Sex Roles. Diseño y Atención a las Oportunidades de Género en la Educación Superior

Gillen, M. M. & Lefkowitz, E. S. (2006). Gender role development and body image among male and female first year college student. Sex Roles, 55, 25-37.

In the current study we examined associations between gender role development and body image. Male and female first-semester college students (N = 434) who identified as African American, Latino/a American, and European American completed surveys about gendered personality traits (instrumentality/expressivity), gender role attitudes, and aspects of body image (e.g., satisfaction, orientation). Gendered traits were more frequently associated with body image than were gender role attitudes. In particular, individuals who were more instrumental and less inauthentic in their relationships felt more positive about their bodies. Gender role attitudes were also associated with body image, but sometimes in an unexpected direction. These findings highlight the importance of examining multiple components of gender role development and body image in both men and women.

Sümer, H. C. (2006). Women in management: still waiting to be full members of the club. Sex Roles, 55, 63-72.

The purpose of this study was first to explore the dimensionality of the ratings made for a successful middle manager using the Schein Descriptive Index (SDI) (Schein, 1973), and then to compare the ratings made for a successful middle manager, a women, and a man on the identified dimensions. Students (N=806) enrolled in psychology courses in a university in Ankara, Turkey rated the SDI adjectives to describe a woman, a man, or a successful middle manager. Three factors were identified that underlie the SDI adjectives for a successful middle manager: relationship-orientation, task-orientation, and emotional stability. Compared to men and middle managers in general, women were perceived by all participants to be relatively high in relationship-orientation, relatively low in task-orientation, and relatively low in emotional stability. Implications of the findings are discussed using role congruity theory as a general framework.

Silverschanz, P., Cortina, L. M., Konik, J. & Magley, V. J. (2008). Slurs, snubs, and queer jokes: incidence and impact of heterosexist harassment in academia. Sex Roles, 58, 179-191.

Previous research has suggested that overt hostility against sexual minorities is associated with decrements in their well-being. However, subtler forms of heterosexism and their potential effects have been overlooked, heterosexuals have not been asked how they fare in a heterosexist environment, and no research has examined whether women and men might respond differently to heterosexism. Data from 3,128 northwestern US university students (representing all sexual orientations) address these gaps. Approximately 40% reported experiences of heterosexist harassment (HH) in the past year, and those who encountered both ambient and personal HH reported worse psychological and academic well-being than those who encountered no HH. Similar patterns of findings held for sexual minorities and heterosexuals, and for women and men.

Verdonk, P., Benschop, Y. W. M., De Haes, H. C. J. M. & Lagro-Janssen, T. L. M. (2008). Medical students’ gender awareness. Construction of the Nijmegen gender awareness in medicine scale (N-GAMS). Sex Roles, 58, 222-234.

Gender awareness in medicine consists of two attitudinal components: gender sensitivity and gender-role ideology. In this article, the development of a scale to measure these attitudes in Dutch medical students is described. After a pilot study and a feasibility study, 393 medical students in The Netherlands responded to a preliminary instrument consisting of 82 items (response rate 61.3%). Reliability and validity were established. A gender awareness scale containing a gender sensitivity subscale (14 items), and gender stereotypes towards patients (11 items) as well as towards doctors (7 items) was developed. The instrument may be used for research purposes to evaluate gender awareness raising courses.

Hartman, H. & Hartman, M. (2008). How undergraduate engineering students perceive women’s (and men’s) problems in science, math and engineering. Sex Roles, 58, 251-265.

This paper compares perceptions of problems for women and men in the fields of science, math, and engineering among undergraduate engineering students surveyed at a mid-Atlantic American university over a period of 5 years. Gender differences in these perceptions are analyzed, as are changes in these perceptions over the course of the undergraduate years. Undergraduate exposure to female role models in these fields has little impact on these perceptions, but exposure to professional engineering experiences reduces the seriousness with which some problems are perceived, especially by women. While perceived problems do not seem to be related to engineering self-confidence, they are related to men’s satisfaction with engineering, and to women’s intentions to persist in the engineering field after graduation.

Todd, Z., Madill, A., Shaw, N. & Bown, N. (2008). Faculty members’ perceptions of how academic work is evaluated: similarities and differences by gender. Sex Roles, 59, 765-775.

A questionnaire about how academic performance is evaluated and the importance of teaching and research was completed by 265 faculties at a UK research university. Factor analysis followed by t-tests showed that male faculty had a more realistic understanding of how their research is evaluated, rate the importance of research to their careers more highly, and are more likely than women to work over hours through choice. Women faculty are more likely than men to work over hours because of teaching workload and rate the importance of a teaching qualification more highly, despite giving similar ratings as men to the importance of teaching to their career. The implications for differential rates of promotion are discussed.

Sanders, K., Willemsen, T. M. & Millar, C. C. J. M. (2009). Views from above the glass ceiling: does the academic environment influence women professors’ careers and experiences? Sex Roles, 60, 301-312.

Using data from 188 female full professors from all 14 Dutch universities this study examines whether skewed sex ratios in the environment and the absence of a women-friendly environment are related to their career path experiences and to their perception of the general ease of women’s obtaining a professorship. Results from multi-level analyses show a positive relationship between the perception of women-friendly environment and both the experience of their own career path, and the perceived ease with which other women could become a full professor. Moreover results show that the higher the percentage of women professors in the academic field the stronger the relationship between perception of women friendliness and the experienced ease with which they became a full professor.

Lampman, C., Phelps, A., Bancroft, S. & Beneke, M. (2009). Contrapower harassment in academia: a survey of faculty experience with student incivility, bullying, and sexual attention. Sex Roles, 60, 331-346.

This study defines contrapower harassment in academia as student incivility, bullying, and sexual attention aimed at faculty. A U.S., Alaskan sample of 399 professors (50% women, 88% white) at the state’s largest public university was surveyed about their experience with contrapower harassment. Although men reported more sexual attention from students and comparable levels of student incivility–bullying, women reported that such behaviors were more upsetting and had a greater negative impact on their health and work-lives; they were also more likely to take action following such experiences than men. Tenure-track faculty appear to be at increased risk of student hostility. Discussion focuses on how gender and other markers of socio-cultural or institutional power relate to the experience of contrapower harassment.

Brinkman, B. G. & Rickard, K. M. (2009). College students’ descriptions of everyday gender prejudice. Sex Roles, 61, 461-475.

This study examined 104 undergraduate college students (mean age = 19) from the Western United States regarding gender differences in their experiences of gender prejudice. Women (N=81) and men (N=22) responded to an online diary for 14 days, resulting in 1008 descriptions of events. Women reported significantly higher levels of negative affect than men during the experiences. Qualitative content analysis was used to analyze event descriptions and three main themes emerged including target of the event, perpetrator and setting. Significant differences were found for target and perpetrator based upon the gender of the participant. There were also significant differences in the distribution of the type of event (gender role stereotypes, sexual objectification or demeaning events) based on the setting and target.

Sakall%u0131-U%u011Furlu, N. (2010). Ambivalent sexism, gender, and mayor as predictors of Turkish college students’ attitudes toward women and men’s atypical educational choices. Sex Roles, 62, 427-437.

The aim of the study was to investigate how ambivalent gender attitudes (hostile/benevolent sexism; hostility/benevolence toward men), plus gender and major predict attitudes toward men studying social sciences and women studying natural sciences in Turkey, where gender attitudes are relatively traditional. Undergraduates (N=215, mean age=21.16) completed scales of Ambivalent Sexism, Ambivalence toward Men, Attitudes toward Men in Social Sciences (AMSS), and Attitudes toward Women in Natural Sciences (AWNS). Although AMSS and AWNS were positive, men and natural-science majors had less positive AMSS and AWNS. Men in social sciences were perceived more negatively than women in natural sciences. Gender and hostile sexism predicted AWNS; gender, major, and benevolence toward men predicted AMSS. Implications for status relations are discussed.

Fields, A. M., Swan, S. & Kloos, B. (2010). “What it means to be a woman”: ambivalent sexism in female college students’ experiences and attitudes. Sex Roles, 62, 554-567.

This study used content analysis to examine if themes related to ambivalent sexism (Glick and Fiske 1996) emerged when female students wrote an essay answering the question “What does it mean to be a woman?” and examined the relationship between Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI) scores (Glick and Fiske 1996) and content analysis. Participants were 78 female undergraduate students in the Southeastern U.S. Findings revealed themes related to ambivalent sexism were present in 99% of essays, indicating that ambivalent sexism is highly relevant to women’s gendered experiences. Furthermore participants’ ASI scores were positively correlated with a sexism score created from coded essay content. The discussion addresses theoretical and contextual implications of the findings.

Brinkman, B. G., Garcia, K. & Rickard, K. M. (2011). “What I wanted to do was…” Discrepancies between college women’s desired and reported responses to gender prejudice. Sex Roles, 65, 344-355.

When experiencing gender prejudice, college women engage in a dynamic decision making process about whether and how to respond. We examined the discrepancy between how college women wanted to respond and how they actually responded to gender prejudice events and explored their reasons for not using a desired response. In this study, 81 college women from the Western United States responded to a qualitative online daily diary about gender prejudice. In 34% (N=265) of the events, the women reported there was a discrepancy between what they wanted to do and how they actually reacted, with the most common discrepancy being a desire to utilize a confrontational response (91%, N=242). Over the two week period, women reported significantly more events during which they considered the use of a confrontational response (N=242) than they actually used one (N=199). Women’s reported reasons for not using their desired response included: not being cost effective (25%), concern about social norms (37%), setting limitations (19%), personality characteristics (9%) and not being bothered enough by the event (10%). We also found that when women considered using a confrontational response but decided not to, they reported using all other response types instead. In these cases, women who did nothing during the event reported lower levels of distress during the event than women who used a psychological response or a different confrontational response. Implications and future research directions are discussed.

Schrick, B. H., Sharp, E. A., Zvonkovic, A. & Reifman, A. (2012). Never let them see you sweat: silencing and striving to appear perfect among U.S. college women. Sex Roles, 67, 591-604.

Smeding, A. (2012). Women in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM): an investigation of their implicit gender stereotypes and stereotypes’ connectedness to Math performance. Sex Roles, 67, 617-629.

In spite of many barriers facing women’s enrollment in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), some women are successful in these counterstereotypic disciplines. The present research extended work primarily conducted in the United States by investigating implicit gender-STEM stereotypes—and their relation to performance—among female and male engineering and humanities students in Southern France. In study 1 (N055), we tested whether implicit gender-math stereotypes—as measured by the Implicit Association Test (IAT; Greenwald et al. 1998)—would be weaker among female engineering students as compared to female humanities, male engineering and male humanities students. In study 2 (N0201), we tested whether this same results pattern would be observed with implicit gender-reasoning stereotypes (using a newly created IAT) and, in addition, whether implicit genderreasoning stereotypes would be more strongly (and negatively) related to math grades for female humanities students as compared to the three other groups. Results showed that female engineering students held weaker implicit gendermath and gender-reasoning stereotypes than female humanities, male engineering and male humanities students. Moreover, implicit stereotyping was more negatively related to math grades for female humanities students than for the three other groups. Together, findings demonstrate that female engineering students hold weaker implicit genderSTEM stereotypes than other groups of students and, in addition, that these stereotypes are not necessarily negatively associated with math performance for all women. Discussion emphasizes how the present research helps refine previous finding.

Hurst, R. J. & Beesley, D. (2013). Perceived sexism, self-silencing, and psychological distress in college women. Sex Roles, 68, 311-320.

The current study aimed to increase knowledge related to the role of a restrictive relational strategy in the well-established link between women’s experiences of sexism and psychological distress. Utilizing self-report data, this study examined whether self-silencing mediated the relationship between perceived sexism and psychological distress in a sample of U.S. college women (n0143) from a large, Midwestern university. It was hypothesized that recent sexist events, lifetime sexist events, and self-silencing would predict increased psychological distress and that self-silencing would mediate the relationship between perceived sexism and distress. Higher recalled sexist events both within the past year and over a lifetime predicted increased psychological distress and self-silencing, while self-silencing predicted increased distress. Results from hierarchical multivariate regression analyses and bootstrapping supported the mediating role of self-silencing between lifetime sexist events and distress and between recent (i.e., occurring in the past year) sexist events and distress. Findings support that the adoption of a restrictive relational strategy partially explains the negative psychological consequences of perceived sexism for college women.

Jagacinski, C. M. (2013). Women engineering students: competence perceptions and achievement goals in the Freshman engineering course. Sex Roles, 69, 644-657.

Research suggests that women engineering students in the United States typically have lower competence perceptions than their male classmates. According to achievement goal theory, low competence perceptions are associated with avoidance achievement goals which involve a preoccupation with avoiding failure rather than a focus on approaching success. The current study was conducted to see if women in a freshmen engineering course would rate their competence lower than their male classmates and if they would be more likely to adopt avoidance achievement goals. Further, would lower competence perceptions (i.e., perceived ability, selfefficacy) and avoidance goals have negative effects on grades and interest in the freshman engineering course? A sample of 117 first-semester engineering students from a U.S. Midwestern University completed surveys several times during the semester. Data were also collected from a sample of 82 first-semester students enrolled in an introductory psychology course for comparison purposes. Women in the freshman engineering course reported lower competence perceptions and higher levels of avoidance achievement goals than did men in the engineering course and  than men and women in the psychology course. However, there were no significant gender differences in course grades or interest in the engineering course. Further analyses revealed indirect effects of gender on grades and interest in the engineering course through the competence perceptions. The indirect effects were negative suggesting lower values for women in engineering. The avoidance achievement goals were not influential in the indirect effects. The implications of these finding for the persistence of women in engineering are discussed.

Settles, I. H. & O’Connor, R. C. (2014). Incivility at academic conferences: gender differences and the mediating role of climate. Sex Roles, 71, 71-82.

In a survey study of 458 U.S. women and men, we examined experiences of incivility at an academic conference, a context that represents an important extension of the academic/professional workplace. We hypothesized and found that women reported more incivility, perceived the climate to be more sexist, and reported more conference exclusion than men. Counter to our prediction, men and women did not differ in how negatively they viewed the climate or their conference satisfaction. Since incivility may be a subtle form of bias that targets women more than men, women’s experiences of incivility may lead them to view the environment as more sexist. We found support for this, such that the relationship between incivility and sexist climate perceptions were stronger for women than men. Finally, we proposed that incivility would be related to negative conference outcomes through more negative perceptions of the conference climate for both genders, and through sexist climate perceptions only for women. Results of our path analyses indicated that positive, but not sexist, climate perceptions mediated the relationship between incivility and conference satisfaction for both genders. Further, both sexist and positive climate perceptions mediated the relationship between incivility and conference exclusion for both genders. We discuss incivility as a gendered phenomenon related to sexist contexts, as well as reasons for the observed mediated relationships. Additionally, we discuss the significant role that conference experiences may play for women and men in academia and professional settings, and implications for conference organizers.

Brinkman, B. G., Dean, A. M., Simpson, C. K., McGinley, M. & Rosén, L. A. (2015). Bystander intervention during college women’s experiences of gender prejudice.  Sex Roles, 72, 485-498.

Gender prejudice is a common occurrence that takes place throughout one’s life and in many arenas (i.e., school, work, public settings, etc.). Recent research has explored how targets respond to such experiences, but few studies examine bystander reactions to this type of event. The current study examined four factors (social norms, cost-effectiveness, distress, and feminist activism) that might influence how bystanders respond when witnessing gender prejudice. Male and female college students (n=291) from the Western United States completed online surveys in which they described their experiences witnessing a woman being targeted with gender prejudice. Results indicate gender differences in appraisals of the cost-effectiveness of using particular responses, but no gender differences in the types of responses used. Results indicate that the endorsement of feminist activism predicted female bystanders’ use of confrontational responses, but none of the variables predicted male bystanders’ use of confrontational responses. For female bystanders, those who questioned whether their response would be cost-effective were more likely to report considering, but not using a confrontational response. Implications and future directions are discussed.

Gartzia, L. & Fetterolf, J. C. (2016). What division of labor do university students expect in their future lives? Divergences and communalities of female and male students. Sex Roles, 74, 121-135.

Gender inequality is embedded in men’s greater labor force participation and women’s greater assumption of domestic roles. These inequalities are at the same time rooted in people’s projections about their future lives, which influence future behaviors and values. The current research analyzes factors that influence these projections about the gender division of labor. A sample of 230 male and female Spanish university students reported their expectations about gender equality in their own future life. Data are also presented from 113 female university students from the United States, who completed the same measures. In an experimental design, these participants were also assigned to envision a possible future self as a married parent who was employed full-time, part-time, or not at all and whose educational attainment was a bachelor’s degree or an advanced degree. When reporting expectations for their own future lives, more female than male Spanish participants expected part-time work, marriage, and parenthood. In most aspects, the experimental conditions, with their assignments to particular future situations, yielded the same expectations for the male and female participants. Notably, as hypothesized, participants of both sexes estimated that greater employment would enhance their attainment of career and respect goals but compromise family goals. We discuss the effects of employment expectations on the division of labor and gender equality, and additionally provide a crosscultural interpretation of the differences observed between Spain and the United States.

Banchefsky, S., Westfall, J., Park, B. & Judd, C. M. (2016). But you don’t look like a scientists!: women scientists with feminine appearance are deemed less likely to be scientists. Sex Roles, 75, 95-109.

Two studies examined whether subtle variations in feminine appearance erroneously convey a woman’s likelihood of being a scientist. Eighty photos (half women) of tenured/tenure-track science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) faculty at elite research universities were selected from the Internet. Participants, naïve to the targets’ occupations, rated the photos on femininity and likelihood of being a scientist and an early childhood educator. Linear mixed model analysis treated both participants and stimuli as random factors, enabling generalization to other samples of participants and other samples of stimuli. Feminine appearance affected career judgments for female scientists (with increasing femininity decreasing the perceived likelihood of being a scientist and increasing the perceived likelihood of being an early childhood educator), but had no effect on judgments of male scientists. Study 2 replicated these findings with several key procedural modifications: the presentation of the stimuli was manipulated to either be blocked by gender or completely randomized, questions pertaining to the stimuli’s appearance were removed, and a third career judgment likelihood rating was added to avoid tradeoffs between scientist and early childhood educator. In both studies, results suggest that for women pursuing STEM, feminine appearance may erroneously signal that they are not well suited for science.

Stout, J. G., Grunberg, V. A. & Ito, T. A. (2016). Gender roles and stereotypes about science careers help explain women and men’s science pursuits. Sex Roles, 75, 490-499.

Diverse perspectives in science promote innovation and creativity, and represent the needs of a diverse populace. However, many science fields lack gender diversity. Although fewer women than men pursue careers in physical science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (pSTEM), more women than men pursue careers in behavioral science. The current work measured the relationship between first-year college students’ stereotypes about science professions and course completion in science fields over the next 3 years. pSTEM careers were more associated with self-direction and self-promotion (i.e., agency) than with working with and for the betterment of others (i.e., communion). On the flip side, behavioral science careers were associated with communion to a greater degree than with agency. Women completed a lower proportion of pSTEM courses than did men, but this gender disparity disappeared when women perceived high opportunity for communion in pSTEM. Men pursued behavioral science courses to a lesser degree than did women; this disparity did not exist when men perceived ample opportunity for agency in behavioral science. These results suggest highlighting the communal nature of pSTEM and the agentic nature of behavioral science in pre-college settings may promote greater gender diversity across science fields.