This study investigates whether the choice for a vocationally versus a generally oriented higher education program entails a trade-off between higher employment chances and better matches at the start of the career (when opting for a vocational orientation) and a lower risk of bad match...

We investigate the impact of student work experience on later hiring chances. To completely rule out potential endogeneity, we present a field experiment in which various forms of student work experience are randomly disclosed by more than 1000 fictitious graduates applying for jobs in Belgium....

We investigate whether the publicly available information on Facebook about job applicants affects employers' hiring decisions. To this end, we conduct a field experiment in which fictitious job applications are sent to real job openings in Belgium. The only characteristic in which these...

This study directly assesses the impact of military work experience compared with civilian work experience in similar jobs on the subsequent chances of being hired in the civilian labour market. It does so through a field experiment in the Belgian labour market. A statistical examination of our...

In this letter we present a laboratory experiment to assess the relative and independent effect of perceived attractiveness and personality traits on hiring decisions. Our results indicate that attractiveness and conscientiousness, followed by emotional stability, are important drivers of...

We investigated the impact on first hiring outcomes of two main curriculum vitae (CV) characteristics by which graduates with a tertiary education degree distinguish themselves from their peers: degree class and extra-curricular activities. These characteristics were randomly assigned to 2,800...

Internships during tertiary education have become substantially more common over the past decades in many industrialised countries. This study examines the impact of a voluntary intra-curricular internship experience during university studies on the probability of being invited to a job...

Due to the prevalence and important consequences of student work, the topic has seen an increased interest in the literature. However, to date the focus has been solely on measuring the effect of student employment on later labour market outcomes, relying on signalling theory to explain the...

Due to the prevalence and important consequences of student work, the topic has seen an increased interest in the literature. However, to date the focus has been solely on measuring the effect of student employment on later labour market outcomes, relying on signalling theory to explain the...

The literature on workplace learning in secondary education has mainly focussed on vocational education programmes. In this study, we examine the impact of internship experience in secondary education on a student’s schooling and early labour market outcomes, by analysing unique, longitudinal...