Quantitative measures of discrimination with application to appointment processes.

Area of Science:

• Statistics
• Sociology
• Higher Education Policy

Background:

• Bias and discrimination in appointment processes (hiring, promotions, evaluations) are significant societal issues.
• Quantifying these biases statistically is crucial for understanding and addressing systemic inequalities.
• Existing methods often lack accessible tools for practical application.

Purpose of the Study:

• To statistically quantify bias and discrimination in Australian university senior appointments.
• To provide accessible tools for calculating these statistical measures.
• To assess the likelihood of fair outcomes in current and future appointment processes.

Main Methods:

• Utilized the binomial distribution to statistically measure bias in appointment processes.
• Developed and provided a web application for calculating these statistical measures.
• Applied methods to analyze sex (gender) and racial discrimination in Australian university senior appointments.

Main Results:

• Significant sex discrimination was found in 2018 Vice-Chancellor appointments, with a moderate chance of future fairness.
• No strong sex discrimination was evident in senior appointments at eight main research universities as of 2021.
• Extreme racial discrimination was implicit in selection procedures for both Vice-Chancellors and senior appointments across all analyzed universities.

Conclusions:

• The University of Sydney exhibited the most racially biased senior appointment outcomes among analyzed institutions.
• There is a negligible statistical likelihood of achieving racially unbiased outcomes without substantial modifications to selection procedures.
• Addressing systemic racial bias requires significant reform of university appointment processes.