
Cancer survivors less likely to receive callbacks from potential employers - lujim
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/11/151106113840.htm
======
lagadu
After reading the headline but before reading the article the question in my
mind as I clicked it was: "how would these potential employers know about
someone's health status?"

Fortunately they explain it fairly quickly: They wear baseball caps saying
"cancer survivor" and/or include that they had cancer on their resumes for no
reason, other than for the study.

The way I see it, had I read on a resume that someone is a cancer survivor (or
any other unwarranted personal detail that's clearly being shoehorned in) I'd
find it very off-putting. That alone (along with the "wear a baseball cap"
thing accounts for the discrepancy in hiring, as far as I'm concerned.

This isn't even fake science, this is just a piece designed to generate
outrage.

~~~
pbnjay
Actually, it's just bad reporting. I had the same thoughts as you, but I found
the paper here:
[http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Craig_White6/publication...](http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Craig_White6/publication/279631346_Selection_BIAS_Stereotypes_and_Discrimination_Related_to_Having_a_History_of_Cancer/links/559e8a0e08aeed377e57932d.pdf)

Control group wore plain white hats, and each participant acted as their own
control by applying to one store with a cancer hat and a different with the
plain hat:

> In the experimental condition, confederates wore hats and provided resumes
> that disclosed cancer survivor status. The resumes included the following
> statement, “Please note: There is a gap in my employment because I was
> diagnosed and treated for cancer. I have been in remission for one year” and
> the hat had the words “Cancer Survivor” depicted across the front. In the
> control condition, the resume provided no extra information and participants
> wore a plain white hat. Finally, it is important to note that all
> confederates served as their own control—they entered some stores wearing
> the “Cancer Survivor” hat and other stores with the plain white hat.
> Confederate applicants remained blind to condition

~~~
niccaluim
This is bananas. I'm a cancer survivor and I've administered hundreds of job
interviews; I guarantee a large part of the difference in callbacks, if not
the whole difference, is down to the combination of resumes and hats.
Explaining a gap on your resume, great. Wearing a hat with "CANCER SURVIVOR"
on it to an interview, ok, a little unusual, but whatever. Doing both? That's
_weird_ —not because it has anything to do with cancer, but because the
applicant is putting so much energy into driving home an irrelevant point. I'd
feel the same way if you explained a gap by saying you volunteered at a sloth
rescue in South America (which would be awesome) and wore a hat with "SLOTH
VOLUNTEER" on it (which, combined with the gap explanation, would be a bit
much). It just screams "I have no idea who I am so I've constructed a fragile
identity around this one aspect of my life."

~~~
g8gggu89
This sounds like the people who need to announce that they are trans
everywhere.

~~~
astrodust
Or vegetarian. Or pet owners. Or gamers.

~~~
mazeway
Or hackers.

~~~
TeMPOraL
The term "hacker", despite its current dillution with bastardizations like
"growth hacker" still holds its caveat - you don't get to call yourself a
hacker. It's a term others may apply to you.

------
VeryVito
This "study" seems flawed in so many ways (or the article describing it
doesn't do it justice).

According to the article, the people who did not get a job were the ones who
"indicated on their resumes they were cancer survivors AND WORE A HAT that
read 'cancer survivor' when applying for a job."

NEWS FLASH: Wearing a novelty baseball cap to a job interview may not be the
best idea -- cancer or not.

~~~
sixtypoundhound
Yeah, I call "rigged science" on this one. Wearing any clothing other than
professional apparel would bias an interview outcome regardless of the cause.

The control either should have involved people wearing hats for another cause
and/or they should have had a resume-mention only group in the test.

Point of fact, I would not be suprised if discrimination exists. But no need
to rig the test.

------
baldfat
Doesn't surprise me. I certainly did not disclose my son's health issue when I
was looking for a second job. Must say that when asked why I was looking for a
second job I just stated our current situation needs me to have a second job
and not my wife has to be with our son as he fights for his life and he is in
remission but 99% chance of it coming back int he next 6-12 months.

When my son's cancer did come back the second job (And my main job) were both
outstanding and really gave me flexibility and understanding, but I doubt I
would have gotten the job the first place. It is hard to figure out what to
disclose and what not to disclose for simple jobs like retail.

~~~
lujim
Holy crap man, best of luck. I'm not sure how I would function enough to hold
one job. Do you have any active crowd funding or anything going on right now?

~~~
baldfat
Edit: I certainly don't mind sharing about our family's and son's struggle.
Please don't feel bad that you brought up something bad or talking about it.

Unfortunately he passed away 2 years ago. We had an incredible supportive
local community and few local organizations who's purpose was supporting local
families.

I do highly recommend supporting St. Baldrick's
[http://www.stbaldricks.org/](http://www.stbaldricks.org/) for cancer
research. Kids get the shaft in research money especially with only 1% from
Cancer Society of America and 4% of the Federal Cancer Research Grants got o
fight pediatric cancer. Any adult research is of little value to kids, but any
findings with kids benefits adults in cancer treatment. So in 20+ years we
have the first new chemo drug because of St Baldrick's research funded project
paid off.

~~~
omginternets
Good god. Nobody should have to go through that. From one internet stranger to
another: my sincerest condolences.

Edit: Victor Hugo lost his daughter and subsequently wrote what I consider to
be one of the most beautiful poems in the French language. Here it is with an
English translation: [http://www.frenchtoday.com/french-poetry-reading/poem-
demain...](http://www.frenchtoday.com/french-poetry-reading/poem-demain-des-l-
aube-hugo)

I wish I could do more.

~~~
omginternets
Wikipedia has a better translation:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demain_d%C3%A8s_l%27aube](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demain_d%C3%A8s_l%27aube)

------
ohnomrbill
This says more about the state of experimental methods in psychology than it
does about the employability of cancer survivors.

------
cryoshon
Yeah, because the idea is that the person is already weak and may have a
relapse which will negatively impact their job performance, which is
institutionally thought of as unacceptable. Welcome to late capitalism, where
the money is gone and the "power" of labor doesn't matter.

Even if people don't have a conscious bias against potential liabilities that
an employee might have, I'd suspect that subconsciously they do due to a
general awareness of their own bottom line. When it comes time to make a
hiring decision (an already an a-rational and largely emotional process), the
subconscious biases against taking on a potential liability will probably
manifest themselves, causing employers to invent an unrelated "reason" to
disqualify a cancer-survivor candidate. Or maybe it's just an invisible push
to the bottom of the pile without any false narratives. Either way, I assume
the data doesn't lie.

~~~
zeveb
> Yeah, because the idea is that the person is already weak and may have a
> relapse which will negatively impact their job performance

If I'm hiring, I want the best possible candidate for the job at the best
possible price. Someone who has a higher likelihood of being absent is less
likely to be the best possible candidate for the job. Those emotional biases
have real foundations.

I happen to belong to a protected group and also have a higher chance of being
absent; I disclose that status, do my best to indicate that I _am_ the best
possible candidate, and let the chips fall where they may. It's worked alright
for me so far, although I'm sure that it's cost me a little.

~~~
vkou
Unfortunately, not everyone is in the position of privilege where they can
afford to be discriminated against.

------
rdl
I could see cases where this could be relevant. Imagine someone with a great
career path in, say, SFBA -- forward and upward progression. In 2006 he quits
a job after 6mo and moves to Houston, Boston, Rochester MN, etc. and takes a
much lower job (say IT manager or something remote, and with flexible
hours..,or maybe no job at all for a couple years) for 0-5y, and is now
looking for a job again, based on the previous experience.

Maybe he got fired from the good jobs and couldn't get a job somewhere good
again and had to move somewhere cheaper to take a job more readily available.
Maybe he or a family member had cancer and wanted to be near the world's best
particular cancer care. I'd probably be a lot more strongly biased to hire the
person who was willing to sacrifice his career for a while to save someone's
life than otherwise.

(Although Stanford and UCSF are pretty good...)

------
PixelB
This is disgusting, but not surprising. Companies want young, healthy people
that they can under-pay and over-work without fear of them needing a medical
leave.

~~~
jakejake
Well, I was in a situation where my small company had two people and I needed
another programmer. One applicant came in who was clearly older - in his 60s I
would guess. He came to the interview with a walker and looked in very bad
health.

I really didn't care the age of who I hired but my company was tiny and it was
a struggle for me to pay a good salary and provide insurance (both of which I
did). I was not looking to take advantage of anybody. However if somebody came
on and went on extended medical leave, I wouldn't have been able to keep
paying them - not out of personal greed but because there literally would not
be money to pay them. My salary was not much, if any more than my employees.
Possible I might have had some legal obligation to keep providing some type of
insurance - I'm not sure.

As it turns out he was completely unqualified - his resume did not jive at all
with his knowledge - so I did not have to face the dilemma of whether I would
hire him vs a younger, healthier applicant. But it did make me think and
appreciate both sides of the situation.

~~~
shostack
This is always the conundrum that people don't like to discuss but I think is
worth discussing.

For very early-stage companies where the total employees (and potentially
revenue) can be counted on one hand, all hires are critical.

So a single hire who goes on extended medical leave, or sends your insurance
rates through the roof can literally kill your company. Is it the person's
fault? Not at all, but you are still left dealing with the consequences.

I wonder how early-stage companies draw this line and deal with this type of
decision assuming the reason is not related to any of the protected classes
from a hiring standpoint.

~~~
jakejake
It is tough for sure. People who take a hard-line opinion on the subject I
think may not have worked at a small company and/or have never had to think
about payroll and insurance expenses.

I know when I was younger it never even occurred to me to wonder where my
paycheck came from.

------
logfromblammo
Unfortunately, this doesn't tell us whether ethics in hiring practices have
grown worse, or whether they have always been this bad, and we are just
getting better at objectively measuring them.

Either way, the well-intentioned laws governing discrimination in hiring will
always be toothless as long as there is any legal reason to not hire a person
that otherwise meets the stated job qualifications.

~~~
PixelB
I'm willing to say subjectively that they have gotten worse. Some of the
practices I've seen from the inside are downright despicable. Take your pick..
age, race, gender, health status.. I've seen the hiring department at our
company pull it all. We had a candidate turned down because she spoke with a
lisp and the manager said she wanted someone "intelligent" for the job..
despite the candidate's graduation from an ivy league college.

~~~
kevin_thibedeau
I would be looking for another employer if that's the sort of petty behavior
they promote.

------
vpribish
I'd love to see a study using actual cancer survivors and a control - who do
not in any way include this information in their resume or discussion or
clothing - and see if anyone is digging into personal medical history as part
of their hiring practices. Probably have to apply for a different sort of job
than retail though.

------
conductr
Although this is flawed and kind of silly, the hypothesis the study tries to
support does just kind of make sense in a pure common sense way.

My wife is a survivor and she'd would never show that side of her life during
the interview phase of employment. It just makes sense. Once you get the gig,
and has more meaningful relationships with the people she would likely share.
It's kind of assumed you never get that personal in an interview.

~~~
x1024
"Although it's obviously a bad study, I am going to think its hypothesis is
true."

The only reason we have science is because "common sense" is too easily
fooled.

~~~
michaelkeenan
You're allowed to have a prior:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prior_probability)

A study lacking the power to prove its hypothesis doesn't disprove the
hypothesis.

