Subtle Cyber-Discrimination? Not "If" but "How" Internet Housing Providers Respond Differently to Neil, Tyrone and Jorge

Maria Krysan, University of Illinois at Chicago
Samantha Friedman, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)
Gregory Squires, George Washington University
Jonathan D. Stringfield, University of Illinois at Chicago
Katherine (Kate) Moloney, University at Albany, State University of New York (SUNY)

The study of racial and ethnic discrimination in today’s housing market has become increasingly difficult because the nature of the housing industry has changed and the way households search for housing involves the use of the internet. Little research has captured these changes. One recent study that conducted correspondence tests of housing providers who advertised rental units on Craigslist in Boston and Dallas finds that large majorities of testers, regardless of the race or ethnicity implied by their names, receive responses from housing providers (Friedman et al. 2010). The high response rate to the testers raises the issue of whether qualitative differences exist in the nature of the responses to the testers on the basis of their race or ethnicity. This study will be the first qualitative analysis to systematically examine actual e-mail messages exchanged between testers and housing providers and document potential racial and ethnic differences in treatment.