Making Job Candidates More Honest With a Theory-Based Form

Abstract. In collaboration with recruiting and background check firms, we gave a customized application form designed to both deter and enhance detection of deception to 27 real-life candidates. A total of 269 elements common to both the customized form and their usual free-form resumes were verified. Inaccuracies were reduced from 23% on the resumes to 11% on the customized forms ( p < .001). Furthermore, candidates who did not provide contact information for past professional experiences to facilitate our verifications were less likely to submit fully accurate information about the experience, compared to those who did provide contact information (39% and 77%, respectively, p = .007). This novel method thus appears to be a cost-effective way to address resume fraud.