Biography

Eva Zschirnt is a sociologist with a strong interdisciplinary background. Her research lies at the intersection of sociology, labour market research and social psychology. She is interested in the field of migration policy, with a focus on integration and discrimination. Her PhD project analyses ‘Ethnic discrimination in hiring decisions in the Swiss labour market’ by conducting a field experiment in Switzerland, and shows the existence of ethnic hierarchies. Next to this focus on the labour market, she is also working on a research project on ethnic discrimination in the housing market, which uses the same experimental methodology.

During her fellowship at the EUI she will draw on this experience in discrimination research and experimental methods in the social sciences. She contributes to the international debate on hiring discrimination by focusing not only on ethnicity but also on the importance of language skills in the application process.

Eva holds a BA in European Studies from Maastricht University in the Netherlands and an MA in Migration and Law with distinction from Queen Mary University of London (UK). From 2014-2018, she was a PhD researcher at the University of Neuchâtel in Switzerland in the framework of ‘nccr – on the move’, a research centre funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation that brings together researchers in migration studies from numerous Swiss universities.