4 ms·

> Resistance to anxiety. This disadvantages women, minorities, and people with psychological conditions that should be covered by ADA. I resemble some of those

by wenc 6y ago

> Resistance to anxiety. This disadvantages women, minorities, and people with psychological conditions that should be covered by ADA. I resemble some of those categories, and I don't know if I would feel comfortable making the leap to correlate them to a some inherent reduced level of resistance to anxiety. That seems like a generalization which I feel that, on an aggregate level, seems unsupportable by data. I think that determination should be on a case-by-case basis, as is currently done at universities.

enumjorge 6y ago
Yeah I’ve never heard of women and minorities having less resistance to anxiety as a group. I’m curious where that’s coming from. Certain psychological conditions I could see, but that’s such a broad category that I think that’s also an over generalization.
notacoward 6y ago
Allow me to elaborate, then. There's an inherent power dynamic in interviews, which creates stress in the interviewees. That effect is magnified for anyone who is unlike their interviewers, who still tend to be white and male. It's magnified still further when the power dynamic within the interview reflect the one that - very unfortunately - still persists in society at large. Lastly, the funny thing about stress/anxiety is that it tends to be additive. Having experienced high levels recently (including in other interviews) makes one more susceptible to new triggers. Thus, anyone who is the least bit "outside" in any way will feel more anxious. Is any of that even controversial enough to require citation? How many Psychology or Sociology 101 textbooks should I cite? It's easy enough for those who don't feel this kind of anxiety themselves to brush it off, but for those who are less fortunate all those magnifiers can create an anxiety level that's quite debilitating.
- syndacks 6y ago
  >Is any of that even controversial enough to require citation? I'm sorry, excuse me? Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? Your parent comment certainly seems to suggest that. Which, at a minimum, is flat out wrong. Educate yourself[0]. And then zoom out and ask yourself why it's not only permissible, but often lauded, to so flippantly say what you just said. [0] - https://www.apa.org/about/policy/boys-men-practice-guidelines.pdf https://www.apa.org/about/policy/boys-men-practice-guideline...
  - whalabi 6y ago
    > I'm sorry, excuse me? Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? To be fair, OP did say "That effect is magnified for anyone who is unlike their interviewers" But, I do agree some evidence from OP would help their claims. I wouldn't be surprised if minorities experience more anxiety, on average, in situations like an interview, though. I think it's established that imposter syndrome is more frequently encountered for example but it's too late here to go digging for evidence :)
  - notacoward 6y ago
    > Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? No, and I doubt anyone would have read it that way in good faith.
    - MiroF 6y ago
      Good faith reader here, can confirm - you pretty clearly were only suggesting some general effect applying on average, not to every individual case.
  - oblio 6y ago
    You just "All Lives Matter"ed his "Black Lives Matter" argument. And I'm not writing this as praise for your comment...
    - pb7 6y ago
      Stop dehumanizing an entire group of people. All humans feel anxiety and that's a fact. Excluding one group of people that is equally likely to experience it because it's currently in vogue is still discriminatory.
- wenc 6y ago
  I can see what you're saying (in good faith). I do think interview anxiety is a collocation of multiple factors. I don't think the correlation of anxiety to the listed categories are easily deconvolved from other factors -- it might seem like a common-sense correlation, especially if you start from certain priors, but it's a big assumption to make on average. (Only this past week I had experiences that challenged my assumptions about certain demographics (seniors) and how I would expect they would behave, and how they actually behaved. The lesson I learned was -- don't assume, always collect real data) The white-male interviewer power dynamic has some basis in reality (I've experienced it occasionally, not all the time), but its effect on my interview performance may be less than 10%? (to throw out a number). I find I'm much more affected -- maybe 90% -- about (1) my competence in the subject matter and (2) how well practiced I am (for instance, I know the theory for a great many subjects but am unpracticed at some of them, so I tend to stumble and lack ease when it comes to demonstrating my subject matter knowledge in real time). For different people, those percentages shift, and I believe in a way that is not obviously or necessarily correlated with their demographic (psychological conditions, yes, but also depends on which ones -- some don't affect anxiety). But all I have is anecdata so I'm not able to provide strong evidence one way or another so this is just my two cents worth -- and I do mean this in good faith.
  - notacoward 6y ago
    I appreciate your willingness to continue this conversation in a constructive way. So let me ask you a question. You say the white-male interviewer power dynamic might affect your interview performance by 10% or less. (Personally I'd pick an even lower number, but then I'm a white male myself and also old enough that I've been senior to most of my interviewers for a while now.) Would a 10% difference in interview performance be enough, on average, to affect who gets offers or what those offers are? My basic point here is that even 1% would be too much. If an interview process creates any inherent disadvantage for some groups, I'd say it deserves serious scrutiny. BTW, by "inherent" I mean beyond what can be addressed by bias training and such. That can enable interviewers to conduct any type of interview in as fair and kind a way as possible, but not to change the interview structure itself. If the structure is the problem, training isn't the solution. I think the in-person white-board algorithm interview is unavoidably weighted toward factors that have nothing to do with likely on-the-job performance, and thus should be avoided.
stevula 6y ago
I don’t know about “resistance to anxiety”, but it can certainly be anxiety-inducing to be the only member of a given minority in the interviewing room (or entire floor, as is sometimes the case in tech).

by wenc 6y ago

enumjorge 6y ago

Yeah I’ve never heard of women and minorities having less resistance to anxiety as a group. I’m curious where that’s coming from. Certain psychological conditions I could see, but that’s such a broad category that I think that’s also an over generalization.

notacoward 6y ago

Allow me to elaborate, then. There's an inherent power dynamic in interviews, which creates stress in the interviewees. That effect is magnified for anyone who is unlike their interviewers, who still tend to be white and male. It's magnified still further when the power dynamic within the interview reflect the one that - very unfortunately - still persists in society at large. Lastly, the funny thing about stress/anxiety is that it tends to be additive. Having experienced high levels recently (including in other interviews) makes one more susceptible to new triggers. Thus, anyone who is the least bit "outside" in any way will feel more anxious. Is any of that even controversial enough to require citation? How many Psychology or Sociology 101 textbooks should I cite? It's easy enough for those who don't feel this kind of anxiety themselves to brush it off, but for those who are less fortunate all those magnifiers can create an anxiety level that's quite debilitating.

syndacks 6y ago
>Is any of that even controversial enough to require citation? I'm sorry, excuse me? Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? Your parent comment certainly seems to suggest that. Which, at a minimum, is flat out wrong. Educate yourself[0]. And then zoom out and ask yourself why it's not only permissible, but often lauded, to so flippantly say what you just said. [0] - https://www.apa.org/about/policy/boys-men-practice-guidelines.pdf https://www.apa.org/about/policy/boys-men-practice-guideline...
- whalabi 6y ago
  > I'm sorry, excuse me? Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? To be fair, OP did say "That effect is magnified for anyone who is unlike their interviewers" But, I do agree some evidence from OP would help their claims. I wouldn't be surprised if minorities experience more anxiety, on average, in situations like an interview, though. I think it's established that imposter syndrome is more frequently encountered for example but it's too late here to go digging for evidence :)
- notacoward 6y ago
  > Are you saying that non-minority, non-women don't suffer anxiety? No, and I doubt anyone would have read it that way in good faith.
  - MiroF 6y ago
    Good faith reader here, can confirm - you pretty clearly were only suggesting some general effect applying on average, not to every individual case.
- oblio 6y ago
  You just "All Lives Matter"ed his "Black Lives Matter" argument. And I'm not writing this as praise for your comment...
  - pb7 6y ago
    Stop dehumanizing an entire group of people. All humans feel anxiety and that's a fact. Excluding one group of people that is equally likely to experience it because it's currently in vogue is still discriminatory.
wenc 6y ago
I can see what you're saying (in good faith). I do think interview anxiety is a collocation of multiple factors. I don't think the correlation of anxiety to the listed categories are easily deconvolved from other factors -- it might seem like a common-sense correlation, especially if you start from certain priors, but it's a big assumption to make on average. (Only this past week I had experiences that challenged my assumptions about certain demographics (seniors) and how I would expect they would behave, and how they actually behaved. The lesson I learned was -- don't assume, always collect real data) The white-male interviewer power dynamic has some basis in reality (I've experienced it occasionally, not all the time), but its effect on my interview performance may be less than 10%? (to throw out a number). I find I'm much more affected -- maybe 90% -- about (1) my competence in the subject matter and (2) how well practiced I am (for instance, I know the theory for a great many subjects but am unpracticed at some of them, so I tend to stumble and lack ease when it comes to demonstrating my subject matter knowledge in real time). For different people, those percentages shift, and I believe in a way that is not obviously or necessarily correlated with their demographic (psychological conditions, yes, but also depends on which ones -- some don't affect anxiety). But all I have is anecdata so I'm not able to provide strong evidence one way or another so this is just my two cents worth -- and I do mean this in good faith.
- notacoward 6y ago
  I appreciate your willingness to continue this conversation in a constructive way. So let me ask you a question. You say the white-male interviewer power dynamic might affect your interview performance by 10% or less. (Personally I'd pick an even lower number, but then I'm a white male myself and also old enough that I've been senior to most of my interviewers for a while now.) Would a 10% difference in interview performance be enough, on average, to affect who gets offers or what those offers are? My basic point here is that even 1% would be too much. If an interview process creates any inherent disadvantage for some groups, I'd say it deserves serious scrutiny. BTW, by "inherent" I mean beyond what can be addressed by bias training and such. That can enable interviewers to conduct any type of interview in as fair and kind a way as possible, but not to change the interview structure itself. If the structure is the problem, training isn't the solution. I think the in-person white-board algorithm interview is unavoidably weighted toward factors that have nothing to do with likely on-the-job performance, and thus should be avoided.

stevula 6y ago

I don’t know about “resistance to anxiety”, but it can certainly be anxiety-inducing to be the only member of a given minority in the interviewing room (or entire floor, as is sometimes the case in tech).