Non‐verbal behaviour and the outcome of selection interviews

Non‐verbal behaviour (NVB) is an important component of the selection interview, yet it has received limited attention in the literature. In particular, little published research has examined NVB in real‐life interviews. A study is described in which 101 school‐leavers were interviewed by a four‐member panel for places on an engineering apprentice training scheme. The NVB of each candidate was categorized during the interview using a schedule of 10 classes of NVB divided into 30 components. When the interviews were grouped by outcome, i.e. accept, reserve, and reject, differences were found on several important classes of NVB. Alternative causal hypotheses are suggested for the observed relationship between NVB in the interview and the decision which was made.