These tools will no longer be maintained as of December 31, 2024. Archived website can be found here. PubMed4Hh GitHub repository can be found here. Contact NLM Customer Service if you have questions.


Pubmed for Handhelds

PUBMED FOR HANDHELDS

Search MEDLINE/PubMed

  • Title: Identifying Gender and Racial Bias in Pediatric Fellowship Letters of Recommendation: Do Word Choices Influence Interview Decisions?
    Author: Boolchandani H, Chen L, Elder RW, Osborn R, Phatak UP, Puthenpura V, Sheares BJ, Tiyyagura G, Amster L, Lee S, Langhan ML.
    Journal: J Pediatr; 2024 Feb; 265():113843. PubMed ID: 37995931.
    Abstract:
    OBJECTIVES: To describe linguistic differences in letters of recommendation (LORs) for pediatric fellowship candidates based on applicant and letter writer demographics and to examine if these differences influenced the decision to interview a candidate for a fellowship position. STUDY DESIGN: LORs for applicants to 8 pediatric subspecialty fellowships at a single academic center from the 2020 Match were analyzed in this cross-sectional study. Frequency of validated agentic and communal terms in each letter were determined by a language processing web application. Bias was determined as having a >5% surplus of agentic or communal terms. RESULTS: We analyzed 1521 LORs from 409 applicants: 69% were women, 28% were under-represented minorities in medicine (URM), and 50% were invited to interview. Overall, 66% of LORs were agentic biased, 16% communal biased, and 19% neutral. There was no difference in bias in LORs by an applicant's gender (woman 67% agentic vs man 62% agentic; P = .058), race, or ethnicity (non-URM 65% agentic vs URM 67% agentic; P = .660). Despite a lower frequency of agentic terms in LORs for applicants invited for interviews, when accounting for other components of an application and applicant demographics, no significant association was made between language bias in LORs and fellowship interview status. CONCLUSIONS: The frequency of agentic and communal terms in LORs for pediatric subspecialty fellowship candidates were not found to influence the decision to invite a candidate to interview. However, raising awareness of potential areas of bias within the pediatric fellowship selection process might lead to a more equitable and holistic approach to application review.
    [Abstract] [Full Text] [Related] [New Search]