KUALA LUMPUR: DAP has accused the Centre for Governance and Political Studies (Cent-GPS) of racial incitement following the release of a study by the latter titled Racism in Recruitment: A Study on Racial Bias For Entry Level Jobs in Malaysia.
Results of the study released last Thursday alleged that Malay and Indian jobseekers face discrimination when applying for jobs in the private sector.
DAP’s Parliamentary Research Office in a statement today said the study was methodologically flawed as it only involved seven CV’s, which is a small sample size.
It was pointed out that the number of considerations the authors were testing – which included race, gender and appearance – requires broader research that includes CV’s with and without photos involving bigger sample of candidates from different genders and races.
“For example, as photos of the applicant were included, a controlled study should have been conducted without photos to see the differences. The same applies to using a series of race and gender combinations as there is no certainty as to which particular factor was the influential factor in the experiment,“ read the statement.
“Ideally, each condition should be tested with a larger sample size and with multiple conditions to control extenuating factors (eg. using various photos with different levels of attractiveness). By just using a handful of résumés to check on multiple factors, there is very little confidence that any one factor can have a significant influence on callback rates.”
The study was reported to have based its results based on resumes that were sent to a job portal, and DAP pointed out the flaw in this method as this is subject to the job portal’s selection algorithm.
It was reported that Cent-GPS is founded by Umno senator Khairul Azwan Harun.
“It appears to be that the basis of this report is to reinforce stereotypical views of different ethnic groups and to further racially charged political agendas. Dishonest studies like these do little to actually improve the current situation but instead pander to societal fears and further worsen inter-race relations.”
