We use cookies to provide you with the best possible website experience. This includes cookies that are necessary for the operation of the site, as well as cookies used for anonymous statistics, comfort settings, or displaying personalized content. You can decide which categories you want to allow. Please note that depending on your settings, some features of the website may not be available.

Cookie settings

These necessary cookies are required to enable the core functionality of the website. Opting out of these cookies is not possible.

cb-enable
This cookie stores the user's cookie consent status for the current domain. Expiry: 1 year.
laravel_session
Stores the session ID to recognize the user when the page reloads and to restore their login session. Expiry: 2 hours.
XSRF-TOKEN
Provides CSRF protection for forms. Expiry: 2 hours.
IZA Discussion Paper No. 18517
April 2026
Human–AI Evaluation and Gender Transparency: Application Decisions in Competitive Hiring

We study how human versus LLM-based evaluation and gender transparency shape entry into competitive jobs. In a preregistered online experiment, participants first complete a Niederle and Vesterlund (2007) tournament task to measure competitive preferences, then prepare text-based job applications and decide whether to apply under each of four evaluation regimes—human only, LLM only, and two hybrid human-in-the-loop configurations—while gender disclosure is randomized between subjects. LLM involvement reduces application rates, with stronger effects for women than men, including under hybrid designs. Effects are driven by non-competitive candidates; non-competitive women, the group most exposed to AI-induced deterrence, receive the strongest objective evaluations under pure AI assessment across all subgroups, yet are systematically underconfident and apply least often. Competitive men persistently apply and exhibit overconfidence-driven adverse selection, whereas competitive women show resilience to AI-induced deterrence while remaining well-calibrated under AI evaluation and exhibiting positive self-selection across regimes. We find no effects of gender transparency.

Communications
Mark Fallak
mark.fallak@liser.lu
+352 585-855-526
World of Labour
Olga Nottmeyer
olga.nottmeyer-ext@liser.lu
+352 585-855-501
Network Coordination
Christina Gathmann
christina.gathmann@liser.lu

The IZA@LISER Network is a global community of scholars dedicated to excellence in labor economics and related fields, now coordinated at the Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER) following its transition from Bonn.

About IZA@LISER Network
Contact
IZA@LISER NETWORK (Current Site Operator):

Luxembourg Institute of Socio-Economic Research (LISER)
11, Porte des Sciences
Maison des Sciences Humaines
L-4366 Esch-sur-Alzette / Belval, Luxembourg

IZA Institute (In Liquidation):

Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH i. L.
Schaumburg-Lippe-Str. 5-9, 53113 Bonn. Germany
Phone: +49 228 3894-0 | Fax: +49 228 3894-510
E-Mail: info@iza.org | Web: www.iza.org
Represented by: Martin T. Clemens (Liquidator)