If you think just keeping your Facebook page free of drunken photos will help you land a job, think again. A recent study has shown that Facebook posts give clues to how people will perform at work.
Employers screened their Facebook profiles and came up with a “Facebook personality score” based on the “Big 5” personality traits.
Conscientiousness: This is someone who appears to be well organized and hard-working, and that’s reflected in the way they set up their Facebook page. The profile includes a lot of detailed posts and profile, or photos of the person working hard at something.
Emotional stability: Employees look to see that the candidate is a positive thinker. Meaning that the page is lacking negative and down in the dumps posts; and not overly emotional in images or in what is written.
Agreeableness: This is determined by how they interact with other Facebook users. Are they someone who’s able to get along and doesn’t engage in Facebook conflicts, especially heated debates with friends?
Extraversion: Here’s where lots of Facebook friends come in handy because lots of friends is a predictor of extraversion. Also, photos of you in social situations with lots of people are a good thing, compared to pictures of you alone on your couch.
Openness: Travel and intellect play into this category. If you appear open to different experiences and viewpoints, then you’re viewed as open. Posting quotes from classic literature will probably score higher than if you’re dishing about the latest trashy episode of Jersey Shore. And photos of international travel are also a big plus. An evaluation of job performance is given by the supervisors of the hired employees.
After 6 months of working the employee gets evaluated based on their performance.
The Facebook scores were then compared to how the employee’s actual performance.
The higher the Facebook personality score the higher the job performance rating by supervisors. So next time you’re on Facebook, think twice before making a post. Social media sites are becoming a more popular way of screening job candidates. This newfound method of screening potential employees on Facebook to evaluate the “Big 5” personality traits could cost you a job in the future.
You May Also Find These Documents Helpful
-
Dupree, Scotty (2005, March, 27). Employers Relying on Personality Tests to Screen Applicants. The Washing Post. Retrieved 6/1/2010…
- 5354 Words
- 22 Pages
Powerful Essays -
Social media is extremely popular among young adults and it has a huge impact on their daily lives. In today’s society, everyone is very sociable and it is very predictable that the individuals would share their daily life on social media. Which has an impact on their professional life and the greatest impact social media had on the society, especially young adults is that it made much harder to get a job and get accepted into college. One in ten colleges administers and employers look at the applicant's social profile and determine if the individual gets hired or get admitted. Some in society argue that administers and employers should check social profile before hiring or accepting the applicant because it represents and reflects on the…
- 478 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
Elejalde-Ruiz is arguing that employers ought to be permitted to check social media. It tells your ethnicity, age, religion and if you have any medical problems. Checking social media can state if someone's innovative and sociable.…
- 146 Words
- 1 Page
Satisfactory Essays -
Let me as you a question. Do you think personality traits have a strong correlation if you are a heavy social media user? If we compared the countries in the world in reference to the population of these countries, then Facebook, a popular social media forum, would be the second largest country in the world, compared to India’s population. Only China’s population is larger than Facebook.…
- 1086 Words
- 5 Pages
Good Essays -
Social media has connected the entire world to one another. It has become a cornerstone of communication in the 21st century with websites such as Google, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter to name a few. Since this large boom in social media usage in the past 10 years, many issues have arose with it as well. One of these issues was addressed and discussed in the essay, “Why Asking for a Job Applicant’s Facebook Password is Fair Game” by Alfred Edmond Jr. Edmond’s main argument is that, from the perspective of the business owner, it is appropriate for the employer to ask a job applicant for their Facebook password before being hired. The reasons that he gives for this are in multitude (Edmond, 2012).…
- 831 Words
- 3 Pages
Good Essays -
She is the Associate Professor of Psychology and Department Chair at Albright College. She got her B.A. in Psychology Statistics at the College of New Jersey. She received her M.A. in Psychology at New York University and her Ph.D. in Social Psychology in minor Quantitative Psychology at New York University. Seidman specializes in social psychology, close relationships, and psychology of the Internet. This content is focused on how the Big Five personalities, openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism affect the use of Facebook. The study examined 184 undergraduates took a survey and answered answers about their personality and their behaviors on Facebook. After gathering the data, the scientist were able to connect different personalities to certain behaviors on the site. This item is very useful because it is similar to the science fair project my partner and I are completing. This study looked at what behaviors on Facebook were influenced by what personalities a person consisted of. My science fair project is going to test how the amount of narcissism affects the amount of pictures posted on Instagram. These two are similar because both look at how a personality can affect what a person does on social media…
- 1398 Words
- 6 Pages
Good Essays -
Delaney, J. (2013). EMPLOYER USE OF FACEBOOK AND ONLINE SOCIAL NETWORKS TO DISCRIMINATE AGAINST APPLICANTS FOR EMPLOYMENT AND EMPLOYEES: AN ANALYSIS BALANCING THE RISKS OF HAVING A FACEBOOK ACCOUNT AND THE NEED FOR PROTECTIVE LEGISLATION. Labor Law Journal, 64(2), 86-102.…
- 596 Words
- 3 Pages
Best Essays -
The rapid growth of social media has outpaced the courts and legislation. Information that individuals post onto social networking websites such as Facebook and MySpace is being used by a growing number of recruiters, employers, and potential employers to seek additional information on the after-work behavior of employees and applicants. Organizational and human resource management practices have not kept pace with the changing use and abuse of social networking websites used for job searches, background checks and employee surveillance. Managers and business owners are more frequently turning to internet searches and social networking to investigate employees and prospective employees, potentially turning up more personal information than they…
- 2831 Words
- 12 Pages
Best Essays -
Agreeableness: A tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others.…
- 465 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
I do not believe a company should view these sites when determining whether to hire an individual or not. The reason I believe this is sites such as Facebook, Myspace etc. is a place for friends and family and some statements made on the site towards their friends and family may be taken out of context by an employer who does not know the person personally. Also it goes back to free speech, what you say on your own wall or page should not be held against you when applying for a job.…
- 292 Words
- 2 Pages
Satisfactory Essays -
Agreeableness is a tendency to be pleasant and accommodating in social situations. In contemporary personality psychology, agreeableness is one of the five major dimensions of personality structure, reflecting individual differences in concern for cooperation and social harmony. People who score high on this dimension are on average more empathetic, considerate, friendly, generous, and helpful.…
- 257 Words
- 2 Pages
Satisfactory Essays -
In the text provided, there are certain “Red Flags” of social media, or in other terms, things you should NOT do on a public forum. Just by breaking these “red flags,” you have just allowed hundreds if not thousands of potential employers access almost everything there is to know about who you are as a person, thus making the decision easy on whether you would be…
- 594 Words
- 3 Pages
Good Essays -
This trait implies the importance of how much socializing one needs to have a happy and healthy life style. Agreeableness is a trait that has two extremes. Those that are agreeable want everyone to get along and often go out of their way and make sacrifices for people. People who are on the low side of the agreeableness trait are often argumentative, uncooperative, and prone to severe suspiciousness. They focus on themselves more than others and generally do not get along with others very…
- 486 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
Social media can be distracting in the workplace. People are constantly checking their social media accounts throughout the day. People often find themselves using social media when they are supposed to be focus on their work. For some people it is hard to balance work and social media. In the article Examining Applicants Reactions to the Use of Social Networking Websites in Pre-Employment Screenings by J. William Stroughton, Lori Foster Thompson, and Adam W. Meade says, “The use of social networking websites has proliferated in recent years (73).” In recent years’ social media has become more a distraction to people in the workplace. Social media has become more of a factor in peoples’ everyday life which is not good. This means that social media is starting to take over peoples’ life.…
- 482 Words
- 2 Pages
Good Essays -
Gosling, S. D. (2011). Manifestations of personality in online social networks: Self-reported facebook-related behaviors and observable profile information. Liebert Open Access, 14(9), doi: 10.1089/cyber.2010.0087.…
- 3670 Words
- 15 Pages
Powerful Essays