Advice for Job Seekers

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“Could never figure out why they didn’t hire me?”

You might find others better looking the more you drink, but it seems the reverse is not also true.

U.S. academic researchers have found evidence of what they call the “imbibing idiot bias.”

The problem is that this bias doesn’t just come into play at 3 a.m. in your favourite bar, but also in the job interview. The study by researchers from the University of Michigan and the University of Pennsylvania found that job applicants who drink alcohol -even if they’re sober during the interview -are perceived to be less intelligent.

“Merely holding an alcoholic beverage may reduce the perceived intelligence of the person,” Scott Rick and Maurice Schweitzer wrote.

So if you meet a prospective employer, whether over lunch or at a social occasion, ditch the drink, even if the employer is holding one -and especially if the employer is not.

In the study’s mock interviews, in which the job-seeker ordered wine after the manager ordered a soft drink (the two choices offered), the job seeker was “especially punished” with low ratings for perceived intelligence, the study said.

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