Job Search: A Multidisciplinary Review and Research Agenda

• Author: Laxmikant Manroop,Julia Richardson
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/ijmr.12066
• Date: 01 April 2016
• Published date: 01 April 2016

International Journal of Management Reviews, Vol. 18, 206–227 (2016)

DOI: 10.1111/ijmr.12066

Job Search: A Multidisciplinary Review

and Research Agenda

Laxmikant Manroop and Julia Richardson1

Heller College of Business, Roosevelt University, 430 S. Michigan Ave, Chicago, IL 60605, USA, and 1School of

Human Resource Management, York University, 4700 Keele Street, Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3, Canada

Corresponding author email: lmanroop@roosevelt.edu

Scholarly interestin job search has grown significantly overthe years and can be located

in diverse researchstreams: namely, economics, sociology and industrial/organizational

psychology. This paper reviews these bodies of literature and makes a case for integra-

tion by proposing a multidisciplinary approach to understanding job-seeking behav-

iors. Tothis end, the paper categorizes the respective literatures on the basis of common

themes located in a conceptual multidisciplinary model of job search behaviorsand out-

comes. This model provides a more focused understanding of the job search literature

and how it has developedin the related disciplines. Based on the review and conceptual

model presented, the paper draws attention to several key areas for future research to

advance the field further.

Introduction

Over the past three decades, job search has emerged

as an important area of research across three key

disciplines: namely, labor economics, sociology and

industrial/organizational (I/O) psychology. Public

interest in job search has also increased following the

2008 global economic crises, which sawmany people,

particularly university graduates, struggling to find

work. The November issue of The Economist (2012,

p. 136) predicted that ‘one of the biggest problems

facing the world in 2013 is the . . . crisis of youth un-

employment’. Little wonder,then, that job search and

unemployment are now matters of political, social

and economic concern, garnering much scholarly

interest (e.g. Boswell et al. 2012; Manroop 2013;

Wanberg et al. 2012). An in-depth review and analy-

sis of the job search literature is, therefore, timely and

important.

This paper makes three main contributions: first,

it integrates the job search literature in the fields

The authors would like to thank the editor,Oswald Jones, the

anonymous reviewers and editorial board members for their

detailed and constructive comments.

of labor economics, sociology and I/O psychology.

In doing so, it draws together the dominant theo-

ries and research on job search originating in those

fields into a single document. Therefore, acknowl-

edging the importance of disciplinary diversity, this

paper also demonstrates the interdependence of the

respective research fields and their contribution to

the understanding of job search. Second, the paper

proposes a model that (re)integrates the themes that

have emerged in the respective disciplines into a uni-

fied framework to provide a more holistic under-

standing of job search. Third, the paper identifies

gaps in the extant literature and suggests avenues

for future research. We begin by defining the con-

cept of ‘job search’, acknowledging its complexity,

dynamism and the concomitant implications for job

search scholars.

Kanfer et al. (2001) have defined job search as

‘a dynamic self-regulatory process . .. that begins

with the identification and commitment to pursuing

an employment goal’ (p. 837). A keyassumption here

is that the search for employment initiates job search

behavior. These authors also identify three specific

dimensions of job search: effort–intensity (i.e. how

hard one tries and the frequency of one’s job search

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Job Search: A Review and Research Agenda 207

activity); content–direction1(i.e. activities associated

with job search and the quality of those activities);

and temporal–persistence (i.e. how persistent one is

in searching for a job) (Kanfer et al. 2001). Yet,

much of the contemporary research operationalizes

job search behavior in terms of effort or intensity,

leaving content–direction (i.e. quality of job search

activities) and persistence relatively unexplored (Van

Hoye, in press; Van Hooft et al. 2013). Indeed, Van

Hoye (in press) has called for researchers to examine

job search behavior as a more multidimensional and

composite construct. Responding to this call, we con-

ceptualize job search behavior as a multidimensional

construct composed of effort, intensity, quality and

persistence.

Review methodology

Given that the objective of this paper is to review

and integrate three bodies of literature into a mul-

tidisciplinary framework, a systematic and thorough

search process was essential. First, the search crite-

ria were intentionally broad in order to capture the

full range of themes covered in the respective liter-

atures. We started with Pro Quest Dissertations and

Theses and Google Scholar to maximize the inclu-

sion of papers using keywords such as ‘job search’

and ‘unemployment’. This somewhat crude approach

yielded a large volume of published books, aca-

demic articles and dissertation abstracts. We then

refined this initial pool by setting the scope of the

review to include only peer-reviewed journal articles,

working papers, edited books and dissertations that

reported empirical findings or developed robust theo-

retical and conceptual arguments. Next, we examined

the abstracts and summaries in the refined pool to

parse the literature by discipline, and identify recur-

ring themes. We also compiled a reference list and

compared it with existing reviews of the job search

literature in economics, sociology and I/O psychology

1The content–direction dimension of job search behavior is

composed of two elements: (1) the specific activities job-

seekers engage in (e.g. networking, crafting resumes, inter-

viewing), and (2) the quality of those job-seeking activities.

For example, while networkingis an effective job search ac-

tivity, its success hinges on the ‘quality’ of the contacts in

the jobseeker’s social network (Van Hoye in press). Quality

of job search activity, therefore, is a key dimension of job

search effectiveness. See, for example, works by Van Hooft

et al. (2013), VanHoye et al. (2009) and Van Hoye(in press)

for detailed analyses of the content–direction (e.g. quality)

aspect of job search behaviors.

(e.g. Arpaia and Mourre 2005; Boswell et al. 2012;

Kanfer et al. 2001; Saks 2005). This technique facil-

itated a much more sophisticated and focused search

and, subsequently, a deeper scrutiny of the literature.

We then conducted a further search of the literature

by discipline-specific databases such as PsycINFO

(Psychological Abstracts), SOCA (Sociological Ab-

stracts) and EconLit (Labor Economics Abstracts)

using themes and categories identified in the pre-

liminary review, including: job search methods; job

search strategies; job search expectations; job search

learning; job search behaviors; job search outcomes;

emotional experience and job search; job search and

motivation; and job search antecedents. A synthesis

of these themes constitutes the proposed model. A

total of 176 studies published between 1982 and 2014

contributed to this multidisciplinary review.

Job search as a multidisciplinary

research field

We commence the review by introducing labor eco-

nomics, which adopts a ‘rational’ approach to the

study of job search. We then turn to the sociologi-

cal literature, with its focus on the impact of social

relationships and contextual influences on job search

and the more ‘emic/individual approaches’ adopted

by I/O psychology scholars. This section is intended

to give a broad overarching view of key themes that

will be developed in the detailed discussion of the

proposed model.

Job search theories and research in labor economics

In a comprehensive review of the labor economics

literature, Devine and Kiefer (1991) explore the neo-

classical economic theory of job choice, which as-

sumes that a jobseeker has perfect knowledge of

all available job opportunities and makes a rational

choice by selecting the job with the greatest expected

utility. However, this theory was criticized for being

too simplistic, given its underlying assumption that

jobseekers would have open and complete access to

all ‘relevant’job infor mation (McFadyenand Thomas

1997). Later theories modified this assumption and

focused on how jobseekers generate offersfrom avail-

able opportunities. Devine and Kiefer (1991) note that

labor economic job search models generally acknowl-

edge that (1) job search is associated with costs and

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