“What do you like to do in your spare time?”

If you’re in a job interview, think through your answer very carefully. Although this question has nothing to do with your relevant job skills and qualifications, it can be the reason you don’t get hired.

Sociologist Lauren Rivera, a professor of management and organisations at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, said across national and international surveys, this remains a common question job candidates get asked before the job interview officially starts.

“Interviews can be a somewhat awkward interaction,” Rivera said. “There’s often a desire on the part of the evaluator to make the interviewee feel comfortable ... And one of the ways that interviewers most commonly do that is through asking questions about, ‘What do you like to do in your spare time?’”

But this is not just idle chitchat, because what you do when you’re not working can reveal your race, gender, class and caregiving responsibilities ― and it can give unfair weight to whether a manager sees you as a good fit for the role.

Why This Interview Question Matters More Than Relevant Questions

How you answer this subjective, arbitrary question can determine whether or not you're hired.

If your interviewer is wowed by your hobby, they may like you enough to hire you ― no matter how bad you might be for the job.

That’s because interviewers are “anchoring on this perception of comfort and ease, which is gendered, which is racialised, which is classed,” Rivera said. If your interviewer skis and you mention how you ski on vacation, “that’s great. If you’re not a skier, if you’ve never gone skiing in your life, they may not be as interested.”

Rivera has found this bias repeatedly through her research. In one 2010 study where she interviewed 120 professionals involved in hiring decisions at law firms, investment banking and management consulting........

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