Age, ethnicity, and gender
The pooled results of 40 separate researches[1] find a low negativecorrelation between
age and PRs, whereas age and objective
indices of performance correlate positively.
This implies that PRs show substantial bias
against older persons.
Similar large-scale analysis[2] finds a small
but consistent “own race” bias in PRs; whites
favour whites, blacks favour blacks, etc.
Gender also distorts PRs. Sometimes PRs
show simple gender bias[3], so that women
with masculine characteristics are rated more
promotable. Sometimes the bias is subtler,
involving gender stereotype of the occupation,
so that raters who do not see management as a
traditionally female occupation tend to give
women managers lower PRs[4].