Communication during the selection interview : a structured review

The selection interview is an inherently communicative event. However, in the history of selection interview research, scholars have remarked on how this research lacks a communicative focus. By a lack of focus, they address the need for selection interview research to examine the actual interview event and the communication that takes place during this meeting. Although most interview research does address the conversation or behavior that takes place during the interview, it needs to unpack what is happening during the interview communicatively, instead just reporting communication actions. To respond to the call for more communication-oriented work on the interview, I conducted a structured review on recent empirical work on this subject. By creating a review structure that analyzed findings from articles that addressed communication in the interview, I selected 46 articles to further explore communication themes in selection interview research. I organized these articles around four common foci of interview research—the interview itself, interviewee behavior, interviewer behavior, and the role of stigmatized identity on the interview experience. Then, I aimed to synthesize findings within these subjects to develop themes to describe what current research tells us about communication during the selection interview. Finally, I provide suggestions for future areas of research to explore communicative elements of the interview.Communication Studie