11900: Breaking the Frame: Tests of Frame-of-Reference Interventions for Reducing Pro Male Bias in Ratings (WITHDRAWN) (session 25790)

Frame-of-reference (FOR) interventions are widely recognized for enhancing the quality of job performance ratings within organizations by reducing ambiguity in evaluations. Further, previous research suggests that job performance and leader behavior ratings may be influenced by gender bias. Through two theory-driven studies, we examined the efficacy of two FOR-based interventions for improving the quality of job performance and leader behavior ratings in part by reducing the effects of pro-male bias. In the first study, we observed that FOR training is effective for reducing pro-male bias in performance ratings in a controlled laboratory setting. We found a significant interaction between the training condition and rater gender, wherein male raters assigned higher performance ratings to male candidates compared to female raters in the control condition. No significant differences were detected between male and female raters in the FOR condition. In the second study, a field quasi-experiment, we found that FOR scales were effective in reducing pro-male bias in leader behavior ratings in a sample of employed males. In the standard scale condition, male supervisors rated male employees significantly higher than female supervisors on several dimensions of leader behavior. Conversely, no significant differences were detected between male and female leader behavior ratings of male employees in the FOR-scale condition. These findings underscore the efficacy of FOR-based interventions for promoting more equitable evaluations of job performance and leader behavior by addressing and reducing pro-male gender bias while encouraging data-driven and behavior-based improvements to the evaluation of performance and leader behavior in organizations.

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