Canadian HR Reporter Weekly

2 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2018 CANADIAN HR REPORTER WEEKLY In looking at a variety of media — whether it's children's books, social media pictures or official photos of national leaders — there can be marked differences in the emo- tional states conveyed by people from different cultures. And that variation could have a negative impact when it comes to job applicants because of the way they present themselves during the interview process, according to researchers. "American culture really values excitement states — excitement, enthusiasm, these high-arousal, positive states — more than East Asian cultures (which) place more emphasis or value on calm, peacefulness, serenity — what we call these low-arousal, positive states," said Jeanne Tsai, director of the Stanford Culture and Emotion Laboratory at Stanford University in California. As a result, job candidates from East Asian cultures may face an uphill battle in contending with an American culture that values enthusiasm over calm. "You can see both on the side of people who are applying for jobs and the people that are hiring for jobs, that what they're trying to show and what they're looking for are very much a product of their culturally valued emotional states," said Tsai, co-author of the study Should job applicants be excited or calm? e role of culture and ideal affect in employment settings. e researchers conducted five studies that included a total of 1,041 participants in five different workplace scenarios, comparing European Americans and Asian Americans living in the United States with Chinese living in Hong Kong. In one experiment, participants were asked to fill out an application for a hypothetical internship, including a video introducing themselves. Eighty-six per cent of European Americans and 72 per cent of Asian Americans wanted to convey excitement rather than calm, while 48 per cent of Hong Kong Chinese wanted to show excitement. e researchers also looked at people's facial expressions during the recruitment process. "We found European and Asian Americans are using what we call high-intensity smiles, or these big, toothy, Julia Roberts-type smiles, and Hong Kong Chinese are doing that less — they're smiling at the same rates but they're using low-intensity or calm smiles that are a lot more subdued," said Lucy Zhang Bencharit, post-doctoral researcher at Stanford University and co- author of the study. To assess how this might affect hiring decisions, the researchers asked working adults to imagine their ideal job candidate. European Americans and Asian Americans pictured someone who's excited and enthusiastic, while Hong Kong Chinese spoke of someone who's calm and relaxed. To test this further, researchers presented hiring individuals with videos of three different candidates: an excited one, a calm one and a neutral one. Again, the European and Asian Americans preferred the excited candidate, while the Hong Kong Chinese liked the calm one. "ere's evidence that these emotional values are really influencing the types of people we look for and the types of people we end up choosing and hiring," said Bencharit. Finally, the researchers queried hiring managers attending a company's annual retreat. In looking at the videos, 47 per cent preferred the excited candidate while 24 per cent chose the calm one and 29 per cent liked the neutral one. Different emotional states could jeopardize job candidates' chances: Study American culture values excitement and enthusiasm, while East Asian cultures emphasize calm, serenity, say researchers BY SARAH DOBSON Sign up for the Canadian HR Newswire today for free and enjoy great content from the publishers of Canadian HR Reporter. HR News at Your Fingertips THE LATEST NEWS THE BEST COMMENTARY DELIVERED WEEKLY FOR READING ON ANY DEVICE Visit www.hrreporter.com/ canadian-hr-newswire

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