceptions and alternative job opportunities
• Behavioral intentions are predicted by organizational
attractiveness (β=.62), POS (β=.11) and interviewer
perceptions (β=.10 ; Adj. R2=.56), but not from
justice perceptions and alternative job opportunities
– The important role of organizational attractiveness

12. Initial findings – Moderating analyses
• Justice perceptions moderates the relationship
between interviewer perceptions and job
attractiveness

13. Initial findings – Moderating analyses
• Justice perceptions moderates the relationship
between interviewer perceptions and behavioral
intentions

14. Initial findings – Moderating analyses
• POS does not moderate the relationship
between interviewer perceptions and job
attractiveness / behavioral intentions
• Alternative job opportunities do not moderate
the relationship between interviewer
perceptions and job attractiveness /
behavioral intentions

15. Country differences

16. Country differences
With the exception of alternative job opportunities, the combined USA & Canada mean
scores were consistently higher than joint Greece-Turkey scores

17. Conclusions
• Job attractiveness and applicants’ behavioural
intentions are mainly predicted by
organizational attractiveness and weakly from
POS, interviewer perceptions
• Applicants’ justice perceptions moderate the
relationship between interviewer perceptions
and outcomes
• Strong cross-cultural differences

18. Implications-Limitations
• Research:
– The first study of this kind in applicant reactions research
– Need to explore more countries following a longitudinal design
• Practise:
– The important role of company image and secondly of the
interviewer (i.e. organizational attractiveness, POS).
– Differences between East-West  important for multinational
companies
• Limitations:
– Cross-sectional samples & common method variance effects
– Initial analyses, multi-group SEM is required

19. Cross-cultural Examination of Applicant
Reactions to the Employment Interview
Ioannis Nikolaou
Athens University of Economics and Business, Greece
Talya N. Bauer1, Ana Costa1, Berrin Erdogan1, Julie McCarthy2
Burcu Rodopman3, Donald Truxillo1
1 Portland State University, USA
2 University of Toronto, Canada
3 Bogazici University, Turkey
Thank you for your attention

20. Measures - Perceptions of the interviewer measure
• Informativeness
– Discussed about the career opportunities within the
company
– Presented the organization with clarity
– Described thoroughly the job duties
– Presented the position with clarity
– Presented the required profile of the successful candidate
– Gave a realistic job preview without overstating the
positive elements of the job
Nikolaou, I. (2011). Core processes and applicant reactions to the employment interview: An exploratory study in Greece. International Journal of Human
Resource Management, 22, 2185-2201.

21. Measures - Perceptions of the interviewer measure
• Personableness
– S/he behaved aggressively occasionally (r)
– Did not allow to discuss issues I was considering important
(r)
– S/He kept interfering during the interview (r)
– I would describe the interviewer as a warm personality
– S/he made me feel awkward (r)
Nikolaou, I. (2011). Core processes and applicant reactions to the employment interview: An exploratory study in Greece. International Journal of Human
Resource Management, 22, 2185-2201.

22. Measures - Perceptions of the interviewer measure
• Competence
– S/he was listening carefully what I was saying
– S/he allowed me to talk about my qualifications
– S/he asked interesting and job-related questions
– S/he showed to understand my feelings during the
interview
– S/he was willing to let me present myself
Nikolaou, I. (2011). Core processes and applicant reactions to the employment interview: An exploratory study in Greece. International Journal of Human
Resource Management, 22, 2185-2201.