gender based stereotypes essay

124 Gender Stereotypes Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

Whether you are writing an argumentative paper or an essay about your personal experience, you’ll find something useful on this page. Check out this list of 120 gender stereotypes research titles put together by our experts .

💭 Top 10 Gender Bias Essay Topics

🏆 best gender stereotypes essay topics, 🎓 simple & easy gender stereotypes research titles, 📌 most interesting ideas for a gender stereotypes essay, ❓ research questions about gender stereotypes.

• Gender roles and how they influence the society.
• The gender pay gap in white collar occupations.
• The harms of gender stereotyping in school.
• Inequality between men and women in politics.
• Differences in gender stereotypes in the East and West.
• Gender representation in children’s media.
• Breaking gender stereotypes through education.
• Sexism and gender bias.
• Traditional gender roles in Western society.
• Gender discrimination in healthcare.
• Gender Stereotypes in the “Frozen” and “Shrek” Movies The motivations of female characters in Disney movies are directly tied to the development of goals and ambitions because it is the source of these notions.
• The Smurfette Principle: Gender Stereotypes and Pop-Culture After watching “The Little Mermaid”, and reading “The Cat in the Hat”, Sophie is left disgusted by the peripheral role that female characters play in the media.
• Gender Stereotypes in “Million Dollar Baby” Movie In order to enter the world of boxing, Maggie, the main heroine of Million Dollars Baby, had to overcome the adversities connected with gender stereotypes.
• “The Blue Castle” by Lucy Maud Montgomery: Social Construction and Gender Stereotypes In the past decades, a female child in society had to be prepared for the roles of a mother and a wife to help her take care of the family when she gets married in […]
• Little Red Riding Hood: Breaking Gender Stereotypes On refusing marriage to the Roman prefect of the province, she was fed to Satan who came in the form of a dragon. By the time the wolf arrives, he cannot of course convince the […]
• Gender Stereotypes Found in Media The chosen image represents one of the most common gender biases women are obliged to do the chores because it is not men’s responsibility.
• Gender Stereotypes in Advertisement In addition, I think that this example has a negative contribution and can become harmful for limiting gender stereotypes due to the downplaying of the importance of women.
• Gender Stereotypes and Sexual Discrimination In this Ted Talk, Sandberg also raises a question regarding the changes that are needed to alter the current disbalance in the number of men and women that achieve professional excellence.
• Gender Stereotypes About Women Still Exist Given the fact that this is a whole intellectual sphere, the capabilities of males and females are equilibrated to the greatest extent.
• Media and Gender Stereotypes Against Females in Professional Roles Within the Criminal Justice The first and a half of the second episode were chosen as the pilot episode often reflects the essence of the entire show.
• Disney Princesses as Factors of Gender Stereotypes This research focused on determining the impact of Disney Princesses on of preschool age girls in the context of the transmission of gender stereotypes.
• Gender Stereotypes in Modern Society However, in this case, the problem is that because of such advertisements, men tend to achieve the shown kind of appearance and way of thinking.
• Femininity and Masculinity: Gender Stereotypes In conclusion, it is necessary to admit that femininity and masculinity are two sides of the same medal, and neither should be neglected.
• Sex and Gender Stereotypes: Similar and Different Points To conclude, the works by Devor and Rudacille touch upon the controversial topic of gender identification in the modern society. Nevertheless, both works are similar in their focus on the issues of sex, gender, sexuality, […]
• Problem of Gender Stereotypes in Weightlifting The Change paper is a combination of all the recommendations that can be useful in dealing with the problem of gender stereotypes in weightlifting.
• How Gender Stereotypes Affect Performance in Female Weightlifting One can therefore see that this decision reflected common perceptions among several stakeholders in the weightlifting industry and that the same is likely to occur in the future.
• “Bimbos and Rambos: The Cognitive Basis of Gender Stereotypes” by Matlin W.M. According to this theory, there exists a relationship between the cognitive processes of the brain and the beliefs that the individual leans and takes up according to his or her upbringing. The media tends to […]
• Gender Stereotypes and Human Emotions One of the easiest ways to check the connection between gender and emotions is to ask a person who prefers to demonstrate their emotions in public, a man or a woman.
• Gender Stereotypes and Influence on People’s Lives However, the overall development in human thought enhances the advancement in the framework of people’s understanding of the world around them.
• Gender Stereotyping Rates in the USA I do not feel that gender stereotypes in America are still strong because many women make more money than their husbands do nowadays, whereas men like to do housework and cook for their families.
• Gender Stereotypes: Interview with Dalal Al Rabah Women need a passion to succeed, to be of influence, and to make a difference in the daily living of their loved ones.
• Toxic Relationships and Gender Stereotypes According to the patient, they believe that a woman is responsible for the psychological climate and the psychological well-being of her husband.
• Confronting Gender Stereotypes It is imperative to confront the careless use of male and female stereotypes in order to preserve decency, community, and the lives of children and teenagers.
• Gender Stereotypes in Disney Princesses The evolvement of the princess image in the films of the studio represents the developing position of strong independent women in the society, but the princess stereotypes can harm the mentality of children.
• Gender Stereotypes in the Classroom Matthews notes that the teacher provides the opportunity for his students to control the situation by shaping the two groups. To reinforce the existing gender stereotypes in the given classroom, Mr.
• Dr. Stacy Smith’ View on Women Gender Stereotypes Stacy Smith, the author is unfortunate that despite the fact that population of men and women is equal, the womenfolk, the society is not really to accept this equality in assigning roles, even when a […]
• Influence of activating implicit gender stereotypes in females The results revealed that the participants who were subjected to the gender based prime performed relatively poorly compared to their counterparts on the nature prime.
• Towards Evaluating the Relationship Between Gender Stereotypes & Culture It is therefore the object of this paper to examine the relationship between gender stereotypes and culture with a view to elucidating how gender stereotypes, reinforced by our diverse cultural beliefs, continue to allocate roles […]
• How contemporary toys enforce gender stereotypes in the UK Children defined some of the physical attributes of the toys.”Baby Annabell Function Doll” is a likeness of a baby in that it that it has the size and physical features of a baby.
• Gender Studies: Gender Stereotypes From what is portrayed in the media, it is possible for people to dismiss others on the basis of whether they have masculinity or are feminine.
• Gender stereotypes of superheroes The analysis is based on the number of male versus female characters, the physical characteristic of each individual character, the ability to solve a problem individually as either male or female and both males and […]
• Gender Stereotypes on Television Gender stereotyping in television commercials is a topic that has generated a huge debate and it is an important topic to explore to find out how gender roles in voice-overs TV commercials and the type […]
• How Gender Stereotypes Are Portrayed On The Television Series
• Hollywood is a Vessel for Enforcing Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Stereotypes Of Early Childhood Education
• Gender Stereotypes Among Children’s Toys
• Color and Female Gender Stereotypes: What They Are, How They Came About and What They Mean
• An Analysis of Gender Stereotypes in Boys Don’t Cry, a Film by Kimberly Peirce
• The Role Media Plays In Relation To Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Stereotypes Of Media And Its Effect On Society
• English Postcolonial Animal Tales and Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Stereotypes : The Ugly Truth
• Gender Stereotypes and Discrimination in Sports and the Lack of Women in Leadership Position in Professional Sports
• Female Development and the Impact of Gender Stereotypes
• The Hidden Gender Stereotypes in the Animations the Little Mermaid and Tangled
• Gender Stereotypes In The Ordeal Of Gilbert Pinfold
• Gender Stereotypes And The Gender Of A Baby
• Gender Stereotypes in Advertising and the Media
• An Overview of Gender Stereotypes in the United States
• An Overview of Gender Stereotypes During Childhood
• The Issue of Gender Stereotypes and Its Contribution to Gender Inequality in the Second Presidential Debate
• The Impact of Gender Stereotypes in Commercial Advertisements on Family Dynamics
• How Does Gender Stereotypes Affect Today ‘s Society
• Gender Stereotypes on Television, Advertisements and Childrens Television Programs
• Gender Stereotypes in Non-Traditional Sports
• The Importance Of Gender Stereotypes
• How Do Gender Stereotypes Affect The Decisions Our Youth
• Gender Stereotypes in Movies and Their Influence on Gender Nonconforming Movies
• Stereotypes And Stereotypes Of Gender Stereotypes
• The Effects of Advertising in Reinforcing Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Differences and Gender Stereotypes from a Psychological Perspective
• An Analysis of Gender Differences and Gender Stereotypes
• Female Discourse and Gender Stereotypes in Eliot’s Novel
• As You Like It and Gender Stereotypes Based On Rosalind
• Gender Stereotypes Of Harry Potter And The Sorcerer ‘s Stone
• Gender Stereotypes in Achebe’s Dead Men’s Path
• Gender Stereotypes And Stereotypes Of A Child ‘s Play Sets
• Advertising and Gender Stereotypes: How Culture is Made
• Gender Stereotypes Are Challenged By Children And Adolescence
• Gender Stereotypes Of Advertising And Marketing Campaigns
• Does Mainstream Media Have a Duty to Challenge Gender Stereotypes
• A Social Constructivist Approach on the Heterosexual Matrix and Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Stereotypes of Women in Society, Sports, and Workforce
• The Factors That Influence Gender Roles, Gender Identity and Gender Stereotypes
• Gender Stereotypes And Its Effect On Society
• Are Gender Stereotypes Perpetuated In Children’s Magazines
• Gender Stereotypes And Gender Discrimination
• An Explanation of Gender Stereotypes from a Scene in the Movie, Tootsie
• An Analysis of Gender Stereotypes in Today’s Society
• Gender Stereotypes And The Credibility Of Newspaper Articles Associated
• Gender Stereotypes And Behaviors Of Men And Women
• Gender Stereotypes In Boys And Girls By Alice Munro
• Media Affects How We View Gender Stereotypes
• Media and Its Effects on Gender Stereotypes
• How Does Advertising Reinforce Gender Stereotypes?
• Are Gender Stereotypes Perpetuated in Children’s Magazines?
• How Do Contemporary Toys Enforce Gender Stereotypes in the UK?
• Can Gender Quotas Break Down Negative Stereotypes?
• How Do Gender Stereotypes Affect Today’s Society?
• Are Sexist Attitudes and Gender Stereotypes Linked?
• How Does Ridley Scott Create and Destroy Gender Stereotypes in Thelma and Louise?
• Does Mainstream Media Have a Duty to Challenge Gender Stereotypes?
• How Does the Proliferation of Gender Stereotypes Affect Modern Society?
• Why Do Children Learn Gender Stereotypes?
• How Do Gender Roles and Stereotypes Affect Children?
• Do Men and Women Differ in Their Gender Stereotypes?
• How Are Gender Stereotypes Depicted in “A Farewell to Arms” by Hemingway?
• What Are the Problems of Gender Stereotyping?
• How Have Gender Stereotypes Always Been a Part of Society?
• What Are the Factors That Determine Gender Stereotypes?
• How Do Gender Stereotypes Warp Our View of Depression?
• What Influences Gender Roles in Today’s Society?
• How Do Jane Eyre and the Works of Robert Browning Subvert Gender Stereotypes?
• What Is the Difference Between Gender Roles and Gender Stereotypes?
• How Do Magazines Create Gender Stereotypes?
• Where Did Gender Stereotypes Originate?
• How Does the Society Shape and Stereotypes Gender Roles?
• Why Do Gender Roles Change Over Time?
• How Do Gender Stereotypes Affect Students?
• What Is the Role of Family in Gender Stereotyping?
• How Can Gender Stereotypes Be Overcome?
• Can Stereotypes Be Changed?
• How Does Culture Influence Gender Stereotypes?
• How Can We Prevent Gender Stereotypes in Schools?
• Sociological Perspectives Titles
• Gender Roles Paper Topics
• Ethics Ideas
• Human Behavior Research Topics
• Motherhood Ideas
• Relationship Research Ideas
• Oppression Research Topics
• Parenting Research Topics
• Chicago (A-D)
• Chicago (N-B)

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What Are Gender Stereotypes?

• How They Develop
• How to Combat

Gender stereotypes are preconceived, usually generalized views about how members of a certain gender do or should behave, or which traits they do or should have. They are meant to reinforce gender norms, typically in a binary way ( masculine vs. feminine ).

Gender stereotypes have far-reaching effects on all genders.

Read on to learn about how gender stereotypes develop, the effects of gender stereotypes, and how harmful gender stereotypes can be changed.

Davin G Photography / Getty Images

Meaning of Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes are ideas about how members of a certain gender do or should be or behave. They reflect ingrained biases based on the social norms of that society. Typically, they are considered as binary (male/female and feminine/masculine).

By nature, gender stereotypes are oversimplified and generalized. They are not accurate and often persist even when there is demonstrable evidence that contradict them. They also tend to ignore the fluidity of gender and nonbinary gender identities.

Classification of Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes have two components, which are:

• Descriptive : Beliefs about how people of a certain gender do act, and their attributes
• Prescriptive : Beliefs about how people of a specific gender should act and attributes they should have

Gender stereotypes can be positive or negative. This doesn’t mean good or bad—even stereotypes that seem “flattering” can have harmful consequences.

• Positive gender stereotypes : Describe behaviors or attributes that align with accepted stereotypical ideas for that gender, and that people of that gender are encouraged to display (for example, girls should play with dolls and boys should play with trucks)
• Negative gender stereotypes : Describe behaviors or attributes that are stereotypically undesirable for that gender and that people from that gender are discouraged from displaying (such as women shouldn’t be assertive, or men shouldn’t cry)

The attribute is undesirable for all genders but more accepted in a particular gender than others. For example, arrogance and aggression are unpleasant in all genders but are tolerated more in men and boys than in women, girls, or nonbinary people .

Gender stereotypes tend to be divided into these two generalized themes:

• Communion : This stereotype orients people to others. It includes traits such as compassionate, nurturing, warm, and expressive, which are stereotypically associated with girls/women/femininity.
• Agency : This stereotype orients people to the self and is motivated by goal attainment. It includes traits such as competitiveness, ambition, and assertiveness, which are stereotypically associated with boys/men/masculinity.

Basic types of gender stereotypes include:

• Personality traits : Such as expecting women to be nurturing and men to be ambitious
• Domestic behaviors : Such as expecting women to be responsible for cooking, cleaning, and childcare, while expecting men to do home repairs, pay bills, and fix the car
• Occupations : Associates some occupations such as childcare providers and nurses with women and pilots and engineers with men
• Physical appearance : Associates separate characteristics for women and men, such as women should shave their legs or men shouldn’t wear dresses

Gender stereotypes don’t exist in a vacuum. They can intersect with stereotypes and prejudices surrounding a person’s other identities and be disproportionately harmful to different people. For example, a Black woman experiences sexism and racism , and also experiences unique prejudice from the intersectionality of sexism and racism that a White woman or Black man would not.

Words to Know

• Gender : Gender is a complex system involving roles, identities, expressions, and qualities that have been given meaning by a society. Gender is a social construct separate from sex assigned at birth.
• Gender norms : Gender norms are what a society expects from certain genders.
• Gender roles : These are behaviors, actions, social roles, and responsibilities a society views as appropriate or inappropriate for certain genders.
• Gender stereotyping : This ascribes the stereotypes of a gender group to an individual from that group.
• Self-stereotyping vs. group stereotyping : This is how a person views themselves compared to how they view the gender group they belong to (for example, a woman may hold the belief that women are better caregivers than men, but not see herself as adept in a caregiving role).

How Gender Stereotypes Develop

We all have unconscious biases (assumptions our subconscious makes about people based on groups that person belongs to and our ingrained associations with those groups). Often, we aren’t even aware we have them or how they influence our behavior.

Gender stereotyping comes from unconscious biases we have about gender groups.

We aren’t preprogrammed at birth with these biases and stereotypes. Instead, they are learned through repeated and ongoing messages we receive.

Gender roles, norms, and expectations are learned by watching others in our society, including our families, our teachers and classmates, and the media. These roles and the stereotypes attached to them are reinforced through interactions starting from birth. Consciously or not, adults and often other children will reward behavior or attributes that are in line with expectations for a child’s gender, and discourage behavior and attributes that are not.

Some ways gender stereotypes are learned and reinforced in childhood include:

• How adults dress children
• Toys and play activities offered to children
• Children observing genders in different roles (for example, a child may see that all of the teachers at their daycare are female)
• Praise and criticism children receive for behaviors
• Encouragement to gravitate toward certain subjects in school (such as math for boys and language arts for girls)
• Anything that models and rewards accepted gender norms

Children begin to internalize these stereotypes quite early. Research has shown that as early as elementary school, children reflect similar prescriptive gender stereotypes as adults, especially about physical appearance and behavior.

While all genders face expectations to align with the stereotypes of their gender groups, boys and men tend to face harsher criticism for behavior and attributes that are counterstereotypical than do girls and women. For example, a boy who plays with a doll and wears a princess dress is more likely to be met with a negative reaction than a girl who wears overalls and plays with trucks.

The Hegemonic Myth

The hegemonic myth is the false perception that men are the dominant gender (strong and independent) while women are weaker and need to be protected.

Gender stereotypes propagate this myth.

Effects of Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes negatively impact all genders in a number of ways.

Nonbinary Genders

For people who are transgender / gender nonconforming (TGNC), gender stereotypes can lead to:

• Feelings of confusion and discomfort
• A low view of self-worth and self-respect
• Transphobia (negative feelings, actions, and attitudes toward transgender people or the idea of being transgender, which can be internalized)
• Negative impacts on mental health
• Struggles at school

Unconscious bias plays a part in reinforcing gender stereotypes in the classroom. For example:

• Educators may be more likely to praise girls for being well-behaved, while praising boys for their ideas and comprehension.
• Boys are more likely to be viewed as being highly intelligent, which influences choices. One study found girls as young as 6 avoiding activities that were labeled as being for children who are “really, really smart.”
• Intentional or unintentional steering of children toward certain subjects influences education and future employment.

In the Workforce

While women are in the workforce in large numbers, gender stereotypes are still at play, such as:

• Certain occupations are stereotypically gendered (such as nursing and teaching for women and construction and engineering for men).
• Occupations with more female workers are often lower paid and have fewer opportunities for promotion than ones oriented towards men.
• More women are entering male-dominated occupations, but gender segregation often persists within these spaces with the creation of female-dominated subsets (for example, pediatrics and gynecology in medicine, or human resources and public relations in management).
• Because men face harsher criticism for displaying stereotypically feminine characteristics than women do for displaying stereotypically male characteristics, they may be discouraged from entering female-dominated professions such as early childhood education.

Despite both men and women being in the workforce, women continue to be expected to (and do) perform a disproportionate amount of housework and taking care of children than do men.

Gender-Based Violence

Gender stereotypes can contribute to gender-based violence.

• Men who hold more traditional gender role beliefs are more likely to commit violent acts.
• Men who feel stressed about their ability to meet male gender norms are more likely to commit inter-partner violence .
• Trans people are more likely than their cisgender counterparts to experience discrimination and harassment, and they are twice as likely to engage in suicidal thoughts and actions than cisgender members of the Queer community.

Stereotypes and different ways of socializing genders can affect health in the following ways:

• Adolescent boys are more likely than adolescent girls to engage in violent or risky behavior.
• Mental health issues are more common in girls than boys.
• The perceived “ideal” of feminine slenderness and masculine muscularity can lead to health issues surrounding body image .
• Gender stereotypes can discourage people from seeking medical help or lead to missed diagnosis (such as eating disorders in males ).

Globally, over 575 million girls live in countries where inequitable gender norms contribute to a violation of their rights in areas such as:

• Employment opportunities
• Independence
• Safety from gender-based violence

How to Combat Gender Stereotypes

Some ways to combat gender stereotypes include:

• Examine and confront your own gender biases and how they influence your behavior, including the decisions you make for your children.
• Foster more involvement from men in childcare, both professionally and personally.
• Promote and support counterstereotypical hirings (such as science and technology job fairs aimed at women and campaigns to gain interest in becoming elementary educators for men).
• Confront and address bias in the classroom, including education for teachers on how to minimize gender stereotypes.
• Learn about each child individually, including their preferences.
• Allow children to use their chosen name and pronouns .
• Avoid using gender as a way to group children.
• Be mindful of language (for example, when addressing a group, use “children” instead of “boys and girls” and “families” instead of “moms and dads,”).
• Include books, toys, and other media in the classroom and at home that represent diversity in gender and gender roles.
• View toys as gender neutral, and avoid ones that promote stereotypes (for example, a toy that has a pink version aimed at girls).
• Ensure all children play with toys and games that develop a full set of social and cognitive skills.
• Promote gender neutrality in sports.
• Be mindful of advertising and the messaging marketing sends to children.
• Talk to children about gender, including countering binary thinking and gender stereotypes you come across.
• Take a look at the media your child engages with. Provide media that show all genders in a diversity of roles, different family structures, etc. Discuss any gender stereotyping you see.
• Tell children that it is OK to be themselves, whether that aligns with traditional gender norms or not (for example, it’s OK if a woman wants to be a stay-at-home parent, but it’s not OK to expect her to).
• Give children equal household chores regardless of gender.
• Teach all children how to productively handle their frustration and anger.
• Encourage children to step out of their comfort zone to meet new people and try activities they aren’t automatically drawn to.
• Put gender-neutral bathrooms in schools, workplaces, and businesses.
• Avoid assumptions about a person’s gender, including children.
• Take children to meet people who occupy counterstereotypical roles, such as a female firefighter.
• Speak up and challenge someone who is making sexist jokes or comments.

Movies That Challenge Gender Stereotypes

Not sure where to start? Common Sense Media has compiled a list of movies that defy gender stereotypes .

Gender stereotypes are generalized, preconceived, and usually binary ideas about behaviors and traits specific genders should or should not display. They are based on gender norms and gender roles, and stem from unconscious bias.

Gender stereotypes begin to develop very early in life through socialization. They are formed and strengthened through observations, experiences, and interactions with others.

Gender stereotypes can be harmful to all genders and should be challenged. The best way to start combating gender stereotypes is to examine and confront your own biases and how they affect your behavior.

A Word From Verywell

We all have gender biases, whether we realize it or not. That doesn’t mean we should let gender stereotypes go unchecked. If you see harmful gender stereotyping, point it out.

YWCA Metro Vancouver. Dating safe: how gender stereotypes can impact our relationships .

LGBTQ+ Primary Hub. Gender stereotyping .

Stanford University: Gendered Innovations. Stereotypes .

Koenig AM. Comparing prescriptive and descriptive gender stereotypes about children, adults, and the elderly . Front Psychol . 2018;9:1086. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01086

United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Gender stereotypes .

Hentschel T, Heilman ME, Peus CV. The multiple dimensions of gender stereotypes: a current look at men’s and women’s characterizations of others and themselves . Front Psychol . 2019;10:11. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00011

Eagly AH, Nater C, Miller DI, Kaufmann M, Sczesny S. Gender stereotypes have changed: a cross-temporal meta-analysis of U.S. public opinion polls from 1946 to 2018 . Am Psychol . 2020;75(3):301-315. doi:10.1037/amp0000494

Planned Parenthood. What are gender roles and stereotypes?

Institute of Physics. Gender stereotypes and their effect on young people .

France Stratégie. Report – Gender stereotypes and how to fight them: new ideas from France .

Bian L, Leslie SJ, Cimpian A. Gender stereotypes about intellectual ability emerge early and influence children’s interests . Science . 2017;355(6323):389-391. doi:10.1126/science.aah6524

Save the Children. Gender roles can create lifelong cycle of inequality .

Girl Scouts. 6 everyday ways to bust gender stereotypes .

UNICEF. How to remove gender stereotypes from playtime .

Save the Children. Tips for talking with children about gender stereoptypes .

By Heather Jones Jones is a freelance writer with a strong focus on health, parenting, disability, and feminism.

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Research: How Bias Against Women Persists in Female-Dominated Workplaces

• Amber L. Stephenson,
• Leanne M. Dzubinski

A look inside the ongoing barriers women face in law, health care, faith-based nonprofits, and higher education.

New research examines gender bias within four industries with more female than male workers — law, higher education, faith-based nonprofits, and health care. Having balanced or even greater numbers of women in an organization is not, by itself, changing women’s experiences of bias. Bias is built into the system and continues to operate even when more women than men are present. Leaders can use these findings to create gender-equitable practices and environments which reduce bias. First, replace competition with cooperation. Second, measure success by goals, not by time spent in the office or online. Third, implement equitable reward structures, and provide remote and flexible work with autonomy. Finally, increase transparency in decision making.

It’s been thought that once industries achieve gender balance, bias will decrease and gender gaps will close. Sometimes called the “ add women and stir ” approach, people tend to think that having more women present is all that’s needed to promote change. But simply adding women into a workplace does not change the organizational structures and systems that benefit men more than women . Our new research (to be published in a forthcoming issue of Personnel Review ) shows gender bias is still prevalent in gender-balanced and female-dominated industries.

• Amy Diehl , PhD is chief information officer at Wilson College and a gender equity researcher and speaker. She is coauthor of Glass Walls: Shattering the Six Gender Bias Barriers Still Holding Women Back at Work (Rowman & Littlefield). Find her on LinkedIn at Amy-Diehl , Twitter @amydiehl , and visit her website at amy-diehl.com
• AS Amber L. Stephenson , PhD is an associate professor of management and director of healthcare management programs in the David D. Reh School of Business at Clarkson University. Her research focuses on the healthcare workforce, how professional identity influences attitudes and behaviors, and how women leaders experience gender bias.
• LD Leanne M. Dzubinski , PhD is acting dean of the Cook School of Intercultural Studies and associate professor of intercultural education at Biola University, and a prominent researcher on women in leadership. She is coauthor of Glass Walls: Shattering the Six Gender Bias Barriers Still Holding Women Back at Work (Rowman & Littlefield).

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Feminist Perspectives on Sex and Gender

Feminism is said to be the movement to end women’s oppression (hooks 2000, 26). One possible way to understand ‘woman’ in this claim is to take it as a sex term: ‘woman’ picks out human females and being a human female depends on various biological and anatomical features (like genitalia). Historically many feminists have understood ‘woman’ differently: not as a sex term, but as a gender term that depends on social and cultural factors (like social position). In so doing, they distinguished sex (being female or male) from gender (being a woman or a man), although most ordinary language users appear to treat the two interchangeably. In feminist philosophy, this distinction has generated a lively debate. Central questions include: What does it mean for gender to be distinct from sex, if anything at all? How should we understand the claim that gender depends on social and/or cultural factors? What does it mean to be gendered woman, man, or genderqueer? This entry outlines and discusses distinctly feminist debates on sex and gender considering both historical and more contemporary positions.

1.1 Biological determinism

1.2 gender terminology, 2.1 gender socialisation, 2.2 gender as feminine and masculine personality, 2.3 gender as feminine and masculine sexuality, 3.1.1 particularity argument, 3.1.2 normativity argument, 3.2 is sex classification solely a matter of biology, 3.3 are sex and gender distinct, 3.4 is the sex/gender distinction useful, 4.1.1 gendered social series, 4.1.2 resemblance nominalism, 4.2.1 social subordination and gender, 4.2.2 gender uniessentialism, 4.2.3 gender as positionality, 5. beyond the binary, 6. conclusion, other internet resources, related entries, 1. the sex/gender distinction..

The terms ‘sex’ and ‘gender’ mean different things to different feminist theorists and neither are easy or straightforward to characterise. Sketching out some feminist history of the terms provides a helpful starting point.

Most people ordinarily seem to think that sex and gender are coextensive: women are human females, men are human males. Many feminists have historically disagreed and have endorsed the sex/ gender distinction. Provisionally: ‘sex’ denotes human females and males depending on biological features (chromosomes, sex organs, hormones and other physical features); ‘gender’ denotes women and men depending on social factors (social role, position, behaviour or identity). The main feminist motivation for making this distinction was to counter biological determinism or the view that biology is destiny.

A typical example of a biological determinist view is that of Geddes and Thompson who, in 1889, argued that social, psychological and behavioural traits were caused by metabolic state. Women supposedly conserve energy (being ‘anabolic’) and this makes them passive, conservative, sluggish, stable and uninterested in politics. Men expend their surplus energy (being ‘katabolic’) and this makes them eager, energetic, passionate, variable and, thereby, interested in political and social matters. These biological ‘facts’ about metabolic states were used not only to explain behavioural differences between women and men but also to justify what our social and political arrangements ought to be. More specifically, they were used to argue for withholding from women political rights accorded to men because (according to Geddes and Thompson) “what was decided among the prehistoric Protozoa cannot be annulled by Act of Parliament” (quoted from Moi 1999, 18). It would be inappropriate to grant women political rights, as they are simply not suited to have those rights; it would also be futile since women (due to their biology) would simply not be interested in exercising their political rights. To counter this kind of biological determinism, feminists have argued that behavioural and psychological differences have social, rather than biological, causes. For instance, Simone de Beauvoir famously claimed that one is not born, but rather becomes a woman, and that “social discrimination produces in women moral and intellectual effects so profound that they appear to be caused by nature” (Beauvoir 1972 [original 1949], 18; for more, see the entry on Simone de Beauvoir ). Commonly observed behavioural traits associated with women and men, then, are not caused by anatomy or chromosomes. Rather, they are culturally learned or acquired.

Although biological determinism of the kind endorsed by Geddes and Thompson is nowadays uncommon, the idea that behavioural and psychological differences between women and men have biological causes has not disappeared. In the 1970s, sex differences were used to argue that women should not become airline pilots since they will be hormonally unstable once a month and, therefore, unable to perform their duties as well as men (Rogers 1999, 11). More recently, differences in male and female brains have been said to explain behavioural differences; in particular, the anatomy of corpus callosum, a bundle of nerves that connects the right and left cerebral hemispheres, is thought to be responsible for various psychological and behavioural differences. For instance, in 1992, a Time magazine article surveyed then prominent biological explanations of differences between women and men claiming that women’s thicker corpus callosums could explain what ‘women’s intuition’ is based on and impair women’s ability to perform some specialised visual-spatial skills, like reading maps (Gorman 1992). Anne Fausto-Sterling has questioned the idea that differences in corpus callosums cause behavioural and psychological differences. First, the corpus callosum is a highly variable piece of anatomy; as a result, generalisations about its size, shape and thickness that hold for women and men in general should be viewed with caution. Second, differences in adult human corpus callosums are not found in infants; this may suggest that physical brain differences actually develop as responses to differential treatment. Third, given that visual-spatial skills (like map reading) can be improved by practice, even if women and men’s corpus callosums differ, this does not make the resulting behavioural differences immutable. (Fausto-Sterling 2000b, chapter 5).

In order to distinguish biological differences from social/psychological ones and to talk about the latter, feminists appropriated the term ‘gender’. Psychologists writing on transsexuality were the first to employ gender terminology in this sense. Until the 1960s, ‘gender’ was often used to refer to masculine and feminine words, like le and la in French. However, in order to explain why some people felt that they were ‘trapped in the wrong bodies’, the psychologist Robert Stoller (1968) began using the terms ‘sex’ to pick out biological traits and ‘gender’ to pick out the amount of femininity and masculinity a person exhibited. Although (by and large) a person’s sex and gender complemented each other, separating out these terms seemed to make theoretical sense allowing Stoller to explain the phenomenon of transsexuality: transsexuals’ sex and gender simply don’t match.

Along with psychologists like Stoller, feminists found it useful to distinguish sex and gender. This enabled them to argue that many differences between women and men were socially produced and, therefore, changeable. Gayle Rubin (for instance) uses the phrase ‘sex/gender system’ in order to describe “a set of arrangements by which the biological raw material of human sex and procreation is shaped by human, social intervention” (1975, 165). Rubin employed this system to articulate that “part of social life which is the locus of the oppression of women” (1975, 159) describing gender as the “socially imposed division of the sexes” (1975, 179). Rubin’s thought was that although biological differences are fixed, gender differences are the oppressive results of social interventions that dictate how women and men should behave. Women are oppressed as women and “by having to be women” (Rubin 1975, 204). However, since gender is social, it is thought to be mutable and alterable by political and social reform that would ultimately bring an end to women’s subordination. Feminism should aim to create a “genderless (though not sexless) society, in which one’s sexual anatomy is irrelevant to who one is, what one does, and with whom one makes love” (Rubin 1975, 204).

In some earlier interpretations, like Rubin’s, sex and gender were thought to complement one another. The slogan ‘Gender is the social interpretation of sex’ captures this view. Nicholson calls this ‘the coat-rack view’ of gender: our sexed bodies are like coat racks and “provide the site upon which gender [is] constructed” (1994, 81). Gender conceived of as masculinity and femininity is superimposed upon the ‘coat-rack’ of sex as each society imposes on sexed bodies their cultural conceptions of how males and females should behave. This socially constructs gender differences – or the amount of femininity/masculinity of a person – upon our sexed bodies. That is, according to this interpretation, all humans are either male or female; their sex is fixed. But cultures interpret sexed bodies differently and project different norms on those bodies thereby creating feminine and masculine persons. Distinguishing sex and gender, however, also enables the two to come apart: they are separable in that one can be sexed male and yet be gendered a woman, or vice versa (Haslanger 2000b; Stoljar 1995).

So, this group of feminist arguments against biological determinism suggested that gender differences result from cultural practices and social expectations. Nowadays it is more common to denote this by saying that gender is socially constructed. This means that genders (women and men) and gendered traits (like being nurturing or ambitious) are the “intended or unintended product[s] of a social practice” (Haslanger 1995, 97). But which social practices construct gender, what social construction is and what being of a certain gender amounts to are major feminist controversies. There is no consensus on these issues. (See the entry on intersections between analytic and continental feminism for more on different ways to understand gender.)

2. Gender as socially constructed

One way to interpret Beauvoir’s claim that one is not born but rather becomes a woman is to take it as a claim about gender socialisation: females become women through a process whereby they acquire feminine traits and learn feminine behaviour. Masculinity and femininity are thought to be products of nurture or how individuals are brought up. They are causally constructed (Haslanger 1995, 98): social forces either have a causal role in bringing gendered individuals into existence or (to some substantial sense) shape the way we are qua women and men. And the mechanism of construction is social learning. For instance, Kate Millett takes gender differences to have “essentially cultural, rather than biological bases” that result from differential treatment (1971, 28–9). For her, gender is “the sum total of the parents’, the peers’, and the culture’s notions of what is appropriate to each gender by way of temperament, character, interests, status, worth, gesture, and expression” (Millett 1971, 31). Feminine and masculine gender-norms, however, are problematic in that gendered behaviour conveniently fits with and reinforces women’s subordination so that women are socialised into subordinate social roles: they learn to be passive, ignorant, docile, emotional helpmeets for men (Millett 1971, 26). However, since these roles are simply learned, we can create more equal societies by ‘unlearning’ social roles. That is, feminists should aim to diminish the influence of socialisation.

Social learning theorists hold that a huge array of different influences socialise us as women and men. This being the case, it is extremely difficult to counter gender socialisation. For instance, parents often unconsciously treat their female and male children differently. When parents have been asked to describe their 24- hour old infants, they have done so using gender-stereotypic language: boys are describes as strong, alert and coordinated and girls as tiny, soft and delicate. Parents’ treatment of their infants further reflects these descriptions whether they are aware of this or not (Renzetti & Curran 1992, 32). Some socialisation is more overt: children are often dressed in gender stereotypical clothes and colours (boys are dressed in blue, girls in pink) and parents tend to buy their children gender stereotypical toys. They also (intentionally or not) tend to reinforce certain ‘appropriate’ behaviours. While the precise form of gender socialization has changed since the onset of second-wave feminism, even today girls are discouraged from playing sports like football or from playing ‘rough and tumble’ games and are more likely than boys to be given dolls or cooking toys to play with; boys are told not to ‘cry like a baby’ and are more likely to be given masculine toys like trucks and guns (for more, see Kimmel 2000, 122–126). [ 1 ]

According to social learning theorists, children are also influenced by what they observe in the world around them. This, again, makes countering gender socialisation difficult. For one, children’s books have portrayed males and females in blatantly stereotypical ways: for instance, males as adventurers and leaders, and females as helpers and followers. One way to address gender stereotyping in children’s books has been to portray females in independent roles and males as non-aggressive and nurturing (Renzetti & Curran 1992, 35). Some publishers have attempted an alternative approach by making their characters, for instance, gender-neutral animals or genderless imaginary creatures (like TV’s Teletubbies). However, parents reading books with gender-neutral or genderless characters often undermine the publishers’ efforts by reading them to their children in ways that depict the characters as either feminine or masculine. According to Renzetti and Curran, parents labelled the overwhelming majority of gender-neutral characters masculine whereas those characters that fit feminine gender stereotypes (for instance, by being helpful and caring) were labelled feminine (1992, 35). Socialising influences like these are still thought to send implicit messages regarding how females and males should act and are expected to act shaping us into feminine and masculine persons.

Nancy Chodorow (1978; 1995) has criticised social learning theory as too simplistic to explain gender differences (see also Deaux & Major 1990; Gatens 1996). Instead, she holds that gender is a matter of having feminine and masculine personalities that develop in early infancy as responses to prevalent parenting practices. In particular, gendered personalities develop because women tend to be the primary caretakers of small children. Chodorow holds that because mothers (or other prominent females) tend to care for infants, infant male and female psychic development differs. Crudely put: the mother-daughter relationship differs from the mother-son relationship because mothers are more likely to identify with their daughters than their sons. This unconsciously prompts the mother to encourage her son to psychologically individuate himself from her thereby prompting him to develop well defined and rigid ego boundaries. However, the mother unconsciously discourages the daughter from individuating herself thereby prompting the daughter to develop flexible and blurry ego boundaries. Childhood gender socialisation further builds on and reinforces these unconsciously developed ego boundaries finally producing feminine and masculine persons (1995, 202–206). This perspective has its roots in Freudian psychoanalytic theory, although Chodorow’s approach differs in many ways from Freud’s.

Gendered personalities are supposedly manifested in common gender stereotypical behaviour. Take emotional dependency. Women are stereotypically more emotional and emotionally dependent upon others around them, supposedly finding it difficult to distinguish their own interests and wellbeing from the interests and wellbeing of their children and partners. This is said to be because of their blurry and (somewhat) confused ego boundaries: women find it hard to distinguish their own needs from the needs of those around them because they cannot sufficiently individuate themselves from those close to them. By contrast, men are stereotypically emotionally detached, preferring a career where dispassionate and distanced thinking are virtues. These traits are said to result from men’s well-defined ego boundaries that enable them to prioritise their own needs and interests sometimes at the expense of others’ needs and interests.

Chodorow thinks that these gender differences should and can be changed. Feminine and masculine personalities play a crucial role in women’s oppression since they make females overly attentive to the needs of others and males emotionally deficient. In order to correct the situation, both male and female parents should be equally involved in parenting (Chodorow 1995, 214). This would help in ensuring that children develop sufficiently individuated senses of selves without becoming overly detached, which in turn helps to eradicate common gender stereotypical behaviours.

Catharine MacKinnon develops her theory of gender as a theory of sexuality. Very roughly: the social meaning of sex (gender) is created by sexual objectification of women whereby women are viewed and treated as objects for satisfying men’s desires (MacKinnon 1989). Masculinity is defined as sexual dominance, femininity as sexual submissiveness: genders are “created through the eroticization of dominance and submission. The man/woman difference and the dominance/submission dynamic define each other. This is the social meaning of sex” (MacKinnon 1989, 113). For MacKinnon, gender is constitutively constructed : in defining genders (or masculinity and femininity) we must make reference to social factors (see Haslanger 1995, 98). In particular, we must make reference to the position one occupies in the sexualised dominance/submission dynamic: men occupy the sexually dominant position, women the sexually submissive one. As a result, genders are by definition hierarchical and this hierarchy is fundamentally tied to sexualised power relations. The notion of ‘gender equality’, then, does not make sense to MacKinnon. If sexuality ceased to be a manifestation of dominance, hierarchical genders (that are defined in terms of sexuality) would cease to exist.

So, gender difference for MacKinnon is not a matter of having a particular psychological orientation or behavioural pattern; rather, it is a function of sexuality that is hierarchal in patriarchal societies. This is not to say that men are naturally disposed to sexually objectify women or that women are naturally submissive. Instead, male and female sexualities are socially conditioned: men have been conditioned to find women’s subordination sexy and women have been conditioned to find a particular male version of female sexuality as erotic – one in which it is erotic to be sexually submissive. For MacKinnon, both female and male sexual desires are defined from a male point of view that is conditioned by pornography (MacKinnon 1989, chapter 7). Bluntly put: pornography portrays a false picture of ‘what women want’ suggesting that women in actual fact are and want to be submissive. This conditions men’s sexuality so that they view women’s submission as sexy. And male dominance enforces this male version of sexuality onto women, sometimes by force. MacKinnon’s thought is not that male dominance is a result of social learning (see 2.1.); rather, socialization is an expression of power. That is, socialized differences in masculine and feminine traits, behaviour, and roles are not responsible for power inequalities. Females and males (roughly put) are socialised differently because there are underlying power inequalities. As MacKinnon puts it, ‘dominance’ (power relations) is prior to ‘difference’ (traits, behaviour and roles) (see, MacKinnon 1989, chapter 12). MacKinnon, then, sees legal restrictions on pornography as paramount to ending women’s subordinate status that stems from their gender.

3. Problems with the sex/gender distinction

3.1 is gender uniform.

The positions outlined above share an underlying metaphysical perspective on gender: gender realism . [ 2 ] That is, women as a group are assumed to share some characteristic feature, experience, common condition or criterion that defines their gender and the possession of which makes some individuals women (as opposed to, say, men). All women are thought to differ from all men in this respect (or respects). For example, MacKinnon thought that being treated in sexually objectifying ways is the common condition that defines women’s gender and what women as women share. All women differ from all men in this respect. Further, pointing out females who are not sexually objectified does not provide a counterexample to MacKinnon’s view. Being sexually objectified is constitutive of being a woman; a female who escapes sexual objectification, then, would not count as a woman.

One may want to critique the three accounts outlined by rejecting the particular details of each account. (For instance, see Spelman [1988, chapter 4] for a critique of the details of Chodorow’s view.) A more thoroughgoing critique has been levelled at the general metaphysical perspective of gender realism that underlies these positions. It has come under sustained attack on two grounds: first, that it fails to take into account racial, cultural and class differences between women (particularity argument); second, that it posits a normative ideal of womanhood (normativity argument).

Elizabeth Spelman (1988) has influentially argued against gender realism with her particularity argument. Roughly: gender realists mistakenly assume that gender is constructed independently of race, class, ethnicity and nationality. If gender were separable from, for example, race and class in this manner, all women would experience womanhood in the same way. And this is clearly false. For instance, Harris (1993) and Stone (2007) criticise MacKinnon’s view, that sexual objectification is the common condition that defines women’s gender, for failing to take into account differences in women’s backgrounds that shape their sexuality. The history of racist oppression illustrates that during slavery black women were ‘hypersexualised’ and thought to be always sexually available whereas white women were thought to be pure and sexually virtuous. In fact, the rape of a black woman was thought to be impossible (Harris 1993). So, (the argument goes) sexual objectification cannot serve as the common condition for womanhood since it varies considerably depending on one’s race and class. [ 3 ]

For Spelman, the perspective of ‘white solipsism’ underlies gender realists’ mistake. They assumed that all women share some “golden nugget of womanness” (Spelman 1988, 159) and that the features constitutive of such a nugget are the same for all women regardless of their particular cultural backgrounds. Next, white Western middle-class feminists accounted for the shared features simply by reflecting on the cultural features that condition their gender as women thus supposing that “the womanness underneath the Black woman’s skin is a white woman’s, and deep down inside the Latina woman is an Anglo woman waiting to burst through an obscuring cultural shroud” (Spelman 1988, 13). In so doing, Spelman claims, white middle-class Western feminists passed off their particular view of gender as “a metaphysical truth” (1988, 180) thereby privileging some women while marginalising others. In failing to see the importance of race and class in gender construction, white middle-class Western feminists conflated “the condition of one group of women with the condition of all” (Spelman 1988, 3).

Betty Friedan’s (1963) well-known work is a case in point of white solipsism. [ 4 ] Friedan saw domesticity as the main vehicle of gender oppression and called upon women in general to find jobs outside the home. But she failed to realize that women from less privileged backgrounds, often poor and non-white, already worked outside the home to support their families. Friedan’s suggestion, then, was applicable only to a particular sub-group of women (white middle-class Western housewives). But it was mistakenly taken to apply to all women’s lives — a mistake that was generated by Friedan’s failure to take women’s racial and class differences into account (hooks 2000, 1–3).

Spelman further holds that since social conditioning creates femininity and societies (and sub-groups) that condition it differ from one another, femininity must be differently conditioned in different societies. For her, “females become not simply women but particular kinds of women” (Spelman 1988, 113): white working-class women, black middle-class women, poor Jewish women, wealthy aristocratic European women, and so on.

This line of thought has been extremely influential in feminist philosophy. For instance, Young holds that Spelman has definitively shown that gender realism is untenable (1997, 13). Mikkola (2006) argues that this isn’t so. The arguments Spelman makes do not undermine the idea that there is some characteristic feature, experience, common condition or criterion that defines women’s gender; they simply point out that some particular ways of cashing out what defines womanhood are misguided. So, although Spelman is right to reject those accounts that falsely take the feature that conditions white middle-class Western feminists’ gender to condition women’s gender in general, this leaves open the possibility that women qua women do share something that defines their gender. (See also Haslanger [2000a] for a discussion of why gender realism is not necessarily untenable, and Stoljar [2011] for a discussion of Mikkola’s critique of Spelman.)

Judith Butler critiques the sex/gender distinction on two grounds. They critique gender realism with their normativity argument (1999 [original 1990], chapter 1); they also hold that the sex/gender distinction is unintelligible (this will be discussed in section 3.3.). Butler’s normativity argument is not straightforwardly directed at the metaphysical perspective of gender realism, but rather at its political counterpart: identity politics. This is a form of political mobilization based on membership in some group (e.g. racial, ethnic, cultural, gender) and group membership is thought to be delimited by some common experiences, conditions or features that define the group (Heyes 2000, 58; see also the entry on Identity Politics ). Feminist identity politics, then, presupposes gender realism in that feminist politics is said to be mobilized around women as a group (or category) where membership in this group is fixed by some condition, experience or feature that women supposedly share and that defines their gender.

Butler’s normativity argument makes two claims. The first is akin to Spelman’s particularity argument: unitary gender notions fail to take differences amongst women into account thus failing to recognise “the multiplicity of cultural, social, and political intersections in which the concrete array of ‘women’ are constructed” (Butler 1999, 19–20). In their attempt to undercut biologically deterministic ways of defining what it means to be a woman, feminists inadvertently created new socially constructed accounts of supposedly shared femininity. Butler’s second claim is that such false gender realist accounts are normative. That is, in their attempt to fix feminism’s subject matter, feminists unwittingly defined the term ‘woman’ in a way that implies there is some correct way to be gendered a woman (Butler 1999, 5). That the definition of the term ‘woman’ is fixed supposedly “operates as a policing force which generates and legitimizes certain practices, experiences, etc., and curtails and delegitimizes others” (Nicholson 1998, 293). Following this line of thought, one could say that, for instance, Chodorow’s view of gender suggests that ‘real’ women have feminine personalities and that these are the women feminism should be concerned about. If one does not exhibit a distinctly feminine personality, the implication is that one is not ‘really’ a member of women’s category nor does one properly qualify for feminist political representation.

Butler’s second claim is based on their view that“[i]dentity categories [like that of women] are never merely descriptive, but always normative, and as such, exclusionary” (Butler 1991, 160). That is, the mistake of those feminists Butler critiques was not that they provided the incorrect definition of ‘woman’. Rather, (the argument goes) their mistake was to attempt to define the term ‘woman’ at all. Butler’s view is that ‘woman’ can never be defined in a way that does not prescribe some “unspoken normative requirements” (like having a feminine personality) that women should conform to (Butler 1999, 9). Butler takes this to be a feature of terms like ‘woman’ that purport to pick out (what they call) ‘identity categories’. They seem to assume that ‘woman’ can never be used in a non-ideological way (Moi 1999, 43) and that it will always encode conditions that are not satisfied by everyone we think of as women. Some explanation for this comes from Butler’s view that all processes of drawing categorical distinctions involve evaluative and normative commitments; these in turn involve the exercise of power and reflect the conditions of those who are socially powerful (Witt 1995).

In order to better understand Butler’s critique, consider their account of gender performativity. For them, standard feminist accounts take gendered individuals to have some essential properties qua gendered individuals or a gender core by virtue of which one is either a man or a woman. This view assumes that women and men, qua women and men, are bearers of various essential and accidental attributes where the former secure gendered persons’ persistence through time as so gendered. But according to Butler this view is false: (i) there are no such essential properties, and (ii) gender is an illusion maintained by prevalent power structures. First, feminists are said to think that genders are socially constructed in that they have the following essential attributes (Butler 1999, 24): women are females with feminine behavioural traits, being heterosexuals whose desire is directed at men; men are males with masculine behavioural traits, being heterosexuals whose desire is directed at women. These are the attributes necessary for gendered individuals and those that enable women and men to persist through time as women and men. Individuals have “intelligible genders” (Butler 1999, 23) if they exhibit this sequence of traits in a coherent manner (where sexual desire follows from sexual orientation that in turn follows from feminine/ masculine behaviours thought to follow from biological sex). Social forces in general deem individuals who exhibit in coherent gender sequences (like lesbians) to be doing their gender ‘wrong’ and they actively discourage such sequencing of traits, for instance, via name-calling and overt homophobic discrimination. Think back to what was said above: having a certain conception of what women are like that mirrors the conditions of socially powerful (white, middle-class, heterosexual, Western) women functions to marginalize and police those who do not fit this conception.

These gender cores, supposedly encoding the above traits, however, are nothing more than illusions created by ideals and practices that seek to render gender uniform through heterosexism, the view that heterosexuality is natural and homosexuality is deviant (Butler 1999, 42). Gender cores are constructed as if they somehow naturally belong to women and men thereby creating gender dimorphism or the belief that one must be either a masculine male or a feminine female. But gender dimorphism only serves a heterosexist social order by implying that since women and men are sharply opposed, it is natural to sexually desire the opposite sex or gender.

Further, being feminine and desiring men (for instance) are standardly assumed to be expressions of one’s gender as a woman. Butler denies this and holds that gender is really performative. It is not “a stable identity or locus of agency from which various acts follow; rather, gender is … instituted … through a stylized repetition of [habitual] acts ” (Butler 1999, 179): through wearing certain gender-coded clothing, walking and sitting in certain gender-coded ways, styling one’s hair in gender-coded manner and so on. Gender is not something one is, it is something one does; it is a sequence of acts, a doing rather than a being. And repeatedly engaging in ‘feminising’ and ‘masculinising’ acts congeals gender thereby making people falsely think of gender as something they naturally are . Gender only comes into being through these gendering acts: a female who has sex with men does not express her gender as a woman. This activity (amongst others) makes her gendered a woman.

The constitutive acts that gender individuals create genders as “compelling illusion[s]” (Butler 1990, 271). Our gendered classification scheme is a strong pragmatic construction : social factors wholly determine our use of the scheme and the scheme fails to represent accurately any ‘facts of the matter’ (Haslanger 1995, 100). People think that there are true and real genders, and those deemed to be doing their gender ‘wrong’ are not socially sanctioned. But, genders are true and real only to the extent that they are performed (Butler 1990, 278–9). It does not make sense, then, to say of a male-to-female trans person that s/he is really a man who only appears to be a woman. Instead, males dressing up and acting in ways that are associated with femininity “show that [as Butler suggests] ‘being’ feminine is just a matter of doing certain activities” (Stone 2007, 64). As a result, the trans person’s gender is just as real or true as anyone else’s who is a ‘traditionally’ feminine female or masculine male (Butler 1990, 278). [ 5 ] Without heterosexism that compels people to engage in certain gendering acts, there would not be any genders at all. And ultimately the aim should be to abolish norms that compel people to act in these gendering ways.

For Butler, given that gender is performative, the appropriate response to feminist identity politics involves two things. First, feminists should understand ‘woman’ as open-ended and “a term in process, a becoming, a constructing that cannot rightfully be said to originate or end … it is open to intervention and resignification” (Butler 1999, 43). That is, feminists should not try to define ‘woman’ at all. Second, the category of women “ought not to be the foundation of feminist politics” (Butler 1999, 9). Rather, feminists should focus on providing an account of how power functions and shapes our understandings of womanhood not only in the society at large but also within the feminist movement.

Many people, including many feminists, have ordinarily taken sex ascriptions to be solely a matter of biology with no social or cultural dimension. It is commonplace to think that there are only two sexes and that biological sex classifications are utterly unproblematic. By contrast, some feminists have argued that sex classifications are not unproblematic and that they are not solely a matter of biology. In order to make sense of this, it is helpful to distinguish object- and idea-construction (see Haslanger 2003b for more): social forces can be said to construct certain kinds of objects (e.g. sexed bodies or gendered individuals) and certain kinds of ideas (e.g. sex or gender concepts). First, take the object-construction of sexed bodies. Secondary sex characteristics, or the physiological and biological features commonly associated with males and females, are affected by social practices. In some societies, females’ lower social status has meant that they have been fed less and so, the lack of nutrition has had the effect of making them smaller in size (Jaggar 1983, 37). Uniformity in muscular shape, size and strength within sex categories is not caused entirely by biological factors, but depends heavily on exercise opportunities: if males and females were allowed the same exercise opportunities and equal encouragement to exercise, it is thought that bodily dimorphism would diminish (Fausto-Sterling 1993a, 218). A number of medical phenomena involving bones (like osteoporosis) have social causes directly related to expectations about gender, women’s diet and their exercise opportunities (Fausto-Sterling 2005). These examples suggest that physiological features thought to be sex-specific traits not affected by social and cultural factors are, after all, to some extent products of social conditioning. Social conditioning, then, shapes our biology.

Second, take the idea-construction of sex concepts. Our concept of sex is said to be a product of social forces in the sense that what counts as sex is shaped by social meanings. Standardly, those with XX-chromosomes, ovaries that produce large egg cells, female genitalia, a relatively high proportion of ‘female’ hormones, and other secondary sex characteristics (relatively small body size, less body hair) count as biologically female. Those with XY-chromosomes, testes that produce small sperm cells, male genitalia, a relatively high proportion of ‘male’ hormones and other secondary sex traits (relatively large body size, significant amounts of body hair) count as male. This understanding is fairly recent. The prevalent scientific view from Ancient Greeks until the late 18 th century, did not consider female and male sexes to be distinct categories with specific traits; instead, a ‘one-sex model’ held that males and females were members of the same sex category. Females’ genitals were thought to be the same as males’ but simply directed inside the body; ovaries and testes (for instance) were referred to by the same term and whether the term referred to the former or the latter was made clear by the context (Laqueur 1990, 4). It was not until the late 1700s that scientists began to think of female and male anatomies as radically different moving away from the ‘one-sex model’ of a single sex spectrum to the (nowadays prevalent) ‘two-sex model’ of sexual dimorphism. (For an alternative view, see King 2013.)

Fausto-Sterling has argued that this ‘two-sex model’ isn’t straightforward either (1993b; 2000a; 2000b). Based on a meta-study of empirical medical research, she estimates that 1.7% of population fail to neatly fall within the usual sex classifications possessing various combinations of different sex characteristics (Fausto-Sterling 2000a, 20). In her earlier work, she claimed that intersex individuals make up (at least) three further sex classes: ‘herms’ who possess one testis and one ovary; ‘merms’ who possess testes, some aspects of female genitalia but no ovaries; and ‘ferms’ who have ovaries, some aspects of male genitalia but no testes (Fausto-Sterling 1993b, 21). (In her [2000a], Fausto-Sterling notes that these labels were put forward tongue–in–cheek.) Recognition of intersex people suggests that feminists (and society at large) are wrong to think that humans are either female or male.

To illustrate further the idea-construction of sex, consider the case of the athlete Maria Patiño. Patiño has female genitalia, has always considered herself to be female and was considered so by others. However, she was discovered to have XY chromosomes and was barred from competing in women’s sports (Fausto-Sterling 2000b, 1–3). Patiño’s genitalia were at odds with her chromosomes and the latter were taken to determine her sex. Patiño successfully fought to be recognised as a female athlete arguing that her chromosomes alone were not sufficient to not make her female. Intersex people, like Patiño, illustrate that our understandings of sex differ and suggest that there is no immediately obvious way to settle what sex amounts to purely biologically or scientifically. Deciding what sex is involves evaluative judgements that are influenced by social factors.

Insofar as our cultural conceptions affect our understandings of sex, feminists must be much more careful about sex classifications and rethink what sex amounts to (Stone 2007, chapter 1). More specifically, intersex people illustrate that sex traits associated with females and males need not always go together and that individuals can have some mixture of these traits. This suggests to Stone that sex is a cluster concept: it is sufficient to satisfy enough of the sex features that tend to cluster together in order to count as being of a particular sex. But, one need not satisfy all of those features or some arbitrarily chosen supposedly necessary sex feature, like chromosomes (Stone 2007, 44). This makes sex a matter of degree and sex classifications should take place on a spectrum: one can be more or less female/male but there is no sharp distinction between the two. Further, intersex people (along with trans people) are located at the centre of the sex spectrum and in many cases their sex will be indeterminate (Stone 2007).

More recently, Ayala and Vasilyeva (2015) have argued for an inclusive and extended conception of sex: just as certain tools can be seen to extend our minds beyond the limits of our brains (e.g. white canes), other tools (like dildos) can extend our sex beyond our bodily boundaries. This view aims to motivate the idea that what counts as sex should not be determined by looking inwards at genitalia or other anatomical features. In a different vein, Ásta (2018) argues that sex is a conferred social property. This follows her more general conferralist framework to analyse all social properties: properties that are conferred by others thereby generating a social status that consists in contextually specific constraints and enablements on individual behaviour. The general schema for conferred properties is as follows (Ásta 2018, 8):

Conferred property: what property is conferred. Who: who the subjects are. What: what attitude, state, or action of the subjects matter. When: under what conditions the conferral takes place. Base property: what the subjects are attempting to track (consciously or not), if anything.

With being of a certain sex (e.g. male, female) in mind, Ásta holds that it is a conferred property that merely aims to track physical features. Hence sex is a social – or in fact, an institutional – property rather than a natural one. The schema for sex goes as follows (72):

Conferred property: being female, male. Who: legal authorities, drawing on the expert opinion of doctors, other medical personnel. What: “the recording of a sex in official documents ... The judgment of the doctors (and others) as to what sex role might be the most fitting, given the biological characteristics present.” When: at birth or after surgery/ hormonal treatment. Base property: “the aim is to track as many sex-stereotypical characteristics as possible, and doctors perform surgery in cases where that might help bring the physical characteristics more in line with the stereotype of male and female.”

This (among other things) offers a debunking analysis of sex: it may appear to be a natural property, but on the conferralist analysis is better understood as a conferred legal status. Ásta holds that gender too is a conferred property, but contra the discussion in the following section, she does not think that this collapses the distinction between sex and gender: sex and gender are differently conferred albeit both satisfying the general schema noted above. Nonetheless, on the conferralist framework what underlies both sex and gender is the idea of social construction as social significance: sex-stereotypical characteristics are taken to be socially significant context specifically, whereby they become the basis for conferring sex onto individuals and this brings with it various constraints and enablements on individuals and their behaviour. This fits object- and idea-constructions introduced above, although offers a different general framework to analyse the matter at hand.

In addition to arguing against identity politics and for gender performativity, Butler holds that distinguishing biological sex from social gender is unintelligible. For them, both are socially constructed:

If the immutable character of sex is contested, perhaps this construct called ‘sex’ is as culturally constructed as gender; indeed, perhaps it was always already gender, with the consequence that the distinction between sex and gender turns out to be no distinction at all. (Butler 1999, 10–11)

(Butler is not alone in claiming that there are no tenable distinctions between nature/culture, biology/construction and sex/gender. See also: Antony 1998; Gatens 1996; Grosz 1994; Prokhovnik 1999.) Butler makes two different claims in the passage cited: that sex is a social construction, and that sex is gender. To unpack their view, consider the two claims in turn. First, the idea that sex is a social construct, for Butler, boils down to the view that our sexed bodies are also performative and, so, they have “no ontological status apart from the various acts which constitute [their] reality” (1999, 173). Prima facie , this implausibly implies that female and male bodies do not have independent existence and that if gendering activities ceased, so would physical bodies. This is not Butler’s claim; rather, their position is that bodies viewed as the material foundations on which gender is constructed, are themselves constructed as if they provide such material foundations (Butler 1993). Cultural conceptions about gender figure in “the very apparatus of production whereby sexes themselves are established” (Butler 1999, 11).

For Butler, sexed bodies never exist outside social meanings and how we understand gender shapes how we understand sex (1999, 139). Sexed bodies are not empty matter on which gender is constructed and sex categories are not picked out on the basis of objective features of the world. Instead, our sexed bodies are themselves discursively constructed : they are the way they are, at least to a substantial extent, because of what is attributed to sexed bodies and how they are classified (for discursive construction, see Haslanger 1995, 99). Sex assignment (calling someone female or male) is normative (Butler 1993, 1). [ 6 ] When the doctor calls a newly born infant a girl or a boy, s/he is not making a descriptive claim, but a normative one. In fact, the doctor is performing an illocutionary speech act (see the entry on Speech Acts ). In effect, the doctor’s utterance makes infants into girls or boys. We, then, engage in activities that make it seem as if sexes naturally come in two and that being female or male is an objective feature of the world, rather than being a consequence of certain constitutive acts (that is, rather than being performative). And this is what Butler means in saying that physical bodies never exist outside cultural and social meanings, and that sex is as socially constructed as gender. They do not deny that physical bodies exist. But, they take our understanding of this existence to be a product of social conditioning: social conditioning makes the existence of physical bodies intelligible to us by discursively constructing sexed bodies through certain constitutive acts. (For a helpful introduction to Butler’s views, see Salih 2002.)

For Butler, sex assignment is always in some sense oppressive. Again, this appears to be because of Butler’s general suspicion of classification: sex classification can never be merely descriptive but always has a normative element reflecting evaluative claims of those who are powerful. Conducting a feminist genealogy of the body (or examining why sexed bodies are thought to come naturally as female and male), then, should ground feminist practice (Butler 1993, 28–9). Feminists should examine and uncover ways in which social construction and certain acts that constitute sex shape our understandings of sexed bodies, what kinds of meanings bodies acquire and which practices and illocutionary speech acts ‘make’ our bodies into sexes. Doing so enables feminists to identity how sexed bodies are socially constructed in order to resist such construction.

However, given what was said above, it is far from obvious what we should make of Butler’s claim that sex “was always already gender” (1999, 11). Stone (2007) takes this to mean that sex is gender but goes on to question it arguing that the social construction of both sex and gender does not make sex identical to gender. According to Stone, it would be more accurate for Butler to say that claims about sex imply gender norms. That is, many claims about sex traits (like ‘females are physically weaker than males’) actually carry implications about how women and men are expected to behave. To some extent the claim describes certain facts. But, it also implies that females are not expected to do much heavy lifting and that they would probably not be good at it. So, claims about sex are not identical to claims about gender; rather, they imply claims about gender norms (Stone 2007, 70).

Some feminists hold that the sex/gender distinction is not useful. For a start, it is thought to reflect politically problematic dualistic thinking that undercuts feminist aims: the distinction is taken to reflect and replicate androcentric oppositions between (for instance) mind/body, culture/nature and reason/emotion that have been used to justify women’s oppression (e.g. Grosz 1994; Prokhovnik 1999). The thought is that in oppositions like these, one term is always superior to the other and that the devalued term is usually associated with women (Lloyd 1993). For instance, human subjectivity and agency are identified with the mind but since women are usually identified with their bodies, they are devalued as human subjects and agents. The opposition between mind and body is said to further map on to other distinctions, like reason/emotion, culture/nature, rational/irrational, where one side of each distinction is devalued (one’s bodily features are usually valued less that one’s mind, rationality is usually valued more than irrationality) and women are associated with the devalued terms: they are thought to be closer to bodily features and nature than men, to be irrational, emotional and so on. This is said to be evident (for instance) in job interviews. Men are treated as gender-neutral persons and not asked whether they are planning to take time off to have a family. By contrast, that women face such queries illustrates that they are associated more closely than men with bodily features to do with procreation (Prokhovnik 1999, 126). The opposition between mind and body, then, is thought to map onto the opposition between men and women.

Now, the mind/body dualism is also said to map onto the sex/gender distinction (Grosz 1994; Prokhovnik 1999). The idea is that gender maps onto mind, sex onto body. Although not used by those endorsing this view, the basic idea can be summed by the slogan ‘Gender is between the ears, sex is between the legs’: the implication is that, while sex is immutable, gender is something individuals have control over – it is something we can alter and change through individual choices. However, since women are said to be more closely associated with biological features (and so, to map onto the body side of the mind/body distinction) and men are treated as gender-neutral persons (mapping onto the mind side), the implication is that “man equals gender, which is associated with mind and choice, freedom from body, autonomy, and with the public real; while woman equals sex, associated with the body, reproduction, ‘natural’ rhythms and the private realm” (Prokhovnik 1999, 103). This is said to render the sex/gender distinction inherently repressive and to drain it of any potential for emancipation: rather than facilitating gender role choice for women, it “actually functions to reinforce their association with body, sex, and involuntary ‘natural’ rhythms” (Prokhovnik 1999, 103). Contrary to what feminists like Rubin argued, the sex/gender distinction cannot be used as a theoretical tool that dissociates conceptions of womanhood from biological and reproductive features.

Moi has further argued that the sex/gender distinction is useless given certain theoretical goals (1999, chapter 1). This is not to say that it is utterly worthless; according to Moi, the sex/gender distinction worked well to show that the historically prevalent biological determinism was false. However, for her, the distinction does no useful work “when it comes to producing a good theory of subjectivity” (1999, 6) and “a concrete, historical understanding of what it means to be a woman (or a man) in a given society” (1999, 4–5). That is, the 1960s distinction understood sex as fixed by biology without any cultural or historical dimensions. This understanding, however, ignores lived experiences and embodiment as aspects of womanhood (and manhood) by separating sex from gender and insisting that womanhood is to do with the latter. Rather, embodiment must be included in one’s theory that tries to figure out what it is to be a woman (or a man).

Mikkola (2011) argues that the sex/gender distinction, which underlies views like Rubin’s and MacKinnon’s, has certain unintuitive and undesirable ontological commitments that render the distinction politically unhelpful. First, claiming that gender is socially constructed implies that the existence of women and men is a mind-dependent matter. This suggests that we can do away with women and men simply by altering some social practices, conventions or conditions on which gender depends (whatever those are). However, ordinary social agents find this unintuitive given that (ordinarily) sex and gender are not distinguished. Second, claiming that gender is a product of oppressive social forces suggests that doing away with women and men should be feminism’s political goal. But this harbours ontologically undesirable commitments since many ordinary social agents view their gender to be a source of positive value. So, feminism seems to want to do away with something that should not be done away with, which is unlikely to motivate social agents to act in ways that aim at gender justice. Given these problems, Mikkola argues that feminists should give up the distinction on practical political grounds.

Tomas Bogardus (2020) has argued in an even more radical sense against the sex/gender distinction: as things stand, he holds, feminist philosophers have merely assumed and asserted that the distinction exists, instead of having offered good arguments for the distinction. In other words, feminist philosophers allegedly have yet to offer good reasons to think that ‘woman’ does not simply pick out adult human females. Alex Byrne (2020) argues in a similar vein: the term ‘woman’ does not pick out a social kind as feminist philosophers have “assumed”. Instead, “women are adult human females–nothing more, and nothing less” (2020, 3801). Byrne offers six considerations to ground this AHF (adult, human, female) conception.

• It reproduces the dictionary definition of ‘woman’.
• One would expect English to have a word that picks out the category adult human female, and ‘woman’ is the only candidate.
• AHF explains how we sometimes know that an individual is a woman, despite knowing nothing else relevant about her other than the fact that she is an adult human female.
• AHF stands or falls with the analogous thesis for girls, which can be supported independently.
• AHF predicts the correct verdict in cases of gender role reversal.
• AHF is supported by the fact that ‘woman’ and ‘female’ are often appropriately used as stylistic variants of each other, even in hyperintensional contexts.

Robin Dembroff (2021) responds to Byrne and highlights various problems with Byrne’s argument. First, framing: Byrne assumes from the start that gender terms like ‘woman’ have a single invariant meaning thereby failing to discuss the possibility of terms like ‘woman’ having multiple meanings – something that is a familiar claim made by feminist theorists from various disciplines. Moreover, Byrne (according to Dembroff) assumes without argument that there is a single, universal category of woman – again, something that has been extensively discussed and critiqued by feminist philosophers and theorists. Second, Byrne’s conception of the ‘dominant’ meaning of woman is said to be cherry-picked and it ignores a wealth of contexts outside of philosophy (like the media and the law) where ‘woman’ has a meaning other than AHF . Third, Byrne’s own distinction between biological and social categories fails to establish what he intended to establish: namely, that ‘woman’ picks out a biological rather than a social kind. Hence, Dembroff holds, Byrne’s case fails by its own lights. Byrne (2021) responds to Dembroff’s critique.

Others such as ‘gender critical feminists’ also hold views about the sex/gender distinction in a spirit similar to Bogardus and Byrne. For example, Holly Lawford-Smith (2021) takes the prevalent sex/gender distinction, where ‘female’/‘male’ are used as sex terms and ‘woman’/’man’ as gender terms, not to be helpful. Instead, she takes all of these to be sex terms and holds that (the norms of) femininity/masculinity refer to gender normativity. Because much of the gender critical feminists’ discussion that philosophers have engaged in has taken place in social media, public fora, and other sources outside academic philosophy, this entry will not focus on these discussions.

4. Women as a group

The various critiques of the sex/gender distinction have called into question the viability of the category women . Feminism is the movement to end the oppression women as a group face. But, how should the category of women be understood if feminists accept the above arguments that gender construction is not uniform, that a sharp distinction between biological sex and social gender is false or (at least) not useful, and that various features associated with women play a role in what it is to be a woman, none of which are individually necessary and jointly sufficient (like a variety of social roles, positions, behaviours, traits, bodily features and experiences)? Feminists must be able to address cultural and social differences in gender construction if feminism is to be a genuinely inclusive movement and be careful not to posit commonalities that mask important ways in which women qua women differ. These concerns (among others) have generated a situation where (as Linda Alcoff puts it) feminists aim to speak and make political demands in the name of women, at the same time rejecting the idea that there is a unified category of women (2006, 152). If feminist critiques of the category women are successful, then what (if anything) binds women together, what is it to be a woman, and what kinds of demands can feminists make on behalf of women?

Many have found the fragmentation of the category of women problematic for political reasons (e.g. Alcoff 2006; Bach 2012; Benhabib 1992; Frye 1996; Haslanger 2000b; Heyes 2000; Martin 1994; Mikkola 2007; Stoljar 1995; Stone 2004; Tanesini 1996; Young 1997; Zack 2005). For instance, Young holds that accounts like Spelman’s reduce the category of women to a gerrymandered collection of individuals with nothing to bind them together (1997, 20). Black women differ from white women but members of both groups also differ from one another with respect to nationality, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation and economic position; that is, wealthy white women differ from working-class white women due to their economic and class positions. These sub-groups are themselves diverse: for instance, some working-class white women in Northern Ireland are starkly divided along religious lines. So if we accept Spelman’s position, we risk ending up with individual women and nothing to bind them together. And this is problematic: in order to respond to oppression of women in general, feminists must understand them as a category in some sense. Young writes that without doing so “it is not possible to conceptualize oppression as a systematic, structured, institutional process” (1997, 17). Some, then, take the articulation of an inclusive category of women to be the prerequisite for effective feminist politics and a rich literature has emerged that aims to conceptualise women as a group or a collective (e.g. Alcoff 2006; Ásta 2011; Frye 1996; 2011; Haslanger 2000b; Heyes 2000; Stoljar 1995, 2011; Young 1997; Zack 2005). Articulations of this category can be divided into those that are: (a) gender nominalist — positions that deny there is something women qua women share and that seek to unify women’s social kind by appealing to something external to women; and (b) gender realist — positions that take there to be something women qua women share (although these realist positions differ significantly from those outlined in Section 2). Below we will review some influential gender nominalist and gender realist positions. Before doing so, it is worth noting that not everyone is convinced that attempts to articulate an inclusive category of women can succeed or that worries about what it is to be a woman are in need of being resolved. Mikkola (2016) argues that feminist politics need not rely on overcoming (what she calls) the ‘gender controversy’: that feminists must settle the meaning of gender concepts and articulate a way to ground women’s social kind membership. As she sees it, disputes about ‘what it is to be a woman’ have become theoretically bankrupt and intractable, which has generated an analytical impasse that looks unsurpassable. Instead, Mikkola argues for giving up the quest, which in any case in her view poses no serious political obstacles.

Elizabeth Barnes (2020) responds to the need to offer an inclusive conception of gender somewhat differently, although she endorses the need for feminism to be inclusive particularly of trans people. Barnes holds that typically philosophical theories of gender aim to offer an account of what it is to be a woman (or man, genderqueer, etc.), where such an account is presumed to provide necessary and sufficient conditions for being a woman or an account of our gender terms’ extensions. But, she holds, it is a mistake to expect our theories of gender to do so. For Barnes, a project that offers a metaphysics of gender “should be understood as the project of theorizing what it is —if anything— about the social world that ultimately explains gender” (2020, 706). This project is not equivalent to one that aims to define gender terms or elucidate the application conditions for natural language gender terms though.

4.1 Gender nominalism

Iris Young argues that unless there is “some sense in which ‘woman’ is the name of a social collective [that feminism represents], there is nothing specific to feminist politics” (1997, 13). In order to make the category women intelligible, she argues that women make up a series: a particular kind of social collective “whose members are unified passively by the objects their actions are oriented around and/or by the objectified results of the material effects of the actions of the other” (Young 1997, 23). A series is distinct from a group in that, whereas members of groups are thought to self-consciously share certain goals, projects, traits and/ or self-conceptions, members of series pursue their own individual ends without necessarily having anything at all in common. Young holds that women are not bound together by a shared feature or experience (or set of features and experiences) since she takes Spelman’s particularity argument to have established definitely that no such feature exists (1997, 13; see also: Frye 1996; Heyes 2000). Instead, women’s category is unified by certain practico-inert realities or the ways in which women’s lives and their actions are oriented around certain objects and everyday realities (Young 1997, 23–4). For example, bus commuters make up a series unified through their individual actions being organised around the same practico-inert objects of the bus and the practice of public transport. Women make up a series unified through women’s lives and actions being organised around certain practico-inert objects and realities that position them as women .

Young identifies two broad groups of such practico-inert objects and realities. First, phenomena associated with female bodies (physical facts), biological processes that take place in female bodies (menstruation, pregnancy, childbirth) and social rules associated with these biological processes (social rules of menstruation, for instance). Second, gender-coded objects and practices: pronouns, verbal and visual representations of gender, gender-coded artefacts and social spaces, clothes, cosmetics, tools and furniture. So, women make up a series since their lives and actions are organised around female bodies and certain gender-coded objects. Their series is bound together passively and the unity is “not one that arises from the individuals called women” (Young 1997, 32).

Although Young’s proposal purports to be a response to Spelman’s worries, Stone has questioned whether it is, after all, susceptible to the particularity argument: ultimately, on Young’s view, something women as women share (their practico-inert realities) binds them together (Stone 2004).

Natalie Stoljar holds that unless the category of women is unified, feminist action on behalf of women cannot be justified (1995, 282). Stoljar too is persuaded by the thought that women qua women do not share anything unitary. This prompts her to argue for resemblance nominalism. This is the view that a certain kind of resemblance relation holds between entities of a particular type (for more on resemblance nominalism, see Armstrong 1989, 39–58). Stoljar is not alone in arguing for resemblance relations to make sense of women as a category; others have also done so, usually appealing to Wittgenstein’s ‘family resemblance’ relations (Alcoff 1988; Green & Radford Curry 1991; Heyes 2000; Munro 2006). Stoljar relies more on Price’s resemblance nominalism whereby x is a member of some type F only if x resembles some paradigm or exemplar of F sufficiently closely (Price 1953, 20). For instance, the type of red entities is unified by some chosen red paradigms so that only those entities that sufficiently resemble the paradigms count as red. The type (or category) of women, then, is unified by some chosen woman paradigms so that those who sufficiently resemble the woman paradigms count as women (Stoljar 1995, 284).

Semantic considerations about the concept woman suggest to Stoljar that resemblance nominalism should be endorsed (Stoljar 2000, 28). It seems unlikely that the concept is applied on the basis of some single social feature all and only women possess. By contrast, woman is a cluster concept and our attributions of womanhood pick out “different arrangements of features in different individuals” (Stoljar 2000, 27). More specifically, they pick out the following clusters of features: (a) Female sex; (b) Phenomenological features: menstruation, female sexual experience, child-birth, breast-feeding, fear of walking on the streets at night or fear of rape; (c) Certain roles: wearing typically female clothing, being oppressed on the basis of one’s sex or undertaking care-work; (d) Gender attribution: “calling oneself a woman, being called a woman” (Stoljar 1995, 283–4). For Stoljar, attributions of womanhood are to do with a variety of traits and experiences: those that feminists have historically termed ‘gender traits’ (like social, behavioural, psychological traits) and those termed ‘sex traits’. Nonetheless, she holds that since the concept woman applies to (at least some) trans persons, one can be a woman without being female (Stoljar 1995, 282).

The cluster concept woman does not, however, straightforwardly provide the criterion for picking out the category of women. Rather, the four clusters of features that the concept picks out help single out woman paradigms that in turn help single out the category of women. First, any individual who possesses a feature from at least three of the four clusters mentioned will count as an exemplar of the category. For instance, an African-American with primary and secondary female sex characteristics, who describes herself as a woman and is oppressed on the basis of her sex, along with a white European hermaphrodite brought up ‘as a girl’, who engages in female roles and has female phenomenological features despite lacking female sex characteristics, will count as woman paradigms (Stoljar 1995, 284). [ 7 ] Second, any individual who resembles “any of the paradigms sufficiently closely (on Price’s account, as closely as [the paradigms] resemble each other) will be a member of the resemblance class ‘woman’” (Stoljar 1995, 284). That is, what delimits membership in the category of women is that one resembles sufficiently a woman paradigm.

4.2 Neo-gender realism

In a series of articles collected in her 2012 book, Sally Haslanger argues for a way to define the concept woman that is politically useful, serving as a tool in feminist fights against sexism, and that shows woman to be a social (not a biological) notion. More specifically, Haslanger argues that gender is a matter of occupying either a subordinate or a privileged social position. In some articles, Haslanger is arguing for a revisionary analysis of the concept woman (2000b; 2003a; 2003b). Elsewhere she suggests that her analysis may not be that revisionary after all (2005; 2006). Consider the former argument first. Haslanger’s analysis is, in her terms, ameliorative: it aims to elucidate which gender concepts best help feminists achieve their legitimate purposes thereby elucidating those concepts feminists should be using (Haslanger 2000b, 33). [ 8 ] Now, feminists need gender terminology in order to fight sexist injustices (Haslanger 2000b, 36). In particular, they need gender terms to identify, explain and talk about persistent social inequalities between males and females. Haslanger’s analysis of gender begins with the recognition that females and males differ in two respects: physically and in their social positions. Societies in general tend to “privilege individuals with male bodies” (Haslanger 2000b, 38) so that the social positions they subsequently occupy are better than the social positions of those with female bodies. And this generates persistent sexist injustices. With this in mind, Haslanger specifies how she understands genders:

S is a woman iff [by definition] S is systematically subordinated along some dimension (economic, political, legal, social, etc.), and S is ‘marked’ as a target for this treatment by observed or imagined bodily features presumed to be evidence of a female’s biological role in reproduction.

S is a man iff [by definition] S is systematically privileged along some dimension (economic, political, legal, social, etc.), and S is ‘marked’ as a target for this treatment by observed or imagined bodily features presumed to be evidence of a male’s biological role in reproduction. (2003a, 6–7)

These are constitutive of being a woman and a man: what makes calling S a woman apt, is that S is oppressed on sex-marked grounds; what makes calling S a man apt, is that S is privileged on sex-marked grounds.

Haslanger’s ameliorative analysis is counterintuitive in that females who are not sex-marked for oppression, do not count as women. At least arguably, the Queen of England is not oppressed on sex-marked grounds and so, would not count as a woman on Haslanger’s definition. And, similarly, all males who are not privileged would not count as men. This might suggest that Haslanger’s analysis should be rejected in that it does not capture what language users have in mind when applying gender terms. However, Haslanger argues that this is not a reason to reject the definitions, which she takes to be revisionary: they are not meant to capture our intuitive gender terms. In response, Mikkola (2009) has argued that revisionary analyses of gender concepts, like Haslanger’s, are both politically unhelpful and philosophically unnecessary.

Note also that Haslanger’s proposal is eliminativist: gender justice would eradicate gender, since it would abolish those sexist social structures responsible for sex-marked oppression and privilege. If sexist oppression were to cease, women and men would no longer exist (although there would still be males and females). Not all feminists endorse such an eliminativist view though. Stone holds that Haslanger does not leave any room for positively revaluing what it is to be a woman: since Haslanger defines woman in terms of subordination,

any woman who challenges her subordinate status must by definition be challenging her status as a woman, even if she does not intend to … positive change to our gender norms would involve getting rid of the (necessarily subordinate) feminine gender. (Stone 2007, 160)

But according to Stone this is not only undesirable – one should be able to challenge subordination without having to challenge one’s status as a woman. It is also false: “because norms of femininity can be and constantly are being revised, women can be women without thereby being subordinate” (Stone 2007, 162; Mikkola [2016] too argues that Haslanger’s eliminativism is troublesome).

Theodore Bach holds that Haslanger’s eliminativism is undesirable on other grounds, and that Haslanger’s position faces another more serious problem. Feminism faces the following worries (among others):

Representation problem : “if there is no real group of ‘women’, then it is incoherent to make moral claims and advance political policies on behalf of women” (Bach 2012, 234). Commonality problems : (1) There is no feature that all women cross-culturally and transhistorically share. (2) Delimiting women’s social kind with the help of some essential property privileges those who possess it, and marginalizes those who do not (Bach 2012, 235).

According to Bach, Haslanger’s strategy to resolve these problems appeals to ‘social objectivism’. First, we define women “according to a suitably abstract relational property” (Bach 2012, 236), which avoids the commonality problems. Second, Haslanger employs “an ontologically thin notion of ‘objectivity’” (Bach 2012, 236) that answers the representation problem. Haslanger’s solution (Bach holds) is specifically to argue that women make up an objective type because women are objectively similar to one another, and not simply classified together given our background conceptual schemes. Bach claims though that Haslanger’s account is not objective enough, and we should on political grounds “provide a stronger ontological characterization of the genders men and women according to which they are natural kinds with explanatory essences” (Bach 2012, 238). He thus proposes that women make up a natural kind with a historical essence:

The essential property of women, in virtue of which an individual is a member of the kind ‘women,’ is participation in a lineage of women. In order to exemplify this relational property, an individual must be a reproduction of ancestral women, in which case she must have undergone the ontogenetic processes through which a historical gender system replicates women. (Bach 2012, 271)

In short, one is not a woman due to shared surface properties with other women (like occupying a subordinate social position). Rather, one is a woman because one has the right history: one has undergone the ubiquitous ontogenetic process of gender socialization. Thinking about gender in this way supposedly provides a stronger kind unity than Haslanger’s that simply appeals to shared surface properties.

Not everyone agrees; Mikkola (2020) argues that Bach’s metaphysical picture has internal tensions that render it puzzling and that Bach’s metaphysics does not provide good responses to the commonality and presentation problems. The historically essentialist view also has anti-trans implications. After all, trans women who have not undergone female gender socialization won’t count as women on his view (Mikkola [2016, 2020] develops this line of critique in more detail). More worryingly, trans women will count as men contrary to their self-identification. Both Bettcher (2013) and Jenkins (2016) consider the importance of gender self-identification. Bettcher argues that there is more than one ‘correct’ way to understand womanhood: at the very least, the dominant (mainstream), and the resistant (trans) conceptions. Dominant views like that of Bach’s tend to erase trans people’s experiences and to marginalize trans women within feminist movements. Rather than trans women having to defend their self-identifying claims, these claims should be taken at face value right from the start. And so, Bettcher holds, “in analyzing the meaning of terms such as ‘woman,’ it is inappropriate to dismiss alternative ways in which those terms are actually used in trans subcultures; such usage needs to be taken into consideration as part of the analysis” (2013, 235).

Specifically with Haslanger in mind and in a similar vein, Jenkins (2016) discusses how Haslanger’s revisionary approach unduly excludes some trans women from women’s social kind. On Jenkins’s view, Haslanger’s ameliorative methodology in fact yields more than one satisfying target concept: one that “corresponds to Haslanger’s proposed concept and captures the sense of gender as an imposed social class”; another that “captures the sense of gender as a lived identity” (Jenkins 2016, 397). The latter of these allows us to include trans women into women’s social kind, who on Haslanger’s social class approach to gender would inappropriately have been excluded. (See Andler 2017 for the view that Jenkins’s purportedly inclusive conception of gender is still not fully inclusive. Jenkins 2018 responds to this charge and develops the notion of gender identity still further.)

In addition to her revisionary argument, Haslanger has suggested that her ameliorative analysis of woman may not be as revisionary as it first seems (2005, 2006). Although successful in their reference fixing, ordinary language users do not always know precisely what they are talking about. Our language use may be skewed by oppressive ideologies that can “mislead us about the content of our own thoughts” (Haslanger 2005, 12). Although her gender terminology is not intuitive, this could simply be because oppressive ideologies mislead us about the meanings of our gender terms. Our everyday gender terminology might mean something utterly different from what we think it means; and we could be entirely ignorant of this. Perhaps Haslanger’s analysis, then, has captured our everyday gender vocabulary revealing to us the terms that we actually employ: we may be applying ‘woman’ in our everyday language on the basis of sex-marked subordination whether we take ourselves to be doing so or not. If this is so, Haslanger’s gender terminology is not radically revisionist.

Saul (2006) argues that, despite it being possible that we unknowingly apply ‘woman’ on the basis of social subordination, it is extremely difficult to show that this is the case. This would require showing that the gender terminology we in fact employ is Haslanger’s proposed gender terminology. But discovering the grounds on which we apply everyday gender terms is extremely difficult precisely because they are applied in various and idiosyncratic ways (Saul 2006, 129). Haslanger, then, needs to do more in order to show that her analysis is non-revisionary.

Charlotte Witt (2011a; 2011b) argues for a particular sort of gender essentialism, which Witt terms ‘uniessentialism’. Her motivation and starting point is the following: many ordinary social agents report gender being essential to them and claim that they would be a different person were they of a different sex/gender. Uniessentialism attempts to understand and articulate this. However, Witt’s work departs in important respects from the earlier (so-called) essentialist or gender realist positions discussed in Section 2: Witt does not posit some essential property of womanhood of the kind discussed above, which failed to take women’s differences into account. Further, uniessentialism differs significantly from those position developed in response to the problem of how we should conceive of women’s social kind. It is not about solving the standard dispute between gender nominalists and gender realists, or about articulating some supposedly shared property that binds women together and provides a theoretical ground for feminist political solidarity. Rather, uniessentialism aims to make good the widely held belief that gender is constitutive of who we are. [ 9 ]

Uniessentialism is a sort of individual essentialism. Traditionally philosophers distinguish between kind and individual essentialisms: the former examines what binds members of a kind together and what do all members of some kind have in common qua members of that kind. The latter asks: what makes an individual the individual it is. We can further distinguish two sorts of individual essentialisms: Kripkean identity essentialism and Aristotelian uniessentialism. The former asks: what makes an individual that individual? The latter, however, asks a slightly different question: what explains the unity of individuals? What explains that an individual entity exists over and above the sum total of its constituent parts? (The standard feminist debate over gender nominalism and gender realism has largely been about kind essentialism. Being about individual essentialism, Witt’s uniessentialism departs in an important way from the standard debate.) From the two individual essentialisms, Witt endorses the Aristotelian one. On this view, certain functional essences have a unifying role: these essences are responsible for the fact that material parts constitute a new individual, rather than just a lump of stuff or a collection of particles. Witt’s example is of a house: the essential house-functional property (what the entity is for, what its purpose is) unifies the different material parts of a house so that there is a house, and not just a collection of house-constituting particles (2011a, 6). Gender (being a woman/a man) functions in a similar fashion and provides “the principle of normative unity” that organizes, unifies and determines the roles of social individuals (Witt 2011a, 73). Due to this, gender is a uniessential property of social individuals.

It is important to clarify the notions of gender and social individuality that Witt employs. First, gender is a social position that “cluster[s] around the engendering function … women conceive and bear … men beget” (Witt 2011a, 40). These are women and men’s socially mediated reproductive functions (Witt 2011a, 29) and they differ from the biological function of reproduction, which roughly corresponds to sex on the standard sex/gender distinction. Witt writes: “to be a woman is to be recognized to have a particular function in engendering, to be a man is to be recognized to have a different function in engendering” (2011a, 39). Second, Witt distinguishes persons (those who possess self-consciousness), human beings (those who are biologically human) and social individuals (those who occupy social positions synchronically and diachronically). These ontological categories are not equivalent in that they possess different persistence and identity conditions. Social individuals are bound by social normativity, human beings by biological normativity. These normativities differ in two respects: first, social norms differ from one culture to the next whereas biological norms do not; second, unlike biological normativity, social normativity requires “the recognition by others that an agent is both responsive to and evaluable under a social norm” (Witt 2011a, 19). Thus, being a social individual is not equivalent to being a human being. Further, Witt takes personhood to be defined in terms of intrinsic psychological states of self-awareness and self-consciousness. However, social individuality is defined in terms of the extrinsic feature of occupying a social position, which depends for its existence on a social world. So, the two are not equivalent: personhood is essentially about intrinsic features and could exist without a social world, whereas social individuality is essentially about extrinsic features that could not exist without a social world.

Witt’s gender essentialist argument crucially pertains to social individuals , not to persons or human beings: saying that persons or human beings are gendered would be a category mistake. But why is gender essential to social individuals? For Witt, social individuals are those who occupy positions in social reality. Further, “social positions have norms or social roles associated with them; a social role is what an individual who occupies a given social position is responsive to and evaluable under” (Witt 2011a, 59). However, qua social individuals, we occupy multiple social positions at once and over time: we can be women, mothers, immigrants, sisters, academics, wives, community organisers and team-sport coaches synchronically and diachronically. Now, the issue for Witt is what unifies these positions so that a social individual is constituted. After all, a bundle of social position occupancies does not make for an individual (just as a bundle of properties like being white , cube-shaped and sweet do not make for a sugar cube). For Witt, this unifying role is undertaken by gender (being a woman or a man): it is

a pervasive and fundamental social position that unifies and determines all other social positions both synchronically and diachronically. It unifies them not physically, but by providing a principle of normative unity. (2011a, 19–20)

By ‘normative unity’, Witt means the following: given our social roles and social position occupancies, we are responsive to various sets of social norms. These norms are “complex patterns of behaviour and practices that constitute what one ought to do in a situation given one’s social position(s) and one’s social context” (Witt 2011a, 82). The sets of norms can conflict: the norms of motherhood can (and do) conflict with the norms of being an academic philosopher. However, in order for this conflict to exist, the norms must be binding on a single social individual. Witt, then, asks: what explains the existence and unity of the social individual who is subject to conflicting social norms? The answer is gender.

Gender is not just a social role that unifies social individuals. Witt takes it to be the social role — as she puts it, it is the mega social role that unifies social agents. First, gender is a mega social role if it satisfies two conditions (and Witt claims that it does): (1) if it provides the principle of synchronic and diachronic unity of social individuals, and (2) if it inflects and defines a broad range of other social roles. Gender satisfies the first in usually being a life-long social position: a social individual persists just as long as their gendered social position persists. Further, Witt maintains, trans people are not counterexamples to this claim: transitioning entails that the old social individual has ceased to exist and a new one has come into being. And this is consistent with the same person persisting and undergoing social individual change via transitioning. Gender satisfies the second condition too. It inflects other social roles, like being a parent or a professional. The expectations attached to these social roles differ depending on the agent’s gender, since gender imposes different social norms to govern the execution of the further social roles. Now, gender — as opposed to some other social category, like race — is not just a mega social role; it is the unifying mega social role. Cross-cultural and trans-historical considerations support this view. Witt claims that patriarchy is a social universal (2011a, 98). By contrast, racial categorisation varies historically and cross-culturally, and racial oppression is not a universal feature of human cultures. Thus, gender has a better claim to being the social role that is uniessential to social individuals. This account of gender essentialism not only explains social agents’ connectedness to their gender, but it also provides a helpful way to conceive of women’s agency — something that is central to feminist politics.

Linda Alcoff holds that feminism faces an identity crisis: the category of women is feminism’s starting point, but various critiques about gender have fragmented the category and it is not clear how feminists should understand what it is to be a woman (2006, chapter 5). In response, Alcoff develops an account of gender as positionality whereby “gender is, among other things, a position one occupies and from which one can act politically” (2006, 148). In particular, she takes one’s social position to foster the development of specifically gendered identities (or self-conceptions): “The very subjectivity (or subjective experience of being a woman) and the very identity of women are constituted by women’s position” (Alcoff 2006, 148). Alcoff holds that there is an objective basis for distinguishing individuals on the grounds of (actual or expected) reproductive roles:

Women and men are differentiated by virtue of their different relationship of possibility to biological reproduction, with biological reproduction referring to conceiving, giving birth, and breast-feeding, involving one’s body . (Alcoff 2006, 172, italics in original)

The thought is that those standardly classified as biologically female, although they may not actually be able to reproduce, will encounter “a different set of practices, expectations, and feelings in regard to reproduction” than those standardly classified as male (Alcoff 2006, 172). Further, this differential relation to the possibility of reproduction is used as the basis for many cultural and social phenomena that position women and men: it can be

the basis of a variety of social segregations, it can engender the development of differential forms of embodiment experienced throughout life, and it can generate a wide variety of affective responses, from pride, delight, shame, guilt, regret, or great relief from having successfully avoided reproduction. (Alcoff 2006, 172)

Reproduction, then, is an objective basis for distinguishing individuals that takes on a cultural dimension in that it positions women and men differently: depending on the kind of body one has, one’s lived experience will differ. And this fosters the construction of gendered social identities: one’s role in reproduction helps configure how one is socially positioned and this conditions the development of specifically gendered social identities.

Since women are socially positioned in various different contexts, “there is no gender essence all women share” (Alcoff 2006, 147–8). Nonetheless, Alcoff acknowledges that her account is akin to the original 1960s sex/gender distinction insofar as sex difference (understood in terms of the objective division of reproductive labour) provides the foundation for certain cultural arrangements (the development of a gendered social identity). But, with the benefit of hindsight

we can see that maintaining a distinction between the objective category of sexed identity and the varied and culturally contingent practices of gender does not presume an absolute distinction of the old-fashioned sort between culture and a reified nature. (Alcoff 2006, 175)

That is, her view avoids the implausible claim that sex is exclusively to do with nature and gender with culture. Rather, the distinction on the basis of reproductive possibilities shapes and is shaped by the sorts of cultural and social phenomena (like varieties of social segregation) these possibilities gives rise to. For instance, technological interventions can alter sex differences illustrating that this is the case (Alcoff 2006, 175). Women’s specifically gendered social identities that are constituted by their context dependent positions, then, provide the starting point for feminist politics.

Recently Robin Dembroff (2020) has argued that existing metaphysical accounts of gender fail to address non-binary gender identities. This generates two concerns. First, metaphysical accounts of gender (like the ones outlined in previous sections) are insufficient for capturing those who reject binary gender categorisation where people are either men or women. In so doing, these accounts are not satisfying as explanations of gender understood in a more expansive sense that goes beyond the binary. Second, the failure to understand non-binary gender identities contributes to a form of epistemic injustice called ‘hermeneutical injustice’: it feeds into a collective failure to comprehend and analyse concepts and practices that undergird non-binary classification schemes, thereby impeding on one’s ability to fully understand themselves. To overcome these problems, Dembroff suggests an account of genderqueer that they call ‘critical gender kind’:

a kind whose members collectively destabilize one or more elements of dominant gender ideology. Genderqueer, on my proposed model, is a category whose members collectively destabilize the binary axis, or the idea that the only possible genders are the exclusive and exhaustive kinds men and women. (2020, 2)

Note that Dembroff’s position is not to be confused with ‘gender critical feminist’ positions like those noted above, which are critical of the prevalent feminist focus on gender, as opposed to sex, kinds. Dembroff understands genderqueer as a gender kind, but one that is critical of dominant binary understandings of gender.

Dembroff identifies two modes of destabilising the gender binary: principled and existential. Principled destabilising “stems from or otherwise expresses individuals’ social or political commitments regarding gender norms, practices, and structures”, while existential destabilising “stems from or otherwise expresses individuals’ felt or desired gender roles, embodiment, and/or categorization” (2020, 13). These modes are not mutually exclusive, and they can help us understand the difference between allies and members of genderqueer kinds: “While both resist dominant gender ideology, members of [genderqueer] kinds resist (at least in part) due to felt or desired gender categorization that deviates from dominant expectations, norms, and assumptions” (2020, 14). These modes of destabilisation also enable us to formulate an understanding of non-critical gender kinds that binary understandings of women and men’s kinds exemplify. Dembroff defines these kinds as follows:

For a given kind X , X is a non-critical gender kind relative to a given society iff X ’s members collectively restabilize one or more elements of the dominant gender ideology in that society. (2020, 14)

Dembroff’s understanding of critical and non-critical gender kinds importantly makes gender kind membership something more and other than a mere psychological phenomenon. To engage in collectively destabilising or restabilising dominant gender normativity and ideology, we need more than mere attitudes or mental states – resisting or maintaining such normativity requires action as well. In so doing, Dembroff puts their position forward as an alternative to two existing internalist positions about gender. First, to Jennifer McKitrick’s (2015) view whereby gender is dispositional: in a context where someone is disposed to behave in ways that would be taken by others to be indicative of (e.g.) womanhood, the person has a woman’s gender identity. Second, to Jenkin’s (2016, 2018) position that takes an individual’s gender identity to be dependent on which gender-specific norms the person experiences as being relevant to them. On this view, someone is a woman if the person experiences norms associated with women to be relevant to the person in the particular social context that they are in. Neither of these positions well-captures non-binary identities, Dembroff argues, which motivates the account of genderqueer identities as critical gender kinds.

As Dembroff acknowledges, substantive philosophical work on non-binary gender identities is still developing. However, it is important to note that analytic philosophers are beginning to engage in gender metaphysics that goes beyond the binary.

This entry first looked at feminist objections to biological determinism and the claim that gender is socially constructed. Next, it examined feminist critiques of prevalent understandings of gender and sex, and the distinction itself. In response to these concerns, the entry looked at how a unified women’s category could be articulated for feminist political purposes. This illustrated that gender metaphysics — or what it is to be a woman or a man or a genderqueer person — is still very much a live issue. And although contemporary feminist philosophical debates have questioned some of the tenets and details of the original 1960s sex/gender distinction, most still hold onto the view that gender is about social factors and that it is (in some sense) distinct from biological sex. The jury is still out on what the best, the most useful, or (even) the correct definition of gender is.

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Beauvoir, Simone de | feminist philosophy, approaches: intersections between analytic and continental philosophy | feminist philosophy, topics: perspectives on reproduction and the family | feminist philosophy, topics: perspectives on the self | homosexuality | identity politics | speech acts

Acknowledgments

I am very grateful to Tuukka Asplund, Jenny Saul, Alison Stone and Nancy Tuana for their extremely helpful and detailed comments when writing this entry.

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• Published: 17 April 2024

Towards Gender Harmony Dataset: Gender Beliefs and Gender Stereotypes in 62 Countries

• Natasza Kosakowska-Berezecka   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-3503-3921 1 ,
• Tomasz Besta   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-6209-3677 1 ,
• Paweł Jurek   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9958-3941 1 ,
• Michał Olech 2 ,
• Jurand Sobiecki 1 ,
• Jennifer Bosson   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2566-1078 3 ,
• Joseph A. Vandello 3 ,
• Deborah Best   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-6715-0957 4 ,
• Magdalena Zawisza 5 ,
• Saba Safdar 6 ,
• Anna Włodarczyk   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-2106-5324 7 &
• Magdalena Żadkowska 1  

Scientific Data volume  11 , Article number:  392 ( 2024 ) Cite this article

Metrics details

• Human behaviour

The Towards Gender Harmony (TGH) project began in September 2018 with over 160 scholars who formed an international consortium to collect data from 62 countries across six continents. Our overarching goal was to analyze contemporary perceptions of masculinity and femininity using quantitative and qualitative methods, marking a groundbreaking effort in social science research. The data collection took place between January 2018 and February 2020, and involved undergraduate students who completed a series of randomized scales and the data was collected through the SurveyMonkey or Qualtrics platforms, with paper surveys being used in rare cases. All the measures used in the project were translated into 22 languages. The dataset contains 33,313 observations and 286 variables, including contemporary measures of gendered self-views, attitudes, and stereotypes, as well as relevant demographic data. The TGH dataset, linked with accessible country-level data, provides valuable insights into the dynamics of gender relations worldwide, allowing for multilevel analyses and examination of how gendered self-views and attitudes are linked to behavioral intentions and demographic variables.

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Background & summary.

The Towards Gender Harmony project ( https://towardsgenderharmony.ug.edu.pl/ ) started in September 2018 with more than 160 scholars who have built an international consortium that collected data in 62 countries and six continents. Our overarching goal was to analyze contemporary perceptions of masculinity and femininity using quantitative and qualitative methods, marking a groundbreaking effort in social science research. Such multinational research is important, as it helps us move beyond the WEIRD perspective of Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich and Democratic countries which heavily predominates in psychology 1 , 2 , 3 .

It has been more than 30 years since a similar large cross-cultural study examined understandings of masculinity and femininity. John Williams and Deborah Best established that universally, across 26 countries, (1) communality is associated with femininity and agency is associated with masculinity, and (2) women view themselves as more communal than men and men view themselves as more agentic than women 4 . While communality and agency are universal dimensions of human evaluation 5 , 6 underlying gender stereotypes and gendered self-views, the measures used in Williams and Best to capture communality and agency were not subjected to rigorous psychometric procedures for ensuring scales’ cultural invariance and equivalence. Further, because some of the data reported in Williams and Best were originally collected around 1977, they do not reflect the influence of dramatic changes in gender roles that have altered contemporary gender stereotypes 7 . It is thus important to reexamine these gender constructs today but with culturally invariant and equivalent measures. Our dataset includes contemporary data reflecting individuals’ gendered self-views, their descriptive, prescriptive, and proscriptive stereotypes about women and men, and a selection of gender beliefs and attitudes reflecting the contemporary literature of social psychology and society as a whole.

What is more, our project is unique as it examines the under-researched topic of the universality of stereotypes about men who, according to results of research (carried out so far mainly within Western cultural contexts), face strong pressures for conformity to norms such as agency, dominance, pursuit of high social status, and avoidance of femininity 8 , 9 . Apart from including contemporary measures of gendered self-views, attitudes, and gender stereotypes, we have also collected relevant demographic data. As a result, our Towards Gender Harmony dataset, linked with accessible country/nation-level data, offers powerful insight into the dynamics of gender relations worldwide, allowing for multilevel analyses and examination of how gender beliefs are linked to behavioral intentions and demographic variables.

This dataset has been so far used to test men’s support for gender equality across countries 10 ; to establish cross-culturally valid, psychometric properties and correlates of precarious manhood beliefs 11 ; to examine binary gender gaps in agentic and communal self-views 12 ; to investigate whether the degree of endorsement of precarious manhood beliefs at the country level was associated with various risk-related health behaviors and outcomes 13 , to test the double standard in gender rules across countries 14 ; and to test whether country-level precarious manhood beliefs were associated with more negative attitudes, fewer rights, more restrictive laws, and reduced safety for LGBTQ+ groups 15 .

To gather data, we conducted a cross-sectional survey study employing a rigorous approach encompassing questionnaire development, data acquisition, data processing, and statistical analysis techniques. Our study aimed to investigate contemporary perceptions of masculinity and femininity across different regions of the world. We prioritize transparency and reproducibility, ensuring that our methods are accessible to fellow researchers.

Questionnaire development

To collect pertinent information, we meticulously designed comprehensive questionnaires (refer to the Measures section for detailed content). Participants completed a battery of scales measuring a broad range of variables concerning gender beliefs and gender stereotypes (the full list is available at https://osf.io/7tza3 ).

Data acquisition

We adopted the convenience sampling method, aiming to recruit a minimum of 200 participants from each country. We sent out invitations to researchers to participate in our project using mailing lists aimed at psychology researchers across the globe. These mailing lists included the International Association of Cross-Cultural Psychology, the International Academy for Intercultural Relations, and the European Association of Social Psychology. To reduce cross-national differences due to potential confounding variables (e.g., education, age) that might occur if relied on more heterogeneous samples, we asked each collaborator to obtain a university student sample of at least 100 women and men. We have also made special efforts to recruit colleagues from underrepresented countries and continents and contacted individual colleagues. Data collection occurred between January 2018 and February 2020, as part of a broader cross-cultural research project (accessible on OSF: https://osf.io/mq48y ). Our participants consisted of undergraduate students who volunteered their time and, in most countries, received no compensation. We obtained ethical approval from the Ethics Board for Research projects at the Institute of Psychology, University of Gdańsk (no. 11/2018) and local Institutional Review Boards, and all participants provided informed consent. The order of measures was randomized, and data collection was facilitated through the SurveyMonkey or Qualtrics platforms. In rare instances, participants completed paper surveys.

Data processing

We took steps to ensure data quality and integrity throughout the data processing phase. Subsequently, we conducted data cleaning procedures to identify and address missing values, outliers, and inconsistencies (detailed in the Data Records section).

By adhering to these rigorous data collection and processing procedures, we aimed to generate reliable and robust findings concerning contemporary perceptions of masculinity and femininity across diverse global contexts. This commitment to transparency and thorough methodology ensures that our research can be comprehended and replicated by other scholars in the field.

All the measures used in the project were translated into 22 languages (Armenian, Chinese, Croatian, Danish, Dutch, English, Filipino, French, Georgian, German, Italian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Spanish, Turkish, Ukrainian). Bilingual scholars in psychology used the back-translation procedure to create national versions of each scale. The English version of the scales was used as the basis for all translations.

Gendered self-views and gender stereotypes

Gendered self-views.

Participants indicated the extent to which 12 agency-related traits, 12 communality-related traits, 12 dominance-related traits, and 12 weakness-related traits described them on a scale from 1 (does not describe me at all) to 7 (describes me well). Traits were selected from a pool of 472 prescriptive gender stereotypes (see supplementary material for the adjectives selected, Table  S1 and https://osf.io/7tza3 ) 4 , 8 , 16 . In addition, using the same scale, they also rated the following traits: gifted in science, gifted in math, linguistically gifted, and gifted in humanities.

Descriptive stereotypes

Participants rated the same set of traits (12 agency-related, 12 communality-related, 12 dominance-related, 12 weakness-related) on a scale from 1 (more frequently associated with women than men) to 7 (more frequently associated with men than women). In addition, using the same scale, they also rated the following traits: gifted in science, gifted in math, linguistically gifted, and gifted in humanities.

Prescriptive and proscriptive stereotypes

Participants rated the prescriptive (desirable) and proscriptive (undesirable) nature of the traits (12 agency-related, 12 communality-related, 12 dominance-related, 12 weakness-related) by answering “How desirable is it in your society for a woman [man] to possess this trait?” on a scale from 1 (not at all desirable) to 7 (very desirable). In addition, using the same scale, they also rated the following traits: gifted in science, gifted in math, linguistically gifted, and gifted in humanities.

Gender Beliefs & Attitudes

Precarious manhood beliefs.

We administered a short version of the Precarious Manhood Beliefs (PMB) scale 17 . Based on an exploratory factor analysis of 7 items from Vandello et al . 17 , we selected four items with loadings >0.45 that conveyed beliefs that manhood is difficult to earn (“Some boys do not become men no matter how old they get,” “Other people often question whether a man is a ‘real man’”) and easy to lose (“It is fairly easy for a man to lose his status as a man,” “Manhood is not assured – it can be lost”). Participants indicated their agreement on a scale from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree).

Gender essentialism

Participants’ essentialist beliefs were measured with five items (e.g., “Their underlying nature makes it difficult for men to learn to behave more like women 18 ) on a scale ranging from strongly disagree (1) to strongly agree (7).

Ambivalent sexism

We used six items from the short version of the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI) 19 , which measures Hostile Sexism (HS) and Benevolent Sexism (BS). We selected items from Rollero et al . 19 with factor loadings >0.50. HS items were: “Women seek to gain power by getting control over men,” “Women exaggerate problems they have at work,” and “When women lose to men in a fair competition, they typically complain about being discriminated against.” BS items were: “Women should be cherished and protected by men,” “Men are incomplete without women,” and “Women, compared to men, tend to have superior moral sensibility.” Items were answered on scales from 0 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).

Ambivalence toward Men

We used six items from the short version of the Ambivalence toward Men Inventory (AMI) 20 , which measures Hostility toward Men (HM) and Benevolence toward Men (BM). We selected items from Rollero et al . 20 with factor loadings >0.50. HM items were: “Men will always fight to have greater control in society than women,” “Men act like babies when they are sick,” and “Most men sexually harass women, even if only in subtle ways, once they are in a position of power over them.” BM items were: “Men are more willing to put themselves in danger to protect others,” “Every woman needs a male partner who will cherish her,” and “A woman will never be truly fulfilled in life if she doesn’t have a committed, long-term relationship with a man.” Items were rated on a 0 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree) scale.

Collective action intentions to support gender equality

To measure intention to engage in collective behaviors for gender equality, we used items taken and modified from two scales. All items were rated on a scale from 1 (not likely at all) to 7 (very likely). Instructions started with a sentence stem (“To support gender equality, how likely it is that you would …”) followed by a list of actions. Four actions, modified from Tausch et al . 21 , included: “participate in demonstrations”; “sign a petition”; “block buildings or streets, and “disturb events, where advocates of inequality appear.” Six actions, modified from Alisat and Reimer 22 , included: “become involved with a group (or political party) focused on gender issues/gender equality (e.g., volunteer, summer job, etc.)”; “consciously make time to be able to work on gender issues/(support) gender equality (e.g., working part time for an organization, contribute to raise awareness about gender issues, choosing activities focused on gender issues over other leisure activities)”; “participate in a community event which focused on gender issues”; “Used online tools (e.g., Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Wikipedia, Blogs) to raise awareness about gender issues/gender equality”; “Participated in an educational event (e.g., workshop) related to gender issues/gender equality”; “Spent time working with a group/organization that deals with the connection of the gender issues/gender equality to other societal issues such as justice or inequality”.

Identification with gender

Participants’ identification with their gender was measured with two items (“Being a member of my gender group is an important part of how I see myself”, “To what extent you consider yourself feminine/masculine”; based on van Breen et al . 23 . Responses ranged from 1 (not at all) to 7 (very much).

Awareness of gender inequalities

Participants’ awareness of gender inequalities was measured with one item: “Overall, our society currently treats women less fairly than it treats men”. Responses ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree).

Gender roles and expectations

The items “What do you think women should prioritize?” and “What do you think men should prioritize?” were asked to assess societal attitudes and beliefs regarding gender roles. Respondents answered using a scale from 1 (Having a family) to 7 (Having a career). These items provided insights into broader societal norms related to gender roles and expectations. Individual preferences were also measured by similarly asking respondents what they would prioritize themselves – having a family or having a career.

Zero-sum beliefs about gender status

Participants’ zero-sum beliefs about gender status were assessed in two ways. The first was by the six-item Zero-Sum Perspective on Gender Status Scale (ZSPGS) 24 . The scale consists of items reflecting zero-sum beliefs in specific domains: occupational (‘More good jobs for women mean fewer good jobs for men’), power (‘The more power women gain, the less power men have’), economic (‘Women’s economic gains translate into men’s economic losses’), political (‘The more influence women have in politics, the less influence men have in politics’), social status (‘As women gain more social status, men lose social status’), and familial (‘More family-related decision making for women means less family-related decision making for men’). The second method was a more general single-item zero-sum perspective of gender status measure: ‘Declines in discrimination against women are directly related to increased discrimination against men’. Response options for each item ranged from 0 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree).

Culture-related Relevant Measures

Autonomy and embeddedness values.

In this study, the 10-item scale for measuring Autonomy vs. Embeddedness values was employed, following Vignoles et al . 25 . This scale, derived from the Portrait Values Questionnaire 26 , assessed participants’ orientations towards Autonomy (e.g., “It is important to this person to think up new ideas and be creative; to do things one’s own way.”) vs. Embeddedness (e.g., “Living in secure surroundings is important to this person; to avoid anything that might be dangerous.”) values. Participants assessed how well the description matched their own characteristics or traits from 1 (very much like me) to 6 (not at all like me).

Power distance beliefs

Participants’ power distance beliefs were measured using four items 27 . These items (e.g., “There should be established ranks in society with everyone occupying their rightful place regardless of whether that place is high or low in the ranking”) measured attitudes about societal ranks, requesting salary increases, questioning authority decisions, and formal communication with superiors. Responses ranged from 1 (strongly disagree) to 7 (strongly agree).

Subjective socio-economic status

The Subjective Social Status Ladder 28 often referred to as the “Social Status Ladder”, was used to gauge an individual’s perception of their relative social position within their country. Respondents were asked to choose a number on the ladder from 0 (representing the lowest social status) to 10 (representing the highest social status) to indicate where they perceive themselves to be in comparison to others.

Attention checks

The survey also included three attention checks in which participants were asked to mark on a scale from 1 to 7 indicated numbers (“If you are reading this please choose 3”).

Demographic variables

At the end of the questionnaire demographic information was collected. We asked participants to declare their age, study major, gender identity, education level, marital status, number of children, citizenship, and sexual orientation/identity. We also measured migration background and ethnicity (with a list of major ethnic backgrounds, if necessary adjusted/extended to meet local cultural contexts). Additionally, we ask who fulfilled the role of financial provider in the family, who fulfilled the role of homemaker in the family, and how would they describe the place they grew up (a city, a town, the countryside/remote place/rural area. Finally, our demographic part included questions about religiosity and religious denomination as well as political orientation.

Data Records

The data comprising the TGH project results are stored in a single table. The data table is available in the repository 29 in three formats: csv, xlsx, and Rda. The dataset contains 33,313 observations, each in a separate row, and 286 variables, each in a separate column. A detailed description of the variables can be found in the Supplementary Excel File titled ‘CodebookTGH.xlsx’, available in the Towards Gender Harmony full dataset repository 29 , which also includes a link to an interactive map with descriptive statistics and a summary of selected published statistics – the map will be developed with more analyses. The variable description consists of the following components: ‘ID’ – a unique sequential number for the item/variable (ranging from 1 to 286); ‘Variable Name’; ‘Measure’ – reference to the measurement tool used to assess this variable (containing the respective item); ‘Scale’ – the dimension, the name of the theoretical variable composed of items assigned to the scale; ‘Label’ – the content of the survey item; ‘Level of measurement’ – information about the level at which the variable/response to the item is expressed (nominal, ordinal, interval, or ratio); ‘Values’ – the range of values the variable can take; ‘Value Labels’ – possible response categories.

The dataset contains only responses provided by the study participants. Aggregated variables requiring, for example, the averaging of selected items (according to the key) must be calculated separately. To facilitate this process, we provide R code enabling the calculation of selected variables ‘TGH total scores code.R’ is available in the repository 29 .

Sample composition

We summarize the sample composition, including sample size, gender distribution, and descriptive statistics regarding age, for 13 distinct world regions, as illustrated in Table  1 . Additionally, we have provided detailed data for the 62 countries under study in the Supplementary Table  1 . As previously mentioned, our participants consisted of undergraduate students who volunteered their time. After data cleaning, the final dataset comprises 33,313 observations from 62 countries across 13 world regions. As can be seen in Table  1 and Supplementary Table  1 , both country-level and regional-level samples exhibit variations not only in terms of sample size but also in gender distribution and age distribution parameters.

Technical Validation

Data cleaning procedure.

Data cleaning is a crucial preparatory step to ensure the quality and reliability of data for subsequent analysis and modeling tasks 30 . In the TGH project, the data-cleaning procedure involved the following steps:

Data Integration: Data from various countries were provided by collaborators in separate files. We combined data from multiple sources into a unified dataset, resolving any inconsistencies in variables or units.

Data Inspection: We examined the dataset to identify inconsistencies, missing values, or outliers. We paid particular attention to data integrity, making sure that values either fell within acceptable ranges or adhered to predefined rules including verification of completeness of the data in all the scales, congruity between nominal categories in different countries. During this stage, we removed records with incorrect responses to attention check questions.

Handling Missing Data: In the TGH database, no data imputation methods were applied. In most cases, records with missing values were retained in the database. Only observations with data gaps preventing the calculation of most measured variables were removed.

Outlier Treatment: Outliers were observed in the age variable. Some responses appeared to contain randomly entered numbers (e.g., 247). Observations with such responses were removed. In a few cases where birthdates were mistakenly entered as ages, we recalculated the age by subtracting the birthdate from the examination date and rounding to full years. Outliers in other variables that could potentially skew the analysis were neither removed nor adjusted.

Data Transformation and Scaling: Due to the use of different response scales (mainly single-item scales) in some countries compared to the standardized scale adopted for the entire study (e.g., using a scale from 0 to 6 instead of 0 to 5), linear transformations were applied to harmonize the data.

Data Formatting: To ensure data format consistency, some responses recorded as labels were encoded into numerical values. The mapping of labels to numbers can be found in the Supplementary Excel File titled ‘CodebookTGH.xlsx,’ available in the repository 29 .

Data Verification: The cleaned dataset underwent validation, including the estimation of reliability ratios for aggregated scores (see Technical Validation).

As a result of the aforementioned operations, 710 observations were removed from the initial dataset ( N  = 34,023). However, further processing is necessary, depending on the objectives of subsequent analyses and due to the presence of missing data in the dataset, to select a subset suitable for testing specific models that involve particular variables.

In addition to socio-demographic variables, the majority of variables under study are psychometric measures. As previously mentioned, the target variables are derived either by averaging/summing responses to items that make up the scale or by calculating them from the results of fitting CFA models. To assess the reliability of these measured variables, it is necessary to employ psychometric techniques. In this field, the most common method for estimating the reliability of such measurements is through the calculation of internal consistency coefficients, such as Cronbach’s (as recommended when raw scores are obtained by averaging/summing responses to items comprising a scale) 31 or McDonald’s omega (recommended when standardized scores are to be derived using CFA results) 32 . Table  2 presents both of these reliability measures for all target variables calculated on the total sample. Detailed data on reliability coefficients calculated for each country separately are provided in Supplementary Excel File titled ‘ReliabilityTGH.xlsx’, available in the repository 29 .

As can be seen in Table  2 , in the vast majority of cases, the reliability of variable measurements, as measured by the coefficient of internal consistency, exceeds the widely accepted cutoff point of >0.70 33 . Only in the case of five measures (i.e., Benevolent Sexism, Benevolence toward Men, Power Distance Beliefs, Autonomy Value, Embeddedness Value) did the results indicate reliabilities below the desired threshold. This partially can be attributed to the use of very short scales (<10 items) to measure these variables. Nevertheless it is advisable to exercise caution in interpreting the results, and it is recommended to thoroughly examine the reliability of measurements for these variables in individual countries (see Supplementary Excel File ‘ReliabilityTGH.xlsx’).

Given the cross-cultural nature of the data, it is essential to establish measurement invariance (MI) before conducting any analyses that compare results between countries. Measurement invariance refers to the consistency of a scale’s measurement properties across different groups or cultural contexts 34 . In simpler terms, it assesses whether the construct being measured is understood and interpreted in the same way across various groups or settings. Typically, researchers report three levels of measurement invariance, which are determined by parameters that are constrained to be equal across groups. The first level, configural invariance, requires the scale to demonstrate the same overall factor structure for all groups; the second level, metric invariance, necessitates that the scale items’ factor loadings be equal across the groups; and the third level, scalar invariance, demands that item intercepts be equal across groups.

For some variables in this study, such analyses have already been conducted and published 10 , 11 , 14 . These analyses involve assessing whether the measurement properties of a scale, such as factor loadings or item intercepts, remain consistent across different groups or countries. Establishing MI is crucial to ensure that any observed differences in the data result from genuine variations in the construct being measured and not from measurement bias or cultural differences.

Moreover, in the context of using the data to calculate country-level scores, it is advisable to test for psychometric isomorphism. Psychometric isomorphism extends the concept of MI by examining whether the underlying psychological structure of the measurement remains consistent across different levels, such as countries or cultures 35 . This analysis goes beyond examining the equivalence of mere measurement properties; it also investigates the constancy of the conceptual meaning and relationships among variables when considering the data at the country level.

These assessments of MI and psychometric isomorphism help ensure the validity and comparability of the data when conducting cross-cultural analyses and making country-level comparisons, providing a robust foundation for meaningful and reliable research findings.

Code availability

We provide R code enabling the calculation of selected variables. This code is available in the repository 29 under the name TGH total scores code.R. Its proper operation requires the use of the R environment at least version 4.3.1 and the tidyverse package 36 .

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Acknowledgements

The results presented in this paper are part of the larger project titled “Towards Gender Harmony” ( www.towardsgenderharmony.ug.edu.pl ), which involves many wonderful people. Here, we acknowledge our University of Gdańsk Research Assistants Team: Agata Bizewska, Mariya Amiroslanova, Aleksandra Globińska, Andy Milewski, Piotr Piotrowski, Stanislav Romanov, Aleksandra Szulc, and Olga Żychlińska for their assistance with programming the surveys and coordinating the collection of data at all sites. We are also thankful to all Towards Gender Harmony collaborators for their assistance in data collection.

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N.K.B. supervised the entire project and data collection. In addition, P.J. and M.O. and J.S. and T.B. were involved in dataset preparation, and P.J. and M.O. were responsible for data validation and data visualization. All Authors (N.K.B., T.B., P.J., M.O., J.S., J.B., J.V., D.B., S.S., A.W., M.Ż.) contributed to the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work, and the drafting of the work or revising it critically for important intellectual contributions. All authors have approved this version of the manuscript and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work in ensuring that questions related to the accuracy or integrity of any part of the work are appropriately investigated and resolved. All persons designated as authors qualify for authorship, and all those who qualify for authorship are listed.

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Kosakowska-Berezecka, N., Besta, T., Jurek, P. et al. Towards Gender Harmony Dataset: Gender Beliefs and Gender Stereotypes in 62 Countries. Sci Data 11 , 392 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-024-03235-x

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Gender stereotypes change outcomes: a systematic literature review

Journal of Humanities and Applied Social Sciences

ISSN : 2632-279X

Article publication date: 15 December 2021

Issue publication date: 19 October 2023

Even though researchers have discussed gender stereotype change, only a few studies have specifically projected outcomes or consequences. Hence, the main purpose of this study is to examine the impact of gender stereotype change concerning the different outcomes.

Design/methodology/approach

In achieving the purpose, the authors searched and reviewed current empirical knowledge on the outcomes of gender stereotype change in the Scopus and EBSCOhost databases from 1970 to 2020. The entire process was conducted through a systematic literature review methodology. The article selection criteria were executed using the PRISMA article selection flowchart steps, and 15 articles were included for the review.

The findings reveal that the outcomes from gender stereotype change research can be categorized mainly under the themes of “family and children,” “marriage” and “equality and women's employment.”

Research limitations/implications

The co-occurrence network visualization map reveals gaps in the existing literature. There may be more possible outcomes relating to the current realities, and more cross-cultural research is needed.

Practical implications

These outcomes provide some implications for policymakers.

Originality/value

Even though researchers have discussed gender stereotype change on its various outcomes or consequences, research is less. Hence, this study provides a synthesis of consequences and addresses the gaps in the area.

• Gender stereotypes change
• Systematic literature review

Priyashantha, K.G. , De Alwis, A.C. and Welmilla, I. (2023), "Gender stereotypes change outcomes: a systematic literature review", Journal of Humanities and Applied Social Sciences , Vol. 5 No. 5, pp. 450-466. https://doi.org/10.1108/JHASS-07-2021-0131

Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2021, K.G. Priyashantha, A. Chamaru De Alwis and Indumathi Welmilla

Published in Journal of Humanities and Applied Social Sciences . Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcode

Introduction

A society's beliefs about the appropriate roles for men and women are gender role attitudes, gender ideology ( Davis and Greenstein, 2009 ) or gender stereotypes ( Attanapola, 2004 ; Berridge et al. , 2009 ; Bosak et al. , 2018 ; Charlesworth and Banaji, 2021 ; De Silva and Priyashantha, 2014 ; Eagly et al. , 2020 ; Lopez-Zafra and Garcia-Retamero, 2021 ). Such beliefs are formed from the peoples' observations of the behavior of men and women in different social roles ( Priyashantha et al. , 2021b ). Particularly, when women or men demonstrate certain behavior more typical to different social roles more often than the opposite sex, such behaviors are believed to be the common traits relevant to men or women ( Eagly et al. , 2020 ; Eagly and Karau, 2002 ). Hence, men are believed to be assertive, independent, rational and decisive, while women are believed to be showing concern for others, warmth, helpfulness and nurturance ( Hoyt et al. , 2009 ). These attributes concerning men and women are referred to as agentic (masculine) and communal (feminine), respectively ( Abele, 2003 ). This agency and communion are then perceived as the fundamental motivators in men's and women's behaviors ( Bakan, 1966 ). However, researchers argue that these perceptions have changed in the contemporary world of work, which has been promoted by females' income-generating activities ( Eagly et al. , 2020 ). Social and economic developments took place, and United Nations initiatives (e.g. human rights, gender equality, nondiscrimination against women, women in development programs) ( Benería et al. , 2015 ) have backed this females' income generation in the mid-20th century in most countries ( Attanapola, 2004 ; Boehnke, 2011 ; Zosuls et al. , 2011 ). These female income generation activities have, in turn, resulted in changes in social role distribution where both men and women are now in multiple roles as parents, employees, employers, volunteers, friends, spouses, siblings, etc. ( Najeema, 2010 ; Perrigino et al. , 2021 ). Thus, peoples' various roles include women's work in men's roles and vice versa ( Blau and Kahn, 2006 ; Mergaert, 2012 ) while playing their traditional roles ( Eagly et al. , 2020 ). This trend has evolved the traditional gender role stereotypes into changing gender stereotypes during the last 50 years ( Blau and Kahn, 2006 ; Mergaert, 2012 ; Priyashantha et al. , 2021b ).

Even though it has been almost 50 years for research into changing gender stereotypes, there are scholarly arguments for the prevalence of traditional gender stereotypes ( Haines et al. , 2016 ; Rudman et al. , 2012 ; Rudman and Glick, 2001 ). Some theoretical bases and the prevalence of some cultures that value gender stereotyping further support these scholarly arguments. Meanwhile, there is an opinion that gender stereotyping violates human rights ( Tabassum and Nayak, 2021 ). Such an opinion is justified by the fact that gender stereotyping limits the capacity of women and men to develop their attributes or professional skills and make decisions about their lives and plans ( Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2014 ). Therefore, researchers have been highly interested in finding whether gender stereotypes have changed or not in societies ( Bosak et al. , 2018 ; Eagly et al. , 2020 ; Haines et al. , 2016 ; Lopez-Zafra and Garcia-Retamero, 2012 , 2021 ; Twenge, 1997a , b ; Ugwu, 2021 ). Instead, it is reported that there are more gender gaps in employment participation in some countries. If the gender stereotypes have changed, theoretically, there should be no such gender gap. Researching this question, the researchers have also been interested in how gender stereotypes change cross-culturally ( Boehnke, 2011 ; Constantin and Voicu, 2015 ; Diekman et al. , 2005 ; Diekman and Eagly, 2000 ; Lopez-Zafra and Garcia-Retamero, 2011 ). Accordingly, they have found that gender stereotypes have changed in Europe ( Berkery et al. , 2013 ; Boehnke, 2011 ; Garcia-Retamero et al. , 2011 ; Lopez-Zafra and Garcia-Retamero, 2012 ) and America ( Alfieri et al. , 1996 ; Beere et al. , 1984 ; Bem, 1974 ; Broverman et al. , 1970 ; Deaux and Lewis, 1984 ; Gill et al. , 1987 ; Lueptow et al. , 1995 ; Parelius, 1975 ; Spence and Hahn, 2016 ; Twenge, 1997a ; Twenge et al. , 2012 ; Zosuls et al. , 2011 ). In addition to that, researchers have found that the gender stereotype change has taken place in East Asia ( Boehnke, 2011 ), Africa ( Bosak et al. , 2018 ) and the Arab World ( Sikdar and Mitra, 2012 ) as well. Some global level studies also confirm that gender stereotype change has occurred in most countries with minor exceptions ( Brown, 1991 ; Charlesworth and Banaji, 2021 ; Constantin and Voicu, 2015 ; Williams and Best, 1990 ). We know that if something happened, this could have various outcomes related to the incident. Accordingly, as the gender stereotype change has also taken place, there could be multiple outcomes associated with it. However, to the best of our knowledge, there is minimal research on this subject matter ( Priyashantha et al. , 2021c ).

Therefore, with the expectation of finding the outcomes of gender stereotype change, we positioned the central question of the current study as, what is the impact of gender stereotype change? Thus, the present study systematically and quantitatively analyzes selected literature in the last 50 years to identify the outcomes of gender stereotypes and gaps in the prevailing knowledge.

Methodology

This article is positioned as Systematic Literature Review (SLR). The SLRs require a prior protocol to be developed to document the inclusion and exclusion of studies and analysis methods ( Pahlevan-Sharif et al. , 2019 ). We did a comprehensive literature search for this study, and a protocol was designed before the article search. There is a standard way of reporting the SLR known as Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA- Liberati et al. , 2009 ), which is highly recommended in Medicine. However, as there is no such framework in social sciences, authors who intend to conduct the SLR tend to use the narrative and arbitrary guidelines ( Pahlevan-Sharif et al. , 2019 ; Petticrew and Roberts, 2006 ). Instead, in this study, for the article selection process to be objective and systematic, we followed the PRISMA article selection flow chart steps to select the articles.

The PRISMA article selection flow diagram has four steps: identification, screening, eligibility and included, and we followed them in the article selection. The identifications stage includes database, search terms and search criteria. The databases were Scopus and Ebscohost for searching the articles. The search terms were “gender stereotype change” and “outcomes.” The search criteria or algorithm was developed by combining the terms with AND operative, and each search term was given similar words combined with OR operative. Accordingly, we retrieved 56 articles from Scopus and 68 Articles from EBSCOhost databases. Subsequently, the retrieved list containing the title, abstract, keywords, authors' names and affiliations, journal name, cited numbers and year, etc., was exported to a Microsoft Excel sheet. The duplicates were then searched and removed.

The screening stage includes eliminating the articles when their titles and abstracts do not meet the inclusion criteria ( Meline, 2006 ). The inclusion criteria for the current study were the “empirical studies” published in “academic journals” in “English” on “gender stereotype change” during the “1970–2020” period. Thus, the reason for selecting 1970 as the entry point was that gender stereotype change started in 1970, and it was extended to 2020 to include more studies for the review. Each author of the current research independently went through each title and abstract and eliminated the studies that did not meet the inclusion criteria. Notably, if there was any disagreement about elimination was resolved through discussion and consensus. Hence, we excluded 73 articles that were based on “review,” “qualitative,” “books,” “book chapters,” “magazines,” “conference papers,” “non-English” and “non-relevance to the current study's scope.” Then, the remaining 50 articles' full-text versions were retrieved for assessing their eligibility, which is the next step of the PRISMA flow diagram.

Since the articles have already been screened out up to this stage, evaluating their methodological reporting for eligibility checking is much better ( Meline, 2006 ). It is justifiable as we had taken an inclusion criterion as “empirical studies.” Thus, the evaluation areas may be the population, methodology, methods, design, context, etc., and can find the reasons for excluding the articles as “ambiguous methods” and “required original information from the author,” etc. ( Meline, 2006 ). Accordingly, we independently evaluated each article on such grounds. We identified some studies based on qualitative reviews, perspectives, ambiguous methods and some sought original information about the methodology from the authors. They all were excluded through our discussion and consensus. In total, we identified 35 papers as irrelevant at this stage, and finally, we selected 15 articles for the review. They are shown in Table 1 , and the process we followed for article selection is shown in Figure 1 .

The Microsoft Excel sheet was then modified, and the data in it were fed into the VOSviewer Software to run the keyword co-occurrence and term co-occurrence network visualization maps. That was to identify the core themes in the selected studies scientifically. Notably, the keyword co-occurrence is to identify the main areas touched from the keywords of the studies as the keywords of a research article denote its primary content on a particular field of investigation. Moreover, the term co-occurrence analysis is to identify more about studies than the keywords co-occurrence as it searches key terms reflected in the titles and abstracts of each article.

Results and analysis

This section is mainly organized to present the results of the SLR and analyze them. It primarily consists of two sections: descriptive analysis and literature classification.

Descriptive analysis

The year-wise article distribution is shown in Figure 2 . Even the 50 years considered for the review, the empirical studies reported on outcomes of gender stereotype change since 1998. Figure 2 shows that at least one empirical study has been conducted for each year during the 1998–2020 period. Moreover, there is a high frequency of studies in 2005, 2017 and 2018 years. Table 2 shows the methodological reporting of the studies. It reveals that studies have been conducted based on large samples drawn on panel surveys. The information ensures the validity of the selected studies for the review, as we had an inclusion criterion for selecting papers as “empirical studies.” Concerning the context under which studies were conducted ( Figure 3 ), the USA takes the led by having seven empirical studies published (1970–2020). Canada is in the second position having two studies during the period. Australia, China, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain and United Kingdom have conducted one study each.

Literature classification

The classification of results is critical in finding out actual work done on the objective set for the research ( Jabeen et al. , 2020 ; Priyashantha et al. , 2021a ). Since the main research objective of the current study was to identify the outcomes of the gender stereotype change, this section mainly classifies the results relating to that. As the keyword co-occurrence network analysis is suitable for identifying the critical areas on a particular investigation, we used it for our study to answer the study's central question. Figure 4 shows the output of it.

The size of the node denotes the number of occurrences in a keyword co-occurrences visualization map. Hence, the higher the number of occurrences, the larger the node's size. Thus, our analysis of the keyword co-occurrences found that “gender,” “employment” and “longitudinal research” denoted in larger nodes in the map ( Figure 4 ). It reveals that they are the keywords that have frequently occurred in studies. We know that “gender” is highly associated with gender stereotypes. It may be a justifiable reason why it happens so often in studies. “Employment” opportunities are also justifiable since it has been proven that employment opportunities have been a significant cause for gender stereotypes changes ( Eagly et al. , 2020 ). Moreover, as almost all the studies in the sample have adopted the “longitudinal research” design, the keyword “longitudinal research” has also fallen to the frequently occurring category. It demonstrates the methods used by the selected articles and their suitability to the current study.

Additionally, Figure 4 shows four main clusters denoted in different colors containing different keywords in each cluster. More specifically, Table 3 shows the number of terms in each cluster, indicating that changing gender stereotype outcomes varied by different areas of investigations. Grouping the keywords into one cluster is regarded as the keywords' likelihood to reflect similar topics. Hence, clusters one and two (as stated in Table 3 ) have the highest number of keywords and suggest that the topics highlighted in those are the centralized fields in gender stereotype change and outcome research. Thus, the central areas highlighted are “attitudes,” “cohabitation,” “fertility,” “life course,” “living arrangements,” “marriage,” “couples,” “employment,” “family economics,” “gender roles,” “longitudinal research” and “marital quality.”

Moreover, the term co-occurrence network visualization map created by the VOSviewer software ( Figure 5 ) is treated as more detailed than the keyword co-occurrence analysis. It provides an analysis that goes beyond the keywords as it further investigates the areas focused on in the title and abstracts of the studies. Hence, creating this type of map further identified the areas frequently investigated on gender stereotypes change outcomes. Accordingly, Figure 5 categorized the terms into three clusters in Blue, Red and Green. In the Blue cluster, there are two terms as “family” and “child.” A common theme can be formed for them as family and child-related outcomes. As we did a detailed search for the outcomes in each article, we could summarize them in Table 4 . Hence, we could extract different family and children-related outcomes from Table 4 . They are; “Family Role Overload and Stress” ( Duxbury et al. , 2018 ), “Subsequent School Enrollment” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “Fewer Children” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ), “Delay in Marital Parenthood” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) and “Children's Convergence of Egalitarian Attitudes” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ).

Concerning the family and children-related outcomes, Duxbury et al. (2018) have found that the “family role overload” of both husbands and wives was consequent in changing gender stereotype contexts. The sense of family role overload then becomes a strong predictor of couples' “perceived stress” ( Duxbury et al. , 2018 ). The perceived stress can undermine the health and well-being of people. The literature confirms that “psychological strains” and “disorders” ( Hébert et al. , 2017 ), “adverse impacts on the immune system” ( Barry et al. , 2020 ; Cohen et al. , 1999 ), “low quality of life,” “insomnia,” “burnout” ( Ribeiro et al. , 2018 ) and “family distress” ( Aryee et al. , 1999 ) resultant from the stress. When the stress becomes to distress level, there is a high possibility of causing chronic diseases and mortality ( Barry et al. , 2020 ). Therefore, these findings provide more implications for the policymakers to emphasize reducing those negative outcomes.

Apart from this, young adults' biases toward changing gender role attitudes can cause “subsequent school enrolments” ( Ciabattari, 2001 ; Cunningham et al. , 2005 ). It is severe, particularly among women, as they need to acquire knowledge to upgrade their employment status ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) and be independent ( Goldscheider and Goldscheider, 1993 ). However, later school enrollment may hinder performing family roles of adults as intensive time is devoted to education ( Marini, 1978 ). Moreover, women with changing attitudes toward gender roles are “less likely to have children” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ) and “delay in marital parenthood” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ). As a result, the future society could go into a severe crisis regarding population growth ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ). It could be challenging to find people for growth prospects in economies. Therefore, the policymakers need to consider this seriously and try to overcome that. In the meantime, scholars need to focus on further research on this outcome to confirm this viewpoint further.

The last outcome of the family and children-related category is the “children's convergence of egalitarian attitudes” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ). It indicates that gender stereotype changes could evolve over the generations and possibly consequent the different outcomes of gender stereotype change. It implies that more research on this area is required to find more associated outcomes.

The cluster in Red ( Figure 5 ) has categorized the terms as; “Role Attitude,” “Attitudes,” “Cohabitation,” “Marriage” and “Consequences.” Out of them, the “role attitudes,” “attitudes” and “consequences” are the general search terms related to the concept of gender stereotype change outcomes, and hence, we ignored them for review. However, the remaining two terms, “marriage” and “cohabitation,” were considered for the review. Since these terms are related to marriage, we themed them as “marriage-related.” Hence, marriage-related outcomes we found were “Increased Cohabitation, Low Marriage Rate” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ), “Delay in Marriage” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “Low Satisfaction,” “Low Relationship Quality,” “Low Stability in Marital Relationships” ( Blom and Hewitt, 2020 ) and “Attitude Convergence in Marriage” ( Kalmijn, 2005 ).

The “increased cohabitation,” “low marriage rate” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ) and “delay in marriage” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) can subsequently impact the population growth negatively ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ). If such outcomes exist over time, it could be a barrier to the progression of societies. However, another finding reveals that gender stereotype change increases childbirth to single parents in recent decades ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ). Therefore, it is difficult to directly conclude that such outcomes negatively affect population growth or societal progression. More research is needed to find the associated outcomes of these consequences so that reasonable judgments can be made whether such outcomes generate more negative or positive effects on the population, society or any other.

Moreover, in marital relationships, Australian-related research has found that “low satisfaction,” “low relationship quality” and “low stability” ( Blom and Hewitt, 2020 ) were consequent from the gender stereotype changes. All of which resemble negative outcomes by their surface nature. However, another finding reveals that “attitude convergence in marriage” ( Kalmijn, 2005 ) occurred due to gender stereotype changes. It is contrary to the previous finding, which is a positive outcome by its surface nature.

Most importantly, for these types of outcomes, positivity or negativity is dependent on cultural values. The negative outcomes as “low satisfaction,” “low relationship quality” and “low stability” may be very accurate for the cultures which value male breadwinner family structures ( Blom and Hewitt, 2020 ). However, more opposing consequences, like “attitude convergence in marriage” ( Kalmijn, 2005 ), can be found in cultures with more egalitarian values like Nordic countries ( Vitali and Arpino, 2016 ). Hence, in total, the positivity or negativity of outcomes is a matter of societal and cultural values. Therefore, generalizing interpretations about the positivity or negativity of each outcome is suitable with more cross-cultural research. Similarly, further research is needed regarding the associated outcomes of each of these outcomes.

Finally, the Green cluster has the terms as; “Outcomes,” “Gender Differences,” “Gender Egalitarianism,” “Work” and “Women.” As in other clusters, we had a common search term, “outcome,” in this cluster, and we ignored it. Except that, the terms “gender difference” and “gender egalitarianism” seem to represent a common theme of “equality.” The remaining terms “work” and “women” are merged, and a theme can be given as “women's employment.” Thus, this cluster is then characterized by the theme of “equality and women employments.” Specifically, under this cluster, we found the outcomes of “Reduction of Gender Role Stereotyping” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ), “Egalitarian Essentialism” ( Cotter et al. , 2011 ), “Non-Difference in Men or Women for Work-Life” ( Lyness and Judiesch, 2014 ) and “Gender Differences in Personality Cross-Culturally” ( Schmitt et al. , 2017 ), and they can be related to the equality. Similarly, the “Women's Full-Time Employment,” “Women's Independent Living” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “More Working Hours” and “More Income for Women” ( Corrigall and Konrad, 2007 ) and “Increased Entrepreneurial Intention of Women” ( Perez-Quintana et al. , 2017 ) were found, and they can be categorized under the theme of women's employment. Moreover, the outcomes of the “Reduction of the Women's Disadvantage in Entering Male-Dominated Occupations” ( He and Zhou, 2018 ) and “Economic Rationality of Females” ( Onozaka and Hafzi, 2019 ) are also categorized to the theme of “women's employment.”

Thus, the “equality” related outcomes in the “equality and women's employment,” the “reduction of traditional gender role stereotyping” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ), “egalitarian essentialism” ( Cotter et al. , 2011 ) and “non-difference in men or women for work-life” ( Lyness and Judiesch, 2014 ) may change in different cultural contexts. As we have various cultural contexts that value either traditional gender norms or gender stereotype change, more cross-cultural research is needed to interpret such outcomes. Moreover, one cross-cultural study found that a “gender difference in personality” is consequenced even though people's gender stereotype attitudes have already changed ( Schmitt et al. , 2017 ). Therefore, this finding confirms the overall behavioral diversity of people, including diversity in gender role behaviors, although the equality of gender roles is emphasized.

Concerning women's employment-related outcomes, such as increases in “women's full-time employment opportunities” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “reduction of women's disadvantage in entering male-dominated occupations” ( He and Zhou, 2018 ), “more working hours and more income for women” ( Corrigall and Konrad, 2007 ) and “their increased entrepreneurial intention” ( Perez-Quintana et al. , 2017 ), women's “economic rationality” ( Onozaka and Hafzi, 2019 ) reveals the women's improved economic status. Moreover, the findings like increased “women's independent living” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) represent their independent decision-making. The positive side of these is that they reduce the gender gap in employment participation and the ultimate contribution to economic growth. However, since we have different cultures worldwide, more cross-cultural research is needed to generalize this. As discussed under “family and children” related outcomes, the negative side of women's employment-related outcomes is the missing family responsibilities or adverse health effects and low reproductivity. Therefore, this provides an implication for policymakers to avoid those harmful effects. In the meantime, as the socialization forces are diverse over time ( Brown and Stone, 2016 ), researchers can further test whether these types of outcomes exist over time.

In the network visualization map in Figure 5 , the circles' size denotes the number of occurrences. It suggests that the higher the number of occurrences, the larger the circle's size. Accordingly, the term “women” is then considered to be the frequently used term. It implies that the women-related outcomes should have been investigated repeatedly. However, even the term “women” has been found to be co-occurred many times in this study, our detailed analysis of each article found that the different women-related outcomes have been investigated only once. Instead, the other outcomes related to terms represented by the nodes in Figure 5 have not been co-occurred or tested frequently in the studies. Hence, overall, more research is needed to be a well-established knowledge on each outcome of stereotype change found in this study.

Gender stereotype change has been given scholarly attention since the 1970s. Traditional gender stereotypes have evolved into gender stereotype change or egalitarian gender stereotypes with females' participation in employment ( Brandth et al. , 2017 ; Mergaert et al. , 2013 ). This gender stereotype change has created various outcomes in various areas. This SLR studied the outcomes of gender stereotype change in the literature during the 1970–2020 period. The literature search was conducted using the Scopus and EBSCOhost databases. Empirical studies were mainly focused on selecting the articles. Initially, we extracted 124 articles for screening. After assessing their eligibility, we finally selected 15 articles for the review. They were subjected to the keyword and term co-occurrence analysis for finding the themes of gender stereotypes change outcomes.

The findings reveal that outcomes of gender stereotypes change are under the main themes of “family and children,” “marriage” and “equality and women's employment.” There are very few studies found relating to the “family and children” related outcomes. They are “Family Role Overload and Stress” ( Duxbury et al. , 2018 ), “Fewer Children” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ), “Later School Enrollment” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) and “Children's Convergence of Egalitarian Attitudes” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ). Of these results, it was found that all other results, except for the convergence of children's egalitarian attitudes ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ), had some adverse effects, such as neglect of family responsibilities and negative effects on health and female fertility. They provide implications to policymakers to ovoid those harmful effects. Moreover, more research is needed to test whether these outcomes exist over time since the socialization forces are diverse ( Brown and Stone, 2016 ).

Compared to the “family and children” related outcomes, more outcomes have found “marriage” associated outcomes. They are “Increase Cohabitation,” “Low Marriage Rate” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ), “Delay in Marriage” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “Attitude Convergence in Marriage” ( Kalmijn, 2005 ), “Low Satisfaction,” “Lower Relationship Quality” and “Low Stability in Marital Relationships” ( Blom and Hewitt, 2020 ). “The Increase in Cohabitation,” “Low Marriage Rate” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ) and “Delay in Marriage” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) can further negatively impact the population growth ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ). However, more research is needed regarding these outcomes and their associated outcomes to generalize whether they generate more positive or negative consequences. Moreover, concerning all the marriage-related outcomes, their positivity or negativity cannot be determined from their surface interpretation. More research is needed to be done on the associated outcomes of each of these outcomes. Moreover, as the marriage-related outcomes are subjected to cultural perspectives on gender roles, we cannot determine the positivity or negativity of such outcomes without doing more cross-cultural studies. Therefore, more cross-cultural research is needed.

Compared to the family and children and marriage-related outcomes, more outcomes were found relating to equality and women's employment-related category. For the analysis purposes, we further categorized them into two sub-themes as equality and women's employment-related. The “equality”-related outcomes found were; “Reduction of Traditional Gender Role Stereotyping” ( Dawson et al. , 2016 ), “Egalitarian Essentialism” ( Cotter et al. , 2011 ), “Non-Difference in Men or Women for Work-Life” ( Lyness and Judiesch, 2014 ), “Gender Difference in Personality” ( Schmitt et al. , 2017 ). We believe that these outcomes may change in different cultural contexts. Hence, more cross-cultural research is needed to make generalizations. Similarly, the women's employment-related outcomes found were: increases in “Women's Full-Time Employment Opportunities” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “Reduction of Women's Disadvantage in Entering Male-Dominated Occupations” ( He and Zhou, 2018 ), “More Working Hours and More Income for Women” ( Corrigall and Konrad, 2007 ), “Women's Increased Entrepreneurial Intention” ( Perez-Quintana et al. , 2017 ), “Women's Independent Living” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ) and their “Economic Rationality” ( Onozaka and Hafzi, 2019 ). These outcomes reveal the improved economic status and independent living of females. These can help reduce the employment gender gap that ultimately contributes to economic growth. For this also, more cross-cultural research is needed to make more generalizations. It is proven in this study that family responsibilities are missed and have adverse effects on health and reproductivity when females are involved in employment opportunities. Therefore, the outcomes provide an implication for the policymakers to ovoid those harmful effects. Moreover, more research is needed to test whether these outcomes exist over time since the socialization forces are diverse ( Brown and Stone, 2016 ).

Practicality and research implications

There are implications for future researchers from the findings of the current research. Although the 50 years considered for reviewing the literature on gender stereotype outcomes, we were able to find very few outcomes from only 15 studies conducted on an empirical basis. Therefore, more research is needed on this area. More specifically, gender stereotyping is coupled with cultural values on gender norms. Mainly, we have cultures on gender role stereotyping and gender role egalitarianism. Therefore, future researches need to focus more research on a cross-cultural basis. Moreover, since the socialization forces are diverse, complex and continuously evolving, more research is essential to have a well-established knowledge of gender stereotype change outcomes.

Additionally, the outcome of “Family Role Overload and Stress” ( Duxbury et al. , 2018 ) has a high possibility to create more health risks to the employees whose gender role attitude changed. Moreover, “Fewer Children” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ), “Later School Enrollment” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), “Increase in Cohabitation,” “Low Marriage Rate” ( Barber and Axinn, 1998 ) and “Delay in Marriage” ( Cunningham et al. , 2005 ), and all the outcomes of women employment-related category can negatively impact on population growth. Therefore, they provide implications to policymakers to ovoid those harmful effects.

PRISMA article selection flow diagram

Year-wise research article distribution

Country-wise article publication

Keywords co-occurrence network visualization map

Term co-occurrence network visualization map

Included articles for the review

Source(s): Authors created (2021)

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Acknowledgements

Funding : No funding was available for this research

Authors Contributions : All authors contributed to the study conception, design, material preparation, data collection and analysis. All versions of drafts of the manuscript were written by Author 1, and other authors commented and revised. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Availability: Data collected during the current study are not publicly available. However, they can be available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Conflicts of Interest : On behalf of all authors, the corresponding author states that there is no conflict of interest.

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Breaking Gender Stereotype

In a world where ideas of what it means to be a man or a woman are often still narrowly defined by stereotypes and media messages, HGSE has long been at the vanguard of change, with faculty members, students, and alumni working to help young people develop confidence in their identities, tackling toxic masculinity and supporting girls’ confidence, and breaking down gender binaries.

HGSE has led the conversation about gender roles, gender identity, and gender stereotypes — helping young people become who they are.

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Lyn Mikel Brown , Ed.D.'89, worked with Gilligan on the influential book, Meeting at the Crossroads: Women’s Psychology and Girls’ Development , identifying the uncertainties girls face as they enter adolescence. Brown has gone on to research and write books about female friendships, sexualization of teenage girls, and female empowerment. An activist, Brown has also co-founded organizations like SPARK Movement and Hardy Girls Healthy Women, which work to build supportive, feminist, anti-racist coalitions.

Yet boys too face their own gender-based developmental challenges, as noted in Packaging Boyhood: Saving Our Sons from Superheroes, Slackers, and Other Media Stereotypes? , written by Brown with Sharon Lamb , Ed.M.'80, Ed.D.'88, and Mark Tappan , Ed.D.'87, and in Deep Secrets: Boys' Friendship and the Crisis of Connections , by psychologist Niobe Way , Ed.M.’94.

"One of our messages in the end is there are still really important conversations parents and teachers can have with boys about the narrow stereotypes that are not benign but could have an effect on their propensity for violence or their performance in school or how they treat girls," Tappan told Harvard Ed. magazine. "…It's easy to take a 'boys will be boys' attitude, but I think there could be more conversations with boys growing up about those kinds of messages."

Forming healthy relationships is central to Making Caring Common ’s (MCC) recent report that looks at the intersection of hookup culture, sexual harassment, and misogyny. To promote the essential conversations between teens and the adults that lead to the growth of healthy attitudes and relationships, MCC developed resources to help parents and teachers lead the discussion.

Jeff Perrotti , C.A.S.’85, has also recognized that schools and adults have a vital role to play in sending messages about gender and identity. As director of the Massachusetts Safe Schools Program for LGBTQ students, Perrotti provides training for teachers and support for transgender students. Since he started offering trainings for staff and faculty in the 90s, requests for assistance have grown. During the 2015–16 school year, the Safe Schools Program conducted 315 trainings and technical assistance sessions. In 2016–17, as of May, the number was already at 432.

“It’s exciting, the different collaborations we’ve had, everything from afterschool programs to adult education. There are a lot of opportunities…. There’s a whole other wave [of interest], sometimes prompted by a student transitioning. It’s a great opportunity to talk about gender identity," Perrotti said .

Following in Perrotti’s footsteps, a new group of HGSE students, including educators Kimm Topping and Jared Fox, are centering their work around supporting the gender and identity development of all students. Much like Gilligan, they advocate for listening to the stories and voices of those who were not previously included in the conversation.

“Yes, we need policies and laws,"  said Topping, Ed.M.'20, "but we also need to have empathy and to understand why we’re breaking down the gender binary. It’s about getting people to connect and being patient.” – Emily Boudreau

Learn More and Connect

Listen to episodes of the Harvard EdCast with Lyn Mikel Brown , Mark Tappan , Niobe Way , and Jeff Perrotti .

Learn more about Making Caring Common and its report, The Talk .

Read Harvard Ed. magazine features on supporting boys , girls , and transgender youth through adolescence.

Home — Essay Samples — Sociology — Sociology of Gender — Gender Stereotypes

Essays on Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes have been a prevalent issue in society for decades, influencing the way individuals are perceived and treated based on their gender. As such, it's a crucial topic for discussion and analysis in academic settings. When it comes to writing an essay on gender stereotypes, choosing the right topic is essential for producing an impactful piece of work. In this article, we'll explore the importance of the topic, provide advice on selecting a suitable essay topic, and offer a detailed list of recommended topics, divided by category.

The subject of gender stereotypes is significant as it directly impacts individuals' lives, shaping their opportunities, experiences, and self-perception. By addressing gender stereotypes in essays, students can contribute to the ongoing conversation about equality and challenge societal norms. Furthermore, exploring this topic can help individuals develop a deeper understanding of how gender stereotypes manifest in various aspects of life, such as education, the workplace, media, and relationships.

Advice on Choosing a Topic

When selecting a gender stereotypes essay topic, it's essential to consider personal interests, research opportunities, and the potential for making a meaningful impact. It's advisable to choose a topic that aligns with one's passion and allows for in-depth exploration. Additionally, students should assess the availability of scholarly resources and data related to the chosen topic to ensure a well-supported argument.

Recommended Gender Stereotypes Essay Topics Essay Topics

• The impact of gender stereotypes on academic performance
• Gender bias in STEM education
• Exploring the portrayal of gender roles in school textbooks
• The influence of teachers' gender stereotypes on students' learning experiences
• Gender stereotypes and the gender pay gap
• Challenges faced by women in male-dominated industries
• Leadership roles and gender bias in corporate environments
• The effects of gender stereotypes on career progression

Media and Entertainment

• Portrayal of masculinity and femininity in popular media
• Gender stereotypes in advertising
• Impact of social media on perpetuating gender stereotypes
• Representation of LGBTQ+ individuals in mainstream media

Relationships and Family Dynamics

• Gender roles in traditional vs. modern family structures
• The influence of gender stereotypes on dating and romantic relationships
• Parental expectations based on gender
• Effect of gender stereotypes on mental health within relationships

Health and Wellness

• Body image and gender stereotypes
• Gender-specific healthcare disparities
• Stigma surrounding mental health based on gender
• Impact of gender stereotypes on access to reproductive health services

Social and Cultural Gender Stereotypes

• Impact of gender stereotypes on society
• Role of media in perpetuating gender stereotypes
• Gender stereotypes in the workplace
• Gender stereotypes in education
• Effect of gender stereotypes on relationships

Psychological and Emotional Effects of Gender Stereotypes

• How gender stereotypes affect self-esteem
• Impact of gender stereotypes on mental health
• Gender stereotypes and body image
• Psychological effects of gender role expectations
• Gender stereotypes and emotional well-being

Historical and Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Gender Stereotypes

• Evolution of gender stereotypes throughout history
• Comparison of gender stereotypes in different cultures
• Impact of religion on gender role expectations
• Gender stereotypes in literature and art
• Challenges to traditional gender roles in different societies

Legal and Policy Implications of Gender Stereotypes

• Gender stereotypes and discrimination in the legal system
• Effect of gender stereotypes on policy-making
• Gender stereotypes and access to healthcare
• Legal protections against gender-based discrimination
• Impact of gender stereotypes on LGBTQ+ rights

Intersectionality and Gender Stereotypes

• Impact of race on gender stereotypes
• Gender stereotypes and disability
• Intersection of gender and socioeconomic status
• Gender stereotypes and age
• Challenges faced by individuals at the intersection of multiple marginalized identities

By exploring these diverse gender stereotypes essay ideas, students can delve into various facets of the issue and contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of its impact on society. Whether examining gender stereotypes in education, the workplace, media, relationships, or health, each topic offers a unique opportunity for critical analysis and meaningful discourse.

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Gender Stereotypes in The Workplace: a Research

Gender stereotypes in modern movies: beauty and the beast, gender stereotypes in the usa, gender stereotypes in disney princess movies, gender stereotypes in parenting and family, definitions, development and aftermath of racial and gender stereotypes, representation of negative gender stereotypes in the movie mulan, gender stereotypes: disney princesses are not harmful to young girls, unfavorability and favorability of female boss, the problem of a lack of female leaders, a theme of gender equality in trifles by susan glaspell, women's struggle in fighting gender inequality in the us, gender roles and stereotypes in walt disney's films, representation of stereotypes in the media, gender differences in the education achievements of boys and girls, women in literature: lanyer vs. modern stereotypes, the portrayals of females and males in superhero movies, rape culture: victim blaming and gender stereotyping, the problem of stereotypes in american society, gender roles in asian culture: their reflection in literature.

A gender stereotype is a generalized view or preconception about attributes or characteristics, or the roles that are or ought to be possessed by, or performed by, women and men.

The four basic kinds of gender stereotypes can relate to personality traits, domestic behaviors, occupations, and physical appearance.

Women are natural nurturers; men are natural leaders. Women with children are less devoted to their jobs. Boys and men are expected to use violence and aggression to prove their manliness. Boys should be directed to like blue and green; girls toward red and pink.

1. Ellemers, N. (2018). Gender stereotypes. Annual review of psychology, 69, 275-298. (https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-psych-122216-011719) 2. Heilman, M. E. (2012). Gender stereotypes and workplace bias. Research in organizational Behavior, 32, 113-135. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191308512000093) 3. Haines, E. L., Deaux, K., & Lofaro, N. (2016). The times they are a-changing… or are they not? A comparison of gender stereotypes, 1983–2014. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 40(3), 353-363. (https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0361684316634081?journalCode=pwqa) 4. Deaux, K., & Lewis, L. L. (1984). Structure of gender stereotypes: Interrelationships among components and gender label. Journal of personality and Social Psychology, 46(5), 991. (https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1984-25799-001) 5. Cvencek, D., Meltzoff, A. N., & Greenwald, A. G. (2011). Math–gender stereotypes in elementary school children. Child development, 82(3), 766-779. (https://srcd.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2010.01529.x) 6. Sanbonmatsu, K. (2002). Gender stereotypes and vote choice. american Journal of political Science, 20-34. (https://www.jstor.org/stable/3088412) 7. Bian, L., Leslie, S. J., & Cimpian, A. (2017). Gender stereotypes about intellectual ability emerge early and influence children’s interests. Science, 355(6323), 389-391. (https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.aah6524) 8. Deaux, K., Winton, W., Crowley, M., & Lewis, L. L. (1985). Level of categorization and content of gender stereotypes. Social Cognition, 3(2), 145-167. (https://guilfordjournals.com/doi/abs/10.1521/soco.1985.3.2.145) 9. Koch, J. W. (2000). Do citizens apply gender stereotypes to infer candidates' ideological orientations?. The Journal of Politics, 62(2), 414-429. (https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1111/0022-3816.00019)

Relevant topics

• Sex, Gender and Sexuality
• Gender Criticism
• Gender Roles
• Media Analysis
• Social Media
• Discourse Community
• Social Justice

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

The multiple dimensions of gender stereotypes: a current look at men’s and women’s characterizations of others and themselves.

• 1 TUM School of Management, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany
• 2 Amsterdam Business School, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, Netherlands
• 3 Department of Psychology, New York University, New York, NY, United States

We used a multi-dimensional framework to assess current stereotypes of men and women. Specifically, we sought to determine (1) how men and women are characterized by male and female raters, (2) how men and women characterize themselves, and (3) the degree of convergence between self-characterizations and charcterizations of one’s gender group. In an experimental study, 628 U.S. male and female raters described men, women, or themselves on scales representing multiple dimensions of the two defining features of gender stereotypes, agency and communality: assertiveness, independence, instrumental competence, leadership competence (agency dimensions), and concern for others, sociability and emotional sensitivity (communality dimensions). Results indicated that stereotypes about communality persist and were equally prevalent for male and female raters, but agency characterizations were more complex. Male raters generally descibed women as being less agentic than men and as less agentic than female raters described them. However, female raters differentiated among agency dimensions and described women as less assertive than men but as equally independent and leadership competent. Both male and female raters rated men and women equally high on instrumental competence. Gender stereotypes were also evident in self-characterizations, with female raters rating themselves as less agentic than male raters and male raters rating themselves as less communal than female raters, although there were exceptions (no differences in instrumental competence, independence, and sociability self-ratings for men and women). Comparisons of self-ratings and ratings of men and women in general indicated that women tended to characterize themselves in more stereotypic terms – as less assertive and less competent in leadership – than they characterized others in their gender group. Men, in contrast, characterized themselves in less stereotypic terms – as more communal. Overall, our results show that a focus on facets of agency and communality can provide deeper insights about stereotype content than a focus on overall agency and communality.

Introduction

There is no question that a great deal of progress has been made toward gender equality, and this progress is particularly evident in the workplace. There also is no question that the goal of full gender equality has not yet been achieved – not in pay ( AAUW, 2016 ) or position level ( Catalyst, 2016 ). In a recent interview study with female managers the majority of barriers for women’s advancement that were identified were consequences of gender stereotypes ( Peus et al., 2015 ). There is a long history of research in psychology that corroborates this finding (for reviews see Eagly and Sczesny, 2009 ; Heilman, 2012 ). These investigations support the idea that gender stereotypes can be impediments to women’s career advancement, promoting both gender bias in employment decisions and women’s self-limiting behavior ( Heilman, 1983 ).

This study is designed to investigate the current state of gender stereotypes about men and women using a multi-dimensional framework. Much of the original research on the content of gender stereotypes was conducted several decades ago (e.g., Rosenkrantz et al., 1968 ), and more recent research findings are inconsistent, some suggesting that there has been a change in traditional gender stereotypes (e.g., Duehr and Bono, 2006 ) and others suggesting there has not (e.g., Haines et al., 2016 ). Measures of stereotyping in these studies tend to differ, all operationalizing the constructs of agency and communality, the two defining features of gender stereotypes ( Abele et al., 2008 ), but in different ways. We propose that the conflict in findings may derive in part from the focus on different facets of these constructs in different studies. Thus, we seek to obtain a more complete picture of the specific content of today’s gender stereotypes by treating agency and communality, as multi-dimensioned constructs.

Gender stereotypes often are internalized by men and women, and we therefore focus both on how men and women are seen by others and how they see themselves with respect to stereotyped attributes. We also plan to compare and contrast charcterizations of men or women as a group with charcterizations of self, something not typically possible because these two types of characterizations are rarely measured in the same study. In sum, we have multiple objectives: We aim to develop a multi-dimensional framework for assessing current conceptions of men’s and women’s characteristics and then use it to consider how men and women are seen by male and female others, how men and women see themselves, and how these perceptions of self and others in their gender group coincide or differ. In doing so, we hope to demonstrate the benefits of viewing agency and communality as multidimensional constructs in the study of gender stereotypes.

Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes are generalizations about what men and women are like, and there typically is a great deal of consensus about them. According to social role theory, gender stereotypes derive from the discrepant distribution of men and women into social roles both in the home and at work ( Eagly, 1987 , 1997 ; Koenig and Eagly, 2014 ). There has long been a gendered division of labor, and it has existed both in foraging societies and in more socioeconomically complex societies ( Wood and Eagly, 2012 ). In the domestic sphere women have performed the majority of routine domestic work and played the major caretaker role. In the workplace, women have tended to be employed in people-oriented, service occupations rather than things-oriented, competitive occupations, which have traditionally been occupied by men (e.g., Lippa et al., 2014 ). This contrasting distribution of men and women into social roles, and the inferences it prompts about what women and men are like, give rise to gender stereotypical conceptions ( Koenig and Eagly, 2014 ).

Accordingly, men are characterized as more agentic than women, taking charge and being in control, and women are characterized as more communal than men, being attuned to others and building relationships (e.g., Broverman et al., 1972 ; Eagly and Steffen, 1984 ). These two concepts were first introduced by Bakan (1966) as fundamental motivators of human behavior. During the last decades, agency (also referred to as “masculinity,” “instrumentality” or “competence”) and communality (also referred to as “communion,” “femininity,” “expressiveness,” or “warmth”) have consistently been the focus of research (e.g., Spence and Buckner, 2000 ; Fiske et al., 2007 ; Cuddy et al., 2008 ; Abele and Wojciszke, 2014 ). These dual tenets of social perception have been considered fundamental to gender stereotypes.

Stereotypes can serve an adaptive function allowing people to categorize and simplify what they observe and to make predictions about others (e.g., Devine and Sharp, 2009 ; Fiske and Taylor, 2013 ). However, stereotypes also can induce faulty assessments of people – i.e., assessments based on generalization from beliefs about a group that do not correspond to a person’s unique qualities. These faulty assessments can negatively or positively affect expectations about performance, and bias consequent decisions that impact opportunities and work outcomes for both men and women (e.g., Heilman, 2012 ; Heilman et al., 2015 ; Hentschel et al., 2018 ). Stereotypes about gender are especially influential because gender is an aspect of a person that is readily noticed and remembered ( Fiske et al., 1991 ). In other words, gender is a commonly occurring cue for stereotypic thinking ( Blair and Banaji, 1996 ).

Gender stereotypes are used not only to characterize others but also to characterize oneself ( Bem, 1974 ). The process of self-stereotyping can influence people’s identities in stereotype-congruent directions. Stereotyped characteristics can thereby be internalized and become part of a person’s gender identity – a critical aspect of the self-concept ( Ruble and Martin, 1998 ; Wood and Eagly, 2015 ). Young boys and girls learn about gender stereotypes from their immediate environment and the media, and they learn how to behave in gender-appropriate ways ( Deaux and LaFrance, 1998 ). These socialization experiences no doubt continue to exert influence later in life and, indeed, research has shown that men’s and women’s self-characterizations differ in ways that are stereotype-consistent ( Bem, 1974 ; Spence and Buckner, 2000 ).

Measurement of Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes, and their defining features of agency and communality, have been measured in a variety of ways ( Kite et al., 2008 ). Researchers have investigated people’s stereotypical assumptions about how men and women differ in terms of, for example, ascribed traits (e.g., Williams and Best, 1990 ), role behaviors (e.g., Haines et al., 2016 ), occupations (e.g., Deaux and Lewis, 1984 ), or emotions (e.g., Plant et al., 2000 ). Researchers also have distinguished personality, physical, and cognitive components of gender stereotypes ( Diekman and Eagly, 2000 ). In addition, they have investigated how men’ and women’s self-characterizations differ in stereotype-consistent ways ( Spence and Buckner, 2000 ).

Today, the most common measures of gender stereotypes involve traits and attributes. Explicit measures of stereotyping entail responses to questionnaires asking for descriptions of men or women using Likert or bi-polar adjective scales (e.g., Kite et al., 2008 ; Haines et al., 2016 ), or asking for beliefs about the percentage of men and women possessing certain traits and attributes (e.g., McCauley and Stitt, 1978 ). Gender stereotypes have also been studied using implicit measures, using reaction time to measure associations between a gender group and a stereotyped trait or attribute (e.g., Greenwald and Banaji, 1995 ). Although implicit measures are used widely in some areas of research, our focus in the research reported here builds on the longstanding tradition of measuring gender stereotypes directly through the use of explicit measures.

Contemporary Gender Stereotypes

Researchers often argue that stereotypes are tenacious; they tend to have a self-perpetuating quality that is sustained by cognitive distortion ( Hilton and von Hippel, 1996 ; Heilman, 2012 ). However, stereotype maintenance is not only a product of the inflexibility of people’s beliefs but also a consequence of the societal roles women and men enact ( Eagly and Steffen, 1984 ; Koenig and Eagly, 2014 ). Therefore, the persistence of traditional gender stereotypes is fueled by skewed gender distribution into social roles. If there have been recent advances toward gender equality in workforce participation and the rigid representation of women and men in long-established gender roles has eased, then might the content of gender stereotypes have evolved to reflect this change?

The answer to this question is not straightforward; the degree to which there has been a true shift in social roles is unclear. On the one hand, there are more women in the workforce than ever before. In 1967, 36% of U.S. households with married couples were made up of a male provider working outside the home and a female caregiver working inside the home, but now only 19% of U.S. households concur with this division ( Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2017 ). Moreover, women increasingly pursue traditionally male careers, and there are more women in roles of power and authority. For example, today women hold almost 40% of management positions in the United States ( Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2017 ). In addition, more men are taking on a family’s main caretaker role ( Ladge et al., 2015 ). Though families with only the mother working are still rare (5% in 2016 compared to 2% in 1970), the average number of hours fathers spent on child care per week increased from 2.5 to 8 h in the last 40 years ( Pew Research Center, 2018 ). In addition, the majority of fathers perceive parenting as extremely important to their identity ( Pew Research Center, 2018 ).

On the other hand, role segregation, while somewhat abated, has by no means been eliminated. Despite their increased numbers in the labor force, women still are concentrated in occupations that are perceived to require communal, but not agentic attributes. For example, the three most common occupations for women in the U.S. involve care for others (elementary and middle school teacher, registered nurse, and secretary and administrative assistant; U.S. Department of Labor, 2015 ), while men more than women tend to work in occupations requiring agentic attributes (e.g., senior management positions, construction, or engineering; Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2016b ). Sociological research shows that women are underrepresented in occupations that are highly competitive, inflexible, and require high levels of physical skill, while they are overrepresented in occupations that place emphasis on social contributions and require interpersonal skills ( Cortes and Pan, 2017 ). Moreover, though men’s home and family responsibilities have increased, women continue to perform a disproportionate amount of domestic work ( Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2016a ), have greater childcare responsibilities ( Craig and Mullan, 2010 ; Kan et al., 2011 ), and continue to be expected to do so ( Park et al., 2008 ).

Thus, there is reason both to expect traditional gender stereotypes to dominate current conceptions of women and men, and to expect them to not. Relevant research findings are conflicting. For example, a large investigation found that over time managers have come to perceive women as more agentic ( Duehr and Bono, 2006 ). However, other investigations have found gender stereotypes to have changed little over time ( Heilman et al., 1989 ) or even to have intensified ( Lueptow et al., 2001 ). A recent study replicating work done more than 30 years ago found minimal change, with men and women still described very differently from one another and in line with traditional stereotyped conceptions ( Haines et al., 2016 ).

There also have been conflicting findings concerning self-charcterizations, especially in women’s self-views of their agency. Findings by Abele (2003) suggest that self-perceived agency increases with career success. Indeed, there has been indication that women’s self-perceived deficit in agency has abated over time ( Twenge, 1997 ) or that it has abated in some respects but not others ( Spence and Buckner, 2000 ). However, a recent meta-analysis has found that whereas women’s self-perceptions of communality have decreased over time, their self-perceptions of agency have remained stable since the 1990s ( Donnelly and Twenge, 2017 ). Yet another study found almost no change in men’s and women’s self-characterizations of their agency and communality since the 1970s ( Powell and Butterfield, 2015 ).

There are many possible explanations for these conflicting results. A compelling one concerns the conceptualization of the agency and communality constructs and the resulting difference in the traits and behaviors used to measure them. In much of the gender stereotypes literature, agency and communality have been loosely used to denote a set of varied attributes, and different studies have operationalized agency and communality in different ways. We propose that agency and communality are not unitary constructs but rather are comprised of multiple dimensions, each distinguishable from one another. We also propose that considering these dimensions separately will enhance the clarity of our understanding of current differences in the characterization of women and men, and provide a more definitive picture of gender stereotypes today.

Dimensions of Communality and Agency

There has been great variety in how the agency construct has been operationalized, and the specific terms used to measure agency often differ from study to study (e.g., McAdams et al., 1996 ; Rudman and Glick, 2001 ; Abele et al., 2008 ; Schaumberg and Flynn, 2017 ). Furthermore, distinctions between elements of agency have been identified: In a number of studies competence has been shown to be distinct from agency as a separate factor ( Carrier et al., 2014 ; Koenig and Eagly, 2014 ; Abele et al., 2016 ; Rosette et al., 2016 ), and in others, the agency construct has been subdivided into self-reliance and dominance ( Schaumberg and Flynn, 2017 ). There also has been great variety in how the communality construct has been operationalized ( Hoffman and Hurst, 1990 ; Fiske et al., 2007 ; Abele et al., 2008 ; Brosi et al., 2016 ; Hentschel et al., 2018 ). Although there have been few efforts to pinpoint specific components of communality, recent work focused on self-judgments in cross-cultural contexts has subdivided it into facets of warmth and morality ( Abele et al., 2016 ).

The multiplicity of items used to represent agency and communality in research studies involving stereotyping is highly suggestive that agentic and communal content can be decomposed into different facets. In this research we seek to distinguish dimensions underlying both the agency and the communality constructs. Our aim is to lend further credence to the idea that the fundamental constructs of agency and communality are multifaceted, and to supply researchers with dimensions of each that may be useful for study of stereotype evaluation and change.

While we are proposing that agency and communality can be broken down into components, we are not claiming that the use of these overarching constructs in earlier research has been an error. In the vast majority of studies in which communality or agency has been measured the scale reliabilities have been high and the items highly correlated. However, internal consistency does not necessarily indicate that the individual items included are unidimensional ( Schmitt, 1996 ; Sijtsma, 2008 ), or that the entirety of the construct is being captured in a particular measure. Moreover, there are multiple meanings included in these constructs as they have been discussed and operationalized in gender research. Therefore, we propose that breaking them down into separate dimensions will provide finer distinctions about contemporary characterizations of men and women.

Perceiver Sex

Findings often demonstrate that male and female raters are equally likely to characterize women and men in stereotypic terms ( Heilman, 2001 , 2012 ). This suggests that stereotypes outweigh the effects of evaluators’ gender identities and, because men and women live in the same world, they see the world similarly. However, the steady shift of women’s societal roles and its different implications for men and women may affect the degree to which men and women adhere to traditional gender stereotypes.

On the face of it, one would expect women to hold traditional gender stereotypes less than men. The increase of women in the workforce generally, and particularly in domains typically reserved for men, is likely to be very salient to women. Such changes have distinct implications for them – implications that can impact their expectations, aspirations, and actual experiences. As a result, women may be more attentive than men to shifts in workplace and domestic roles, and more accepting of these roles as the new status quo. They consequently may be more amenable to incorporating updated gender roles into their understanding of the world, diminishing stereotypic beliefs.

Unlike women, who may be likely to embrace recent societal changes, men may be prone to reject or dismiss them. The same societal changes that present new opportunities for women can present threats to men, who may see themselves as losing their rightful place in the social order (see also Sidanius and Pratto, 1999 ; Knowles and Lowery, 2012 ). Thus, men may be less willing to accept modern-day changes in social roles or to see these changes as definitive. There may be little impetus for them to relinquish stereotypic beliefs and much impetus for them to retain these beliefs. If this is the case, then men would be expected to adhere more vigorously to traditional gender stereotypes than women.

Self-Stereotyping Versus Stereotyping of One’s Gender Group

Although gender stereotypes impact charcterizations of both self and others, there may be a difference in the degree to which stereotypes dominate in self- and other-characterizations. That is, women may see themselves differently than they see women in general and men may see themselves differently than they see men in general; although they hold stereotypes about their gender groups, they may not apply them to themselves. Indeed, attribution theory ( Jones and Nisbett, 1987 ), which suggests that people are more prone to attribute behavior to stable personality traits when viewing someone else than when viewing oneself, gives reason to argue that stereotypes are more likely to be used when characterizing others in one’s gender group than when characterizing oneself. A similar case can be made for construal level theory ( Trope and Liberman, 2010 ), which suggests that psychological distance promotes abstraction rather than attention to individuating information. Moreover, the impact of societal changes that affect adherence to gender stereotypes is apt to have greater immediacy and personal impact for self, and therefore be more reflected in self-characterizations than in characterizations of others.

Some studies have compared the use of stereotypes in characterizing self and others. In an early study ( Rosenkrantz et al., 1968 ), each participating student was asked to rate men, women, and self on a number of characteristics. The researchers found that self-characterizations of men and women showed less evidence of stereotypes than characterizations of others. Similar results were found in studies on accuracy of stereotyping ( Martin, 1987 ; Allen, 1995 ). Using instrumenal (i.e., agentic) and expressive (i.e., communal) attributes from the BSRI and PAQ scales, Spence and Buckner (2000) found very little relation between stereotypes about others and self-characterizations.

There is reason to think that some dimensions of gender stereotypes are more likely than others to be differentially subscribed to when characterizing self than when characterizing others. For example, there is a tendency to boost self-esteem and adopt descriptors that are self-enhancing when describing oneself ( Swann, 1990 ), and this may have conseqences whether these descriptors are consistent or inconsistent with gender stereotypes. If this is so, gender may be an important factor; there are likely particular aspects of gender stereotypes that are more (or less) acceptable to women and men, affecting the degree to which they are reflected in men’s and women’s self-descriptions as compared to their description of their gender group. However, there also is reason to believe that individuals will embrace positive stereotypes and reject negative stereotypes as descriptive not only of themselves but also of their close in-groups ( Biernat et al., 1996 ), suggesting that there will be little difference between characterizations of oneself and one’s gender group. Therefore, to obtain a full picture of the current state of gender stereotypes and their impact on perceptions, we believe it important to compare self-characterizations and characterizations of one’s gender group on specific dimensions of gender stereotypes.

Overview of the Research

In this study, we develop a multidimensional framework for measuring different elements of agency and communality to provide an assessment of contemporary gender stereotypes and their impact on charcterizations about others and self. Using the multidimensional framework, we sought to determine (1) if men and women differ in their gender stereotypes; (2) if men and women differ in their self-characterizations; and (3) if men’s and women’s self-characterizations differ from their characterizations of their gender groups. In each instance we compare the results using the traditional unidimensional framework for measuring agency and communality with the results using the newly formulated multidimensional framework.

Materials and Methods

Participants.

Six hundred and twenty-nine participants (61% female, all U.S. residents) were recruited online via Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk), providing a more representative sample of the U.S. population than student samples. MTurk samples tend to be slightly more diverse than and similarly reliable as other types of internet samples used in psychological research ( Paolacci et al., 2010 ; Buhrmester et al., 2011 ), but nonetheless are convenience samples rather than true representative samples based on demographic data (see e.g., Pew Research Center, 2017 ). In our sample, ages ranged from 19 to 83, with a mean age of 34.5 years ( SD = 13.1). In addition, education ranged from those who had not attended college (17%), had some college education (33%), had graduated from college (37%), to those who had graduate degrees (13%). 77.6% self-identified as White, 8.4% Asian, 7.0% African American, 4.8% Hispanic, and 2.2% other. 1 The survey link was visible only to U.S. residents who had a greater than 95% acceptance rate of previous MTurk work, an indication that their earlier work had been handled responsibly. In addition, we included a question asking participants to indicate whether they filled out the questionnaire honestly (we assured them that their answer on this question would not have any consequences for their payment). One person indicated that he had not filled out the survey honestly and was excluded from the analyses.

We conducted an experiment with two independent variables: rater gender (male or female) and target group (men in general, women in general, or self). The target group manipulation was randomly assigned to male and female raters. Subsets of this overall design were used to address our specific research questions.

Participants were told that we were interested in people perception, and they were asked either to rate men in general ( N = 215) women in general ( N = 208) or themselves ( N = 205) on an attribute inventory representing various dimensions of agency and communality 2 . The attributes were presented in differing orders to participants, randomized by the survey tool we used. Ratings were made using a 7-point scale with responses ranging from 1 (“not at all”) to 7 (“very much”).

Scale Construction

Using an inductive procedure, scale development proceeded in four steps. In the first step, we identified a set of 74 attributes, representative of how agency and communality have been measured by researchers in the past (consisting of adjectives, traits, and descriptors; see Appendix Tables A , B for the full list). The attributes were chosen from earlier investigations of gender stereotypes, including those of Broverman et al. (1972) , Schein (1973) , Spence and Helmreich (1978) , Heilman et al. (1995) , Fiske et al. (1999) , Diekman and Eagly (2000) , and Oswald and Lindstedt (2006) . They were selected to represent a broad array of agentic and communal attributes with a minimal amount of redundancy.

In the second step, three judges (the first two authors and another independent researcher) sorted the descriptive attributes into categories based on their conceptual similarity. The total set of attributes measured was included in the sorting task, and there was no limit placed on the number of categories to be created and no requirements for the number of attributes to be included within each created category. Specifically, the instructions were to use as many categories as needed to sort the attributes into conceptually distinct groupings. The sorting results were then discussed by the judges and two additional researchers. During the discussion, agreement was reached about the number of categories necessary to best capture the distinct dimensions of the sorted attributes. Attributes for which no consensus was reached about category placement were omitted. Then decisions were made about how each of the categories should be labeled. Seven categories were identified, four of which represented dimensions of agency – instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence – and three of which represented dimensions of communality – concern for others, sociability, emotional sensitivity.

In the third step, we had a different set of three independent judges (all graduate students in a psychology program) do a sorting of the retained attributes into the labeled categories. This was done to make sure that their sorting conformed to the identified categories; items that were misclassified by any of the judges were eliminated from the item set.

Finally, in a fourth step, we used confirmatory factor analysis procedures to further hone our categories. Following standard procedures on increasing model fit (e.g., Byrne, 2010 ), we eliminated all items that showed a low fit to the created categories. We later conducted a conclusive confirmatory factor analysis, for which the results are reported in the next section.

As a result of these steps, we created seven scales, each composed of the attributes remaining in one of the seven designated categories. The scales ranged from 3 to 4 items, the coefficient alphas all surpassed 0.75, and all corrected item-scale correlations surpassed 0.40 ( Field, 2006 ). Table 1 presents the attributes comprising each of the scales as well as the Cronbach alphas and corrected-item-scale correlations.

Table 1. Dimension scales, scale items, and reliability information.

The four scales composed of agentic attributes and denoting dimensions of agency were: instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, and independence. Thus, the sorting process not only distinguished between competence and other elements of agency (as has been suggested by others like Carrier et al., 2014 ), but further decomposed the non-competence elements of agency into dimensions of assertiveness and independence. Assertiveness concerns acting on the world and taking charge. Independence connotes self-reliance and acting on one’s own, free of the influence of others. Furthermore, competence was subdivided into two separate dimensions – one focused on performance execution (instrumental competence), and the other focused on capability to perform as a leader (leadership competence). Both leadership competence and assertiveness imply high social power whereas instrumental competence and independence are not typically associated with power relations.

The three scales composed of communal attributes and denoting dimensions of communality were: concern for others, sociability, and emotional sensitivity. Concern for others and sociability both entail a focus on others, but the former involves a one-way relationship of giving and nurturance while the latter involves a transactional relationship focused on relationship building. Emotional sensitivity implies an orientation that focuses on feelings as an antecedent or consequence of interactions with others.

Confirmatory Factor Analysis

We conducted a confirmatory factor analysis using the R package lavaan ( Rosseel, 2012 ) to test the factor structure of the four final agency scales and the three final communality scales. Results revealed that for agency, the theoretically assumed four-factor model (i.e., instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, and independence as first-order factors) provided adequate fit (χ 2 = 370.224, df = 84, p < 0.001, χ 2 /df = 4.41, CFI = 0.947, RMSEA = 0.076, SRMR = 0.045) and also was more suitable than a one-factor model in which all agency items loaded on a single factor (χ 2 = 813.318, df = 90, p < 0.001, χ 2 /df = 9.04, CFI = 0.866, RMSEA = 0.116, SRMR = 0.068). A comparison of the two models showed that the four-factor agency model differed significantly from the one-factor model and was thus preferable (Δχ 2 = 443.09, df = 6, p < 0.001). Similarly, for communality the theoretically posited three-factor model (i.e., concern for others, sociability, and emotional sensitivity as first-order factors) provided acceptable fit (χ 2 = 326.000, df = 41, p < 0.001, χ 2 /df = 7.95, CFI = 0.931, RMSEA = 0.108, SRMR = 0.048) 3 and was more suitable than the one-factor model in which all communality items loaded on a single factor (χ 2 = 359.803, df = 44, p < 0.001, χ 2 /df = 7.95, CFI = 0.924, RMSEA = 0.110, SRMR = 0.048). A comparison of the two models showed that the three-factor communality model differed significantly from the one-factor model and was therefore preferable (Δχ 2 = 33.80, df = 3, p < 0.001). Overall, these results indicated that even though there were high correlations among the agency scales and also among the communality scales (as we would expect given our idea that in each case the multiple scales are part of the same construct; see Table 2 ), the four scales for agency and the three scales for communality represent different dimensions of these constructs.

Table 2. Descriptive statistics and intercorrelations of agentic and communal dimension scales.

Overall Measures

To provide a point of comparison for our multi-dimensional framework, we also determined scales for overall agency and overall communality. In other words, the 15 agency items were combined into one overall agency scale (α = 0.93) and the 11 communality items were combined into one overall communality scale (α = 0.93).

Preliminary Analyses: Rater Age and Education Level

Because of potential consequences of raters’ age and education level on the use of gender stereotypes (younger and more educated people might be less likely to adhere to them), we conducted initial analyses to identify their independent and interactive effects. We did not have the opportunity to do the same for race because our subsamples of Asian, African American, and Hispanic participants were not large enough. To determine whether there were differences in the pattern of responses depending upon the age of the rater, we chose the age of 40 as a midlife indicator, divided our sample into two age groups (39 years and younger, 40 years and older), and included age as an additional independent variable in our analyses. Results indicated no main effects or interactions involving age in the ANOVAs conducted. We also divided our sample into two education level groups (those who had graduated from college or had advanced degrees and those who had not graduated from college), and included educational level as an additional independent variable in our analyses. We found no main effects or interactions involving educational level in the ANOVAs. As a consequence we combined data from both younger and older participants and from those who were and were not college educated in the analyses reported below.

Main Analyses

To address our research questions, we conducted a series of ANOVAs on subsets of our participant sample. For each question, we first conducted ANOVAs on the overall agency scale and the overall communality scale. Then, to determine whether the results differed for different agency and communality dimensions, we conducted mixed-model ANOVAs that included either agency dimension (instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence) or communality dimension as a within-subjects factor (concern for others, sociability, and emotional sensitivity). Fisher’s least significant difference (LSD) method was used to test the question-relevant planned comparisons.

Do Men and Women Differ in Their Gender Stereotypes?

We used a 2 × 2 ANOVA, with rater gender (male, female) and target group (men in genereal, women in general) to assess differences in men’s and women’s gender stereotypes. We first analyzed the overall agency and communality ratings, and then conducted a 2 × 2 × 4 mixed-model ANOVA including the agency dimensions, and a 2 × 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA including the communality dimensions. The mixed-model ANOVA results are presented in Table 3 . We followed up with LSD comparisons (see Table 4 ).

Table 3. Results of 2 × 2 × 4 Agency ANOVA and 2 × 2 × 3 Communality ANOVA for stereotype ratings.

Table 4. Means, standard deviations, and LSD results of stereotype ratings.

The 2 × 2 ANOVA results for the overall agency ratings indicated a main effect for both rater gender, F (1,418) = 15.10, p < 0.001, η p 2 = 0.04, and target group, F (1,418) = 5.52, p = 0.019, η p 2 = 0.01. The results of the 2 × 2 × 4 mixed-model ANOVA, including the four agency dimensions as a within-subject factor, repeated the main effects for rater gender and target group and also indicated a main effect for agency dimension and an interaction between agency dimension and target group (see Table 3 ), suggesting that there were differences in ratings depending on the agency dimension.

Differences in ratings of men in general and women in general

LSD comparisons (see Table 4 ) of the overall agency ratings indicated that male raters rated women in general as lower in overall agency than men in general. They further indicated that female raters rated women in general and men in general as equally agentic. LSD comparisons of the individual agency scales indicated that this result held true for most of the agency dimensions. With the exception of the instrumental competence dimension (on which there were no differences in ratings of women and men in general whether the rater was male or female), male raters rated women in general lower than men in general on the agency dimensions (leaderhip competence, assertiveness, and independence). In contrast to the ratings of male raters but in line with the overall agency result, female raters rated women in general no differently than they rated men in general in leadership competence and independence. Yet, in contrast to the results of the overall agency ratings, female raters differentiated between women and men in ratings of assertiveness. That is, much like male raters, female raters rated women in general as less assertive than men in general. Figure 1 displays the results for the agency dimensions.

Figure 1. Ratings of agency dimensions (instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence) of men in general and women in general by male and female raters.

Rater gender differences in target group characterizations

Additional LSD comparisons (again see Table 4 ) lent further insight into the source of the gender discrepancy in the comparative ratings of women and men in general. Comparisons of the overall agency ratings indicated that ratings of men in general did not differ as a result of rater gender, but women in general were rated lower by male as compared to female raters. LSD comparisons of the agency dimensions were in line with the overall agency result in ratings of women in general – they were rated lower by male raters as compared to female raters on all four agency dimensions. However, comparisons of the agency dimensions in ratings of men in general were not uniform and deviated from the overall agency results. Although men in general were rated no differently by male and female raters on the instrumental competence, assertiveness, or independence dimensions, female as compared to male raters rated men in general higher in leadership competence (again see Figure 1 ).

Communality

A 2 (rater gender: male, female) × 2 (target group: men in general, women in general) ANOVA of the overall communality ratings indicated only a main effect for target group, F (1,418) = 88.68, p < 0.001, η p 2 = 0.18. The 2 × 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA (see Table 3 ), including the three communality dimensions as a within-subject factor, indicated main effects for target group, rater gender, and communality dimension as well as significant interactions between target group and rater gender, between communality dimension and target group, between communality dimension and rater type, and a three-way interaction.

LSD comparisons (see Table 4 ) for overall communality indicated that men in general were rated lower in communality than women in general by both male and female raters. In line with this overall finding, results of the LSD comparisons indicated that both female and male raters rated men in general as lower than women in general on all three communality dimensions: concern for others, sociability, and emotional sensitivity. Thus, using the overall measure yielded the same information as did the multidimensional measure.

Additional LSD comparisons (again see Table 4 ) of the communality ratings indicated that both male and female raters rated men in general similarly in communality, but female raters rated women in general higher in communality than male raters did. LSD comparisons of male and female raters rating men in general using the three communality dimensions were aligned with the overall communality result: male and female raters did not differ in ratings of concern for others, sociability, or emotional sensitivity. However, when rating women in general, results of the LSD comparisons of male and female raters were aligned with the overall measure result for only two of the communality dimensions: Female raters rated women in general higher in concern for others and emotional sensitivity than male raters did. On the dimension of sociability, male and female raters did not differ in their ratings of women in general.

Do Men and Women Differ in Their Self-Characterizations?

We used a one-way ANOVA to assess differences in men’s and women’s self-characterizations. We first analyzed the overall agency and communality ratings, and then conducted a mixed-model 2 × 4 ANOVA including the agency dimensions, and a 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA including the communality dimensions as a within-subject variable (see Table 5 ). We again followed up with LSD comparisons (see Table 6 ).

Table 5. 2 × 4 Agency ANOVA and 2 × 3 Communality ANOVA for self-ratings.

Table 6. Means (and standard deviations) and LSD results of self-ratings.

ANOVA results of the self-ratings of male and female raters on the overall measure of agency indicated no significant effect for rater gender, F (1,204) = 1.67, p = 0.198, η p 2 = 0.01. However, results of the 2 × 4 mixed model ANOVA, with agency dimensions as the within-subject factor, indicated a main effect for agency dimension and an interaction between agency dimension and rater gender, suggesting that self-ratings differed depending on the agency dimension in question (see Table 5 ). LSD comparisons (see Table 6 ) of overall agency showed that, as was indicated by the non-significant gender main effects, women rated themselves as equally agentic as men. Yet, the results for the analyses including the four agency dimensions indicated that only findings for instrumental competence and independence were consisent with the pattern of results for the overall agency ratings (there were no differences in the self-ratings of female and male raters). There were, however, significant differences in ratings of leadership competence and in ratings of assertiveness. For both of these dimensions of agency, women rated themselves lower than men did (see Figure 2 ).

Figure 2. Ratings of agency dimensions (instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence) by male and female self-raters.

Results of the ANOVA of the self-ratings of male and female raters indicated a rater gender main effect, F (1,204) = 5.42, p = 0.021, η p 2 = 0.03. Results of a 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA (again see Table 5 ) with communality dimension as the within-subjects factor, indicated significant main effects for rater gender and communality dimensions. LSD comparisons (again see Table 6 ), in line with the main effect for rater gender, indicated that men rated themselves lower on overall communality than women. LSD comparisons on the dimension scales indicated that, consistent with the overall communality results, men rated themselves as less concerned for others and less emotionally sensitive than women. However, in contrast to the results for overall communality, there was no difference in how men and women characterized themselves in terms of sociability (see Figure 3 ).

Figure 3. Ratings of communality dimensions (concern for others, emotional sensitivity, sociability) by male and female self-raters.

Do Men’s and Women’s Self-Characterizations Differ From Their Characterizations of Their Gender Groups?

We used a 2 × 2 ANOVA, with rater gender (male, female) and target group (self, men in general when rater was male or women in general when rater was female) to assess differences in men’s and women’s self characterizations and same-sex others‘ characterizations of their gender groups. We first analyzed the overall agency and communality ratings, and then again conducted a 2 × 2 × 4 mixed-model ANOVA including our agency dimensions, and a 2 × 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA including our communality dimensions (see Table 7 ) and once more followed up with LSD comparisons (see Table 8 ).

Table 7. 2 × 2 × 4 Agency ANOVA and 2 × 2 × 3 Communality ANOVA for self-ratings versus target group ratings.

Table 8. LSD comparisons of self-ratings versus target group ratings.

The 2 × 2 ANOVA results for the overall agency measure indicated no significant main effect for rater gender, F (1,397) = 2.19, p = 0.139, η p 2 = 0.00, or target group, F (1,397) = 0.013, p = 0.909, η p 2 = 0.00, but a marginally signicant interaction between them, F (1,397) = 2.77, p = 0.097, η p 2 = 0.01. The 2 × 2 × 4 mixed-model ANOVA including the agency dimensions as a within-subjects factor also indicated no significant main effects for rater gender or for target group and again a marginally significant interaction between them. It also indicated a significant main effect for agency dimension and significant interactions of dimension with both rater gender and target group, as well as a three-way interaction between rater gender, target group, and agency dimension (see Table 7 ).

Men’s self-ratings versus ratings of men in general

LSD comparisons (see Table 8 , means and standard deviations are displayed in Tables 4 , 6 ) of overall agency indicated that male raters rated themselves as more agentic than male raters rated men in general. Results for the agency dimensions were more varied: For the independence and instrumental competence dimensions results were in line with the overall agency result, but male raters rated themselves no differently in leadership competence or assertiveness than male raters rated men in general (see Figure 4 ).

Figure 4. Ratings of agency dimensions (instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence) by male raters rating self and men in general.

Women’s self-ratings versus ratings of women in general

LSD comparisons (see Table 8 , means and standard deviations are displayed in Tables 4 , 6 ) of the overall agency ratings indicated that female raters rated themselves no differently than female raters rated women in general. However, comparisons of the four agency dimensions depicted a different pattern. Although ratings of independence were in line with the overall agency result, female raters rated themselves higher in instrumental competence than female raters rated women in general. Most striking, however, were the differences in ratings on the leadership competence and assertiveness dimensions. In contrast to the findings for overall agency, in each of these cases female raters‘ ratings of themselves were significantly lower than female raters‘ ratings of women in general (see Figure 5 ). The differences in self-ratings of assertiveness and leadership competence marked the only instance in which there was a more negative characterization of self than of one’s gender group.

Figure 5. Ratings of agency dimensions (instrumental competence, leadership competence, assertiveness, independence) by female raters rating self and women in general.

The 2 × 2 ANOVA results for the overall communality measure indicated a main effect for rater gender, F (1,397) = 19.03, p < 0.001, η p 2 = 0.01, and target group, F (1,397) = 42.92, p < 0.001, η p 2 = 0.10 as well as a significant interaction, F (1,397) = 10.51, p = 0.001, η p 2 = 0.03. The 2 × 2 × 3 mixed-model ANOVA including the communality dimensions as a within-subjects factor indicated significant main effects for rater gender, for target group, and communality dimension as well as a significant interaction between rater gender and target group, between rater gender and communality dimension, and between target group and communality dimension (see Table 7 ).

LSD comparisons (see Table 8 , means and standard deviations are displayed in Tables 4 , 6 ) of overall communality indicated that male raters rated themselves as more communal than male raters rated men in general. LSD comparisons of the three communality dimension scales were consistent with the finding for overall communality. Male raters rated themselves significantly higher than male raters rated men in general in concern for others, sociability and emotional sensitivity (see Figure 6 ).

Figure 6. Ratings of communality dimensions (concern for others, emotional sensitivity, sociability) by male raters rating self and men in general.

Women’s Self-Ratings Versus Ratings of Women in General

LSD comparisons (see Table 8 , means and standard deviations are displayed in Tables 4 , 6 ) of the overall communality ratings indicated that there was no difference in how female raters rated themselves and how female raters rated women in general. LSD comparisons for sociability and emotional sensitivity were consistent with this finding. However, female raters rated themselves higher in concern for others than they rated women in general (see Figure 7 ).

Figure 7. Ratings of communality dimensions (concern for others, emotional sensitivity, sociability) by female raters rating self and women in general.

It was the objective of this research to investigate gender stereotyping of others and self. To do so, we aimed to take into account multiple dimensions of the agency and communality constructs. It was our contention that perceptions on some of these dimensions of agency and communality would differ from one another, and that there would be a benefit in viewing them separately. Our results support this idea. While there were overall findings for agency and communality, analyses of individual aspects of them were not always consistent with these findings. What often appeared to be a general effect when using the overall measures of agency and communality in fact proved to be more textured and differentiated when the multidimensional framework was used. These results support the idea that distinguishing between different agency and communality facets can offer a deeper, more nuanced understanding of gender stereotypes today. Indeed, some important information appears to get lost by only focusing on the overall constructs.

Answers to Our Research Questions

Current stereotypes.

Our results clearly indicate that gender stereotypes persist. They also indicate that stereotypes about agency were more prevalent for male than for female raters. Specifically, male raters described women in general as lower in most aspects of agency than men in general, and also rated women in general lower on each of the agency dimensions than female raters did. Nonetheless, female raters were not stereotype-free with respect to agency: they described women in general as less assertive than men in general and rated men in general as more leadership competent than male raters did. These findings were masked by the overall measure of agency, which indicated no differences in agency ratings.

Stereotypes about communality also were strongly indicated by our data, but their strength did not tend to differ greatly between male and female raters. All participants rated women higher than men on the three communality dimensions.

Self-Stereotyping

Our results showed that men’s and women’s self-characterizations differed in line with gender stereotypes. Despite the overall agency measure indicating no difference in self-ratings of agency, the analyses incorporating dimensions of agency painted a different picture. Whereas there was no difference in the self-characterizations of men and women in instrumental competence or independence, women rated themselves lower than men in leadership competence and assertiveness. There also were differences in communality self-ratings. Though men tended to rate themselves as generally less communal than women did (as less concerned for others and less emotionally sensitive), their ratings of sociability did not differ from women’s.

Self-Characterizations Versus Characterizations of One’s Gender Group

Self-characterizations were often found to differ from characterizations of one’s gender group. Male raters rated themselves as higher in independence and instrumental competence, but no different in assertiveness or leadership competence than they rated men in general. Female raters rated themselves higher in instrumental competence but lower in assertiveness and leadership competence than they rated women in general. These findings are at odds with the results of the overall agency ratings, which imply that male raters consistently rated themselves higher in agency, and that female raters consistently rated themselves no differently than they rated their gender group.

There also were differences between self-ratings and characterizations of one’s gender group on the communality dimensions. While female raters only rated themselves higher than they rated women in general in concern for others, male raters rated themselves as higher than they rated men in general on all three dimensions of communality.

Implications

What does our analysis of current stereotypes tell us? On the one hand, our results indicate that despite dramatic societal changes many aspects of traditional gender stereotypes endure. Both male and female respondents viewed men in general as being more assertive than women in general, and also viewed women in general as more concerned about others, sociable and emotionally sensitive than men in general. On the other hand, our results indicate important departures from traditional views. This can be seen in the findings that unlike male respondents, female respondents indicated no gender deficit in how independent or how competent in leadership they perceived other women to be.

Self-descriptions also tended to conform to traditional gender stereotypes, with men describing themselves as more assertive and more competent in leadership than women did, and women describing themselves as more concerned about others and more emotional than men did. However, there were aspects of agency and communality for which self-characterizations of men and women did not differ. Women’s self-ratings of independence and instrumental competence were as high as men’s self-ratings, and men’s self-ratings of sociability were as high as women’s self-ratings. Together with the findings about characterizations of men and women in general, these results attest not only to the possible changing face of stereotypes, but also highlight the importance of considering specific dimensions of both agency and communality in stereotype assessment.

It should be noted that our results suggest a greater differentiation between the multidimensional results for agency characterizations than for communality characterizations. That is, the multidmenstional results more often aligned with the results of the overall measure when the focus of measurement was communality than when it was agency. It is not clear at this point whether this is because of the particular items included in our scales or because communality is a more coherent construct. But, based on our results, it would appear that the use of a multidimensional framework is of particular value when the measurement of agency is the focus – something that should be noted by those involved in studying stereotype assessment and change.

Competence Perceptions

The lack of similarity in the pattern of results for the two competence dimensions (instrumental competence and leadership competence) is interesting. Although there were differences in ratings on the leadership competence dimension, ratings on the instrumental competence dimension did not differ when comparing ratings of men and women in general or when comparing male and female raters’ self-characterizations. It thus appears that there is an aspect of competence on which women are rated as highly as men – the wherewithal to get the work done. However, caution is urged in interpreting this finding. The attributes comprising the instrumental competence scale can be seen as indicative of conscientiousness and willingness to work hard, attributes often associated with women as well as men. Thus there is a question about whether instrumental competence is really a component of the agency construct, a question also prompted by its pattern of correlations with the other dependent measure scales (see also Carrier et al., 2014 ).

The leadership competence ratings paint a different picture. The consistent perception by men that leadership competence was more prevalent in men than in women suggests that, at least as far as men are concerned, women still are not seen as “having what it takes” to adequately handle traditionally male roles and positions. Whatever the interpretation, however, the different pattern of results found for these two scales indicates that we as researchers have to be very precise in designating what we are measuring and how we are measuring it. It also indicates that we have to keep close to the construct we actually have measured when drawing conclusions from our data.

Women and Contemporary Gender Stereotypes

Our results show that women do not entirely embrace the stereotypic view of women as less agentic than men. They did not make distinctions between men and women in general when rating their independence and instrumental competence, nor were their self-ratings on the independence and instrumental competence scales lower than the self-ratings made by men. These findings are noteworthy: one of the key aspects of agency is independence, and it appears that women do not see themselves or other women to be lacking it more than men. Women also did not make distinctions between men and women in general when rating their leadership competence, another key component of agency. These findings suggest that, for modern day women, some important aspects of the agency stereotype no longer apply.

However, our results suggest that women have not moved as far along as one would hope in separating themselves from gender stereotypic constraints. In particular, their self-perceptions of assertiveness and leadership competence – dimensions of agency associated with social power – do not seem to deviate from traditional gender conceptions. Our findings indicate that women not only characterized themselves as less assertive and less competent in leadership than men characterized themselves, but they also described themselves significantly more negatively on these two scales than they described women in general. This means that women rated themselves as more deficient in several central aspects of agency than they rated women as a group, adhering more strongly to traditional gender stereotypes when describing themselves than when describing others. These results seem inconsistent with attribution theory ( Jones and Nisbett, 1987 ) and construal level theory ( Trope and Liberman, 2010 ), and challenge the idea that because people differentiate more when viewing themselves as compared to others they are less apt to use stereotypes in self-description. They also raise questions about differences in aspects of agency that do and do not involve power relations. These findings are in need of further exploration.

Men and Contemporary Gender Stereotypes

Our results indicate that men continue to accept the stereotyped conception of men lacking communal qualities. They, along with women, rated men in general lower than women in general on all three communality dimensions. It therefore is particularly interesting that in their self-ratings on one dimension of communality – sociability – they did not differ from women. This finding suggests that men conceive of sociability differently when they characterize themselves than when they charcterize others. Other research suggests that whereas women are more social than men in close relationships, men are more social than women in group contexts ( Baumeister and Sommer, 1997 ; Gabriel and Gardner, 1999 ). Thus, men might have rated themselves as equally sociable as women rated themselves, but for a different reason: because they conceptualized sociability with regard to their groups (rather than close relationships). If so, then clarification is needed about why this potentially different conception of sociability takes hold for men only when they characterize themselves.

Furtherore, it is of note that when comparing themselves with men in general, men’s ratings of themselves were significantly higher on all communal dimensions. This finding suggests that although they strongly adhere to traditional stereotypes in their characterizations of men as a group, there is a tendency for men to be less stereotype-bound when they characterize themselves. It also suggests that they are more self-aggrandizing when rating themselves than when rating other men – ascribing to themselves more of the “wonderful” traits traditionally associated with women ( Eagly and Mladinic, 1989 ). This result contrasts with that found for women, for whom traditional gender stereotypes often appeared to exert more influence in self-characterizations than in characterizations of others, even when the result was self-deprecating rather than self-enhancing. Why there are differences in discrepancies in self-ratings versus other-ratings of women and men raises interesting questions for future research – questions about whether these differential effects are due to the gender of the rater or to the nature of the particular descriptors involved.

Limitations

Our results indicate that breaking down agency and communality into dimensions was often of benefit when assessing stereotyped perceptions. Though many of our scales were highly correlated, the confirmatory factor analyses provided support that they were distinct facets. Our choice to analyze the scales separately despite high correlations is in line with other researchers, who argue that doing so can enhance results interpretation ( Luthar, 1996 ; Tabachnik and Fidell, 2007 ). However, we do not claim that the dimensions we derived are the only way to differentiate among the elements of communality and agency, nor do we claim that our scales are the best way to measure them. Indeed, we chose a top–down procedure, using expert judges to derive our scales. This had the advantage that the judges knew about gender research and could effectively represent the literature on gender stereotypes. Nevertheless, if non-experts had done the initial sorting, they may have come to different conclusions about the number or content of items in the different scales or may have generated different scales altogether, ones that perhaps would have been more representative of everyday categories that are consensual in our culture.

Furthermore, our scale construction may have been constrained because our initial pool of items relied exclusively on existing items from past scales, which, although broadly selected, may have been limited by particular ways of thinking about stereotypes. Recent findings by Abele et al. (2016) , for example, included a morality facet in their breakdown of communality, and found it to be a robust facet of communality in ratings within and between a large number of countries in both Eastern and Western cultures. We, however, did not include many items that measured morality in our original list of attributes. Whereas we scoured the gender stereotyping literature focused on social perception to compile the most frequently used items for our initial item pool, Abele and colleagues went through a similar process, but with literature focused primarily on self-perception. Items focusing on the morality component of communality should no doubt be incorporated in future research. In addition, there might also be additional items relating to other facets of agency, such as a cognitive agency facet (e.g., being rational). Moreover, and more generally, a process by which the attributes comprising the scales are generated in a free-form manner and the categorization tasks are performed by a broad-ranging set of judges would serve as a check on our measures and provide guidance about how to modify and improve them.

There are other methodological limitations that are suggestive of follow-up research. We found no differences as a result of the rater’s age and education, attesting to the generality of the effects we uncovered, but there no doubt are other possible moderating factors to be explored, such as race and socio-economic level. Moreover, although we were able to tap into a wide-ranging population, it is important to replicate our study with a more representative U.S. sample to assess the full scope of our findings. In addition, our study was restricted to a sample of U.S. citizens, and it would be interesting to replicate this research with samples that are not exclusively from the U.S. Such cross-cultural replications would help not only to assess generalizability to other cultures, but also to assess the extent to which the nature and degree of change in social roles influences the way people currently conceive of men and women, and men and women conceive of themselves. Finally, it would be useful to conduct research using our measure to describe more differentiated targets to determine whether our results would be similar or different when intersectionality is taken into account and when particular subtypes of women and men are the focus.

Going Forward

Our findings stimulate several questions for future research. Not only would it be useful to further investigate the competence component of agency, clarifying what it does and does not entail, but also to consider another aspect of competence that has recently been identified as being strongly male gender-typed – intellectual brilliance ( Leslie et al., 2015 ). Exploring the effects of the apparently contradictory view women have of themselves in terms of agency (self-views of their independence and instrumental competence versus self-views of their assertiveness and leadership competence) on women’s attitudes and behavior in a variety of spheres also would be valuable. In addition, it would be advantageous to determine whether the greater communality men ascribe to themselves than to other men reflects actual beliefs or is merely self-enhancing, and if it has implications for men’s approach to traditionally female roles and positions.

Finally, it is important that in future research attempts are made to demonstrate the usefulness of distinguishing among the dimensions of agency and communality we have identified, and to do so for both self and other characterizations. While for some research questions an overall agency and overall communality measure will likely be sufficient, there no doubt are instances in which finer distinctions will be beneficial. It is possible, for example, that different dimensions of gender stereotypes are more strongly associated with selection decisions, performance evaluations, or reward distributions. Indeed, other researchers have already begun to demonstrate the value of considering distinct facets of agency in assessing gender differences in leader evaluations, but with a less differentiated set of dimensions including only self-reliance and dominance ( Schaumberg and Flynn, 2017 ). It also is possible that different dimensions of self-stereotypes are more strongly associated with career aspirations and choices, or support for gender-related organizational policies. Demonstrating that different dimensions of agency and communality predict different outcomes would add support to our multidimensional framework. In addition to increasing our understanding, such discoveries could provide valuable information about leverage points for intervention to ease the negative consequences of gender stereotyping and the bias they promote.

In this study we have demonstrated the value of subdividing the agency and communality construct in the study of gender stereotypes, and shown that making global statements about agency and communality runs the risk of distorting rather than clarifying our understanding.

Our goal with this paper was to further the conversation in the field about different aspects of both agency and communality and their potentially different effects on self and other characterizations. An underlying theme is that we may be losing information by generalizing to two super constructs and not attending to their components. Our findings demonstrate the complexity of the agency and communality constructs and the potential benefits of thinking about them with greater specificity. This can have consequences not only for understanding stereotypes and gender bias, but also for intervention and change efforts.

What are the implications of our findings for understanding the persistence of gender inequality? Although the results signal easing in some dimensions of traditional gender stereotypes, they make clear that in many ways they persist. Of particular importance is men’s unrelenting image of women as deficient in attributes considered to be essential for success in many traditionally male fields – an image that forms the basis of gender bias in many evaluative decisions. But women are not exempt from the influence of gender stereotypes; even though they view women as equal to men in several key agentic qualities, they see themselves as more deficient than men do in both leadership competence and assertiveness, and more deficient in these agency dimensions than women in general. These findings, which result from consideration of multiple aspects of the agency construct, augur ill for the tempering of women’s tendency to limit their opportunities. Evidently we still have a way to go before all the components of traditional gender stereotypes fully dissipate and recede, allowing men and women to be judged, and to judge themselves, on the basis of their merits, not their gender.

Ethics Statement

This study was carried out in accordance with the recommendations of the Institutional Review Board, University Committee on Activities Involving Human Subjects, New York University. The protocol was approved by the University Committee on Activities Involving Human Subjects, New York University.

Author Contributions

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct and intellectual contribution to the work, and approved it for publication.

This project was supported in part by an ADVANCE Diversity Science Research Grant awarded to the second author funded by the National Science Foundation ADVANCE-PAID award (HRD-0820202). This project was further supported by the Research Grant “Selection and Evaluation of Leaders in Business and Academia” awarded to the third author and funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) and the European Social Fund (ESF) (FKZ 01FP1070/71). This publication was supported by the German Research Foundation (DFG) and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) in the framework of the Open Access Publishing Program.

Conflict of Interest Statement

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Acknowledgments

We thank Suzette Caleo, Francesca Manzi, Susanne Braun, and Jennifer Ray for their insights and feedback in the development of this study. We thank Armin Pircher Verdorfer for his support in calculting the CFA. Portions of this study were presented at the Annual Meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.

• ^ The median age of the U.S. population is 37.9 years ( United States Census Bureau, 2017c ); Levels of education of the U.S. population 25 years and older in 2017: 39.2% did not attend college, 16.3% had some college, 31.6% had graduated college, 12.9% have graduate degrees ( United States Census Bureau, 2017a ); Race/ethnicity percentages in the general U.S. population are as follows: 60.7% White, 18.1% Hispanic, 13.4% African American, 5.8% Asian, 2% other ( United States Census Bureau, 2017b ).
• ^ The attributes in the inventory included the communal and agentic attributes of interest as well as a group of attributes measuring other constructs that were included for exploratory purposes but not used in this study.
• ^ The relatively large RMSEA is likely due to violation of multivariate normality assumptions (joint multivariate kurtosis = 76.55 with a critical ratio of 55.30). The most important implication of non-normality is that chi-square values are inflated, whereas parameter estimates are still fairly accurate ( Kline, 2011 ).

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Table A. List of agentic attributes measured.

Table B. List of communal attributes measured.

Keywords : gender stereotypes, self-stereotyping, communality, communion, agency, men, women, gender identity

Citation: Hentschel T, Heilman ME and Peus CV (2019) The Multiple Dimensions of Gender Stereotypes: A Current Look at Men’s and Women’s Characterizations of Others and Themselves. Front. Psychol. 10:11. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2019.00011

Received: 20 March 2018; Accepted: 04 January 2019; Published: 30 January 2019.

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Copyright © 2019 Hentschel, Heilman and Peus. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Tanja Hentschel, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Stereotypes and Gender Roles

Many of our gender stereotypes are strong because we emphasize gender so much in culture (Bigler & Liben, 2007). For example, children learn at a young age that there are distinct expectations for boys and girls. Gender roles refer to the role or behaviors learned by a person as appropriate to their gender and are determined by the dominant cultural norms. Cross-cultural studies reveal that children are aware of gender roles by age two or three and can label others’ gender and sort objects into gender categories. At four or five, most children are firmly entrenched in culturally appropriate gender roles (Kane, 1996). When children do not conform to the appropriate gender role for their culture, they may face negative sanctions such as being criticized, bullied, marginalized or rejected by their peers. A girl who wishes to take karate class instead of dance lessons may be called a “tomboy” and face difficulty gaining acceptance from both male and female peer groups (Ready, 2001). Boys, especially, are subject to intense ridicule for gender nonconformity (Coltrane and Adams, 2008; Kimmel, 2000)

By the time we are adults, our gender roles are a stable part of our personalities, and we usually hold many gender stereotypes. Men tend to outnumber women in professions such as law enforcement, the military, and politics. Women tend to outnumber men in care-related occupations such as child care, health care, and social work. These occupational roles are examples of typical Western male and female behavior, derived from our culture’s traditions. Adherence to these occupational gender roles demonstrates fulfillment of social expectations but may not necessarily reflect personal preference (Diamond, 2002).

Gender stereotypes are not unique to American culture. Williams and Best (1982) conducted several cross-cultural explorations of gender stereotypes using data collected from 30 cultures. There was a high degree of agreement on stereotypes across all cultures which led the researchers to conclude that gender stereotypes may be universal. Additional research found that males tend to be associated with stronger and more active characteristics than females (Best, 2001); however recent research argues that culture shapes how some gender stereotypes are perceived. Researchers found that across cultures, individualistic traits were viewed as more masculine; however, collectivist cultures rated masculine traits as collectivist and not individualist (Cuddy et al., 2015). These findings provide support that gender stereotypes may be moderated by cultural values.

There are two major psychological theories that partially explain how children form their own gender roles after they learn to differentiate based on gender. Gender schema theory argues that children are active learners who essentially socialize themselves and actively organize others’ behavior, activities, and attributes into gender categories, which are known as schemas . These schemas then affect what children notice and remember later. People of all ages are more likely to remember schema-consistent behaviors and attributes than schema-inconsistent behaviors and attributes. So, people are more likely to remember men, and forget women, who are firefighters. They also misremember schema-inconsistent information. If research participants are shown pictures of someone standing at the stove, they are more likely to remember the person to be cooking if depicted as a woman, and the person to be repairing the stove if depicted as a man. By only remembering schema-consistent information, gender schemas strengthen more and more over time.

A second theory that attempts to explain the formation of gender roles in children is social learning theory which argues that gender roles are learned through reinforcement, punishment, and modeling. Children are rewarded and reinforced for behaving in concordance with gender roles and punished for breaking gender roles. In addition, social learning theory argues that children learn many of their gender roles by modeling the behavior of adults and older children and, in doing so, develop ideas about what behaviors are appropriate for each gender. Social learning theory has less support than gender schema theory but research shows that parents do reinforce gender-appropriate play and often reinforce cultural gender norms.

Gender Roles and Culture

Hofstede’s (2001) research revealed that on the Masculinity and Femininity dimension (MAS), cultures with high masculinity reported distinct gender roles, moralistic views of sexuality and encouraged passive roles for women. Additionally, these cultures discourage premarital sex for women but have no such restrictions for men. The cultures with the highest masculinity scores were: Japan, Italy, Austria and Venezuela. Cultures low in masculinity (high femininity) had gender roles that were more likely to overlap and encouraged more active roles for women. Sex before marriage was seen as acceptable for both women and men in these cultures. Four countries scoring lowest in masculinity were Norway, Denmark, Netherlands and Sweden. The United States is slightly more masculine than feminine on this dimension; however, these aspects of high masculinity are balanced by a need for individuality.

Culture and Psychology Copyright © 2020 by L D Worthy; T Lavigne; and F Romero is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

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Essay on Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes are enacted from an early age. Boys are expected to wear dull, ‘masculine’ colours and faced with parental outrage if they want to dress up as a princess. Girls are told to ‘play nicely’ and steered towards ‘suitable’ games, rather than climbing trees. Toys are generally divided into what is seen as appropriate for each gender, with rare exceptions such as American store Target, who recently decided to cease separating ‘boys’ toys’ and ‘girls’ toys’.

Such stereotypes persist into adulthood. In an age of supposed equality, women still bear the greater share of responsibility for childcare, housework, and caring for aging parents, even when they work as many hours or more as their male partner. This is because such issues are seen as ‘women’s work’ – something that is quite shocking in the 21st century. They are also underrepresented in politics and business, and are often castigated if they behave in a way that is seen as unbecoming for females – even in supposedly liberated countries.

Gender stereotypes are even more marked in some societies where religion governs behaviour. Women are seen as inferior, deserving of fewer legal and moral rights, and may even be considered their husbands’ property. They have fewer job opportunities and are often expected to follow much harsher standards than men, for example in the wearing of concealing garments. To western eyes, it seems extraordinary that Saudi Arabia, the only country in the world where women are banned from driving, has only recently decided to lift that ban in the near future.

But what are the consequences of forcing or expecting people to conform to gender stereotypes? Both genders stand to lose from the imposition of stereotypes. Being denied the chance to experiment or express oneself is likely to lead to unhappiness. Inequality, whether in the home or the workplace, breeds resentment. A great deal of potential is lost, both on a personal and societal level. Resentment may lead to rebellion against the expectations of society, even if it is at a personal cost.

Indeed, in some ways, it is men who lose the most. They are expected to suppress their feelings; a tragic event such as the loss of a child is seen as greater for the mother, and the father is not allowed to mourn in the same way. Men are expected to be less emotional, and that can be very damaging. They are also mocked if they choose to go into professions that are traditionally seen as suitable only for women, or if they avoid more ‘manly’ pursuits such as sports.

Women, on the other hand, have indeed made gains and now have greater, if not equal, access to many job opportunities that were once considered only suitable for men. The battle is not over, however. There is still a significant pay gap and many professions continue to be male-dominated, especially at higher levels.

While some gender differences are inescapable – whatever the headlines say, a ‘pregnant man’ is still a biological impossibility – everyone should be able to avoid conforming to stereotypes. There is little harm in allowing boys to wear skirts when they are young; indeed, it is only social expectations that prevent them from wearing a dress when they grow up. Of course, most may not wish to do so. But if women want to be treated as equals to men, it follows that men should also be able to do anything that women do. It seems ridiculous that men are effectively prohibited from experimenting with makeup and wearing skirts or dresses, simply because it is seen as effeminate. Equality goes both ways.

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Essay on Gender Stereotypes

Students are often asked to write an essay on Gender Stereotypes in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on Gender Stereotypes

Introduction.

Gender stereotypes are general beliefs about behaviors, characteristics, and roles of men and women in society. They can limit individuals’ potential and opportunities.

Common Stereotypes

Men are often seen as strong and decisive, while women are considered nurturing and emotional. These stereotypes can limit personal growth and career choices.

Consequences

Stereotypes can lead to discrimination and unequal treatment. They can also affect self-esteem and mental health.

Breaking Stereotypes

Education and awareness are key to breaking gender stereotypes. Encouraging individuality and respect for everyone’s abilities can help create a more equal society.

250 Words Essay on Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes are preconceived notions about the roles and behaviors appropriate for men and women. They are deeply ingrained in society and influence our behavior, expectations, and perceptions.

The Origin of Gender Stereotypes

The roots of gender stereotypes can be traced back to traditional societal structures. Historically, men were hunters and protectors, while women were gatherers and caregivers. These roles have been passed down generations, evolving into modern stereotypes.

Implications of Gender Stereotypes

These stereotypes limit individual growth and societal progress. They force individuals into predefined boxes, stifling their true potential. For instance, the stereotype that women are not good at math discourages them from pursuing STEM fields, while the belief that men should not show emotions hinders their mental health.

Breaking Down Stereotypes

It’s crucial to challenge these stereotypes to achieve gender equality. This can be done through education, promoting representation, and encouraging open dialogue. It’s also essential to challenge our own biases and question the stereotypes we unconsciously uphold.

Gender stereotypes are not only unfair but also counterproductive. They limit individuals and society as a whole. By actively challenging these stereotypes, we can work towards a more equitable and inclusive society.

500 Words Essay on Gender Stereotypes

Gender stereotypes are preconceived notions about the roles, characteristics, and behaviors of men and women. These stereotypes are deeply ingrained in our society and have significant implications on individual and societal levels. They are often perpetuated by media, educational systems, and social interactions, and can limit the potential and freedom of individuals, as well as perpetuate inequality and discrimination.

The origins of gender stereotypes can be traced back to traditional societal structures. Historically, men were seen as the providers, hunters, and protectors, while women were perceived as caregivers and homemakers. These roles were often dictated by physical attributes and the need for survival. However, as societies evolved, these roles became less relevant but remained ingrained in societal consciousness, leading to the perpetuation of gender stereotypes.

Gender stereotypes have far-reaching implications. They can limit opportunities and possibilities for individuals, leading to unequal outcomes in education, employment, and leadership roles. For instance, women are often stereotyped as being less capable in STEM fields, which can discourage them from pursuing careers in these areas. Similarly, men may face societal pressure to avoid careers perceived as feminine, such as nursing or teaching.

Furthermore, gender stereotypes can perpetuate harmful norms and behaviors. For example, the stereotype that men should be emotionally strong can deter them from seeking help for mental health issues, leading to adverse health outcomes. On the other hand, women are often objectified and sexualized due to prevalent stereotypes, contributing to issues such as body shaming and sexual harassment.

Challenging Gender Stereotypes

Challenging gender stereotypes requires collective efforts at various levels. Education plays a crucial role in breaking down these stereotypes. Schools and universities should promote a curriculum that encourages critical thinking about gender roles and stereotypes.

Media also plays a significant role in shaping societal perceptions. Hence, it is essential for media outlets to portray diverse and non-stereotypical images of men and women. This includes showcasing women in leadership roles and men in caregiving roles.

Moreover, individuals can challenge gender stereotypes in their everyday lives. This can be achieved by questioning traditional gender roles, promoting gender equality in personal and professional spaces, and encouraging open conversations about gender stereotypes.

In conclusion, gender stereotypes are deeply entrenched in our society and have significant implications. While they are rooted in historical societal structures, they are perpetuated by modern institutions and interactions. Therefore, challenging these stereotypes requires concerted efforts at individual, societal, and institutional levels. By promoting gender equality and challenging traditional notions of gender roles, we can create a more inclusive and equitable society.

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Gender and Media Representations: A Review of the Literature on Gender Stereotypes, Objectification and Sexualization

Media representations play an important role in producing sociocultural pressures. Despite social and legal progress in civil rights, restrictive gender-based representations appear to be still very pervasive in some contexts. The article explores scientific research on the relationship between media representations and gender stereotypes, objectification and sexualization, focusing on their presence in the cultural context. Results show how stereotyping, objectifying and sexualizing representations appear to be still very common across a number of contexts. Exposure to stereotyping representations appears to strengthen beliefs in gender stereotypes and endorsement of gender role norms, as well as fostering sexism, harassment and violence in men and stifling career-related ambitions in women. Exposure to objectifying and sexualizing representations appears to be associated with the internalization of cultural ideals of appearance, endorsement of sexist attitudes and tolerance of abuse and body shame. In turn, factors associated with exposure to these representations have been linked to detrimental effects on physical and psychological well-being, such as eating disorder symptomatology, increased body surveillance and poorer body image quality of life. However, specificities in the pathways from exposure to detrimental effects on well-being are involved for certain populations that warrant further research.

1. Introduction

As a social category, gender is one of the earliest and most prominent ways people may learn to identify themselves and their peers, the use of gender-based labels becoming apparent in infants as early as 17 months into their life [ 1 ]. Similarly, the development of gender-based heuristics, inferences and rudimentary stereotypes becomes apparent as early as age three [ 2 , 3 ]. Approximately at this age, the development of a person’s gender identity begins [ 4 ]—that is, the process through which a person tends to identify as a man, as a woman or as a vast spectrum of other possibilities (i.e., gender non-conforming, agender, genderfluid, etc.). These processes continue steadily throughout individuals’ lives as they receive and elaborate information about women and men and what it means to belong to either category, drawing from direct and indirect observations, social contact, personal elaborations and cultural representations [ 5 , 6 ]. As a result, social and mental representations of gender are extremely widespread, especially as a strictly binary construct, and can be argued to be ubiquitous in individual and social contexts.

Among the many sources of influence on gender representations, media occupies an important space and its relevance can be assessed across many different phenomena [ 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 ]. The ubiquity of media, the chronicity of individuals’ exposure to it and its role in shaping beliefs, attitudes and expectations have made it the subject of scientific attention. In fact, several theories have attempted to explore the mechanisms and psychological processes in which media plays a role, including identity development [ 12 , 13 , 14 ], scripts and schemas [ 15 ], cultivation processes [ 16 , 17 , 18 ] and socialization processes [ 5 , 6 ].

The public interest in the topic of gender has seen a surge in the last 10 years, in part due to social and political movements pushing for gender equality across a number of aspects, including how gender is portrayed in media representations. In the academic field as well, publications mentioning gender in their title, abstract or keywords have more than doubled from 2012 to 2022 [ 19 ], while publications mentioning gender in media representations have registered an even more dramatic increase, tripling in number [ 20 ]. Additionally, the media landscape has had a significant shift in the last decade, with the surge in popularity and subsequent addition of social media websites and apps to most people’s mediatic engagement [ 21 ].

The importance of media use in gender-related aspects, such as beliefs, attitudes, or roles, has been extensively documented. As reported in a recent review of the literature [ 22 ], several meta-analyses [ 17 , 23 , 24 ] showed support for the effects of media use on gender beliefs, finding small but consistent effect sizes. These effects appear to have remained present over the decades [ 25 ].

Particular attention has been given to stereotypical, objectifying and sexualizing representations, as portrayals that paint a restrictive picture of the complexity of human psychology, also producing sociocultural pressures to conform to gender roles and body types.

Gender stereotypes can be defined as an extremely simplified concept of attitudes and behaviors considered normal and appropriate for men and women in a specific culture [ 26 ]. They usually span several different areas of people’s characteristics, such as physical appearance, personality traits, behaviors, social roles and occupations. Stereotypical beliefs about gender may be divided into descriptive (how one perceives a person of a certain gender to be; [ 27 ]), prescriptive (how one perceives a person of a certain gender should be and behave; [ 28 , 29 ]) or proscriptive (how one perceives a person of a certain gender should not be and behave; [ 28 , 29 ]). Their content varies on the individual’s culture of reference [ 30 ], but recurring themes have been observed in western culture, such as stereotypes revolving around communion, agency and competence [ 31 ]. Women have stereotypically been associated with traits revolving around communion (e.g., supportiveness, compassion, expression, warmth), while men have been more stereotypically associated with agency (e.g., ambition, assertiveness, competitiveness, action) or competence (e.g., skill, intelligence). Both men and women may experience social and economic penalties (backlash) if they appear to violate these stereotypes [ 29 , 32 , 33 ].

Objectification can be defined as the viewing or treatment of people as objects. Discussing ways in which people may be objectified, Nussbaum first explored seven dimensions: instrumentality (a tool to be employed for one’s purposes); denial of autonomy (lacking self-determination, or autonomy); inertness (lacking in agency or activity); fungibility (interchangeable with others of the same type); violability (with boundaries lacking integrity and permissible to break into); ownership (possible to own or trade); denial of subjectivity (the person’s feelings or experiences are seen as something that does not need to be considered) [ 34 ].

In its initial definition by Fredrickson and Roberts [ 35 ], objectification theory had been offered as a framework to understand how the pervasive sexual objectification of women’s bodies in the sociocultural context influenced their experiences and posed risks to their mental health—a phenomenon that was believed to have uniquely female connotations. In their model, the authors theorized that a cultural climate of sexual objectification would lead to the internalization of objectification (viewing oneself as a sexual and subordinate object), which would in turn lead to psychological consequences (e.g., body shame, anxiety) and mental health risks (e.g., eating disorders, depression). Due to the pervasiveness of the cultural climate, objectification may be difficult to detect or avoid, and objectification experiences may be perceived as normative.

Sexual objectification, in which a person is reduced to a sexual instrument, can be construed to be a subtype of objectification and, in turn, is often defined as one of the types of sexualization [ 36 ]. As previously discussed by Ward [ 37 ], it should be made clear that the mere presence of sexual content, which may be represented in a positive and healthy way, should not be conflated with sexualized or objectifying representations.

The American Psychological Association’s 2007 report defines sexualization as a series of conditions that stand apart from healthy sexuality, such as when a person’s value is perceived to come mainly from sexual appeal or behavior, when physical attractiveness is equated to sexual attractiveness, when a person is sexually objectified or when sexuality is inappropriately imposed on a person [ 36 ]. Sexualization may involve several different contexts, such as personal, interpersonal, and cultural. Self-sexualization involves treating oneself as a sexual object [ 35 ]. Interpersonal contributions involve being treated as sexual objects by others, such as family or peers [ 38 , 39 ]. Finally, contributions by cultural norms, expectations and values play a part as well, including those spread by media representations [ 36 ]. After this initial definition, sexualization as a term has also been used by some authors (e.g., Zurbriggen & Roberts [ 40 ]) to refer to sexual objectification specifically, while others (e.g., Bigler and colleagues [ 41 ]) stand by the APA report’s broader meaning. In this section, we will explore scientific literature adopting the latter.

These portrayals have been hypothesized to lead to negative effects on people’s well-being on a mental and physical level, as well as bearing partial responsibility for several social issues, such as sexism, gender discrimination and harassment. However, the pathways that lead from an individual’s relationship with media to these detrimental effects can be complex. Furthermore, they seem to involve specificities for men and women, as well as for different sexual orientations. A wealth of publications has been produced on these themes and, to the authors’ knowledge, no recent review has attempted to synthesize their findings.

The present article aims to summarize the state of the art of research on stereotyping, sexualization and objectification in gender and media representations. A focus will be placed on the definitions of these concepts, the media where they occur, and verifying whether any changes over time are detectable or any specificities are present. The possible effects of these representations on people’s well-being will be explored as well.

A search of the literature was conducted on scientific search engines (APA PsycArticles, CINAHL Complete, Education Source, Family Studies Abstracts, Gender Studies Database, MEDLINE, Mental Measurements Yearbook, Sociology Source Ultimate, Violence & Abuse Abstracts, PUBMED, Scopus, Web of Science) to locate the most relevant contributions on the topic of media and gender representation, with a particular focus on stereotypes, objectification and sexualization, their presence in the media and their effects on well-being. Keywords were used to search for literature on the intersection of the main topics: media representation (e.g., media OR representation* OR portrayal*), gender (e.g., gender OR sex OR wom* OR m*n) and stereotypes, objectification and sexualization (e.g., stereotyp*, objectif*, sexualiz*). In some cases, additional keywords were used for the screening of studies on specific media (e.g., television, news, social media). When appropriate, further restrictions were used to screen for studies on effects or consequences (e.g., effect* OR impact* OR consequence* OR influence* OR outcome*). Inclusion criteria were the following: (a) academic articles (b) pertaining to the field of media representations (c) pertaining to gender stereotypes, objectification or sexualization. A dataset of 195 selected relevant papers was created. Thematic analysis was conducted following the guidelines developed by Braun and Clarke [ 42 ], in order to outline patterns of meaning across the reviewed studies. The process was organized into six phases: (1) familiarization with the data; (2) coding; (3) searching for themes; (4) reviewing themes; (5) defining and naming themes; and (6) writing up. After removing duplicates and excluding papers that did not meet the inclusion criteria, a total of 87 articles were included in the results of this review. The findings were discussed among researchers (LR, FS, MNP and TT) until unanimous consensus was reached.

2.1. Stereotypical Portrayals

Gender stereotypes appear to be flexible and responsive to changes in the social environment: consensual beliefs about men’s and women’s attributes have evolved throughout the decades, reflecting changes in women’s participation in the labor force and higher education [ 31 , 43 ]. Perceptions of gender equality in competence and intelligence have sharply risen, and stereotypical perceptions of women show significant changes: perceptions of women’s competence and intelligence have surpassed those relative to men, while the communion aspect appears to have shifted toward being even more polarized on being typical of women. Other aspects, such as perceptions of agency being more typical of men, have remained stable [ 31 ].

Despite these changes, gender representation in the media appears to be frequently skewed toward men’s representation and prominently features gender stereotypes. On a global scale, news coverage appears to mostly feature men, especially when considering representation as expert voices, where women are still underrepresented (24%) despite a rise in coverage in the last 5 years [ 44 ]. Underrepresentation has also been reported in many regional and national contexts, but exact proportions vary significantly in the local context. Male representation has been reported to be greater in several studies, with male characters significantly outnumbering female characters [ 45 ], doing so in male-led and mixed-led shows but not in female-led shows [ 46 ] in children’s television programming—a key source of influence on gender representations. Similar results have been found regarding sports news, whose coverage overwhelmingly focuses on men athletes [ 47 , 48 ] and where women are seldom represented.

Several analyses of television programs have also shown how representations of men and women are very often consistent with gender stereotypes. Girls were often portrayed as focusing more on their appearance [ 45 ], as well as being judged for their appearance [ 49 ]. The same focus on aesthetics was found in sports news coverage, which was starkly different across genders, and tended to focus on women athletes’ appearance, featuring overly simplified descriptions (vs. technical language on coverage of men athletes) [ 48 ]. In addition, coverage of women athletes was more likely in sports perceived to be more feminine or gender-appropriate [ 47 , 48 , 50 ]. Similarly, women in videogames appear to be both underrepresented and less likely to be featured as playable characters, as well as being frequently stereotyped, appearing in the role of someone in need of rescuing, as love interests, or cute and innocent characters [ 51 ]. In advertising as well, gender stereotypes have often been used as a staple technique for creating relatability, but their use may lead to negative cross-gender effects in product marketing [ 52 ] while also possibly furthering social issues. Hust and colleagues found that in alcohol advertisements, belief in gender stereotypes was the most consistent predictor of intentions to sexually coerce, showing significant interaction effects with exposure to highly objectifying portrayals [ 53 ]. Representation in advertising prominently features gender stereotypes, such as depicting men in professional roles more often, while depicting women in non-working, recreational roles, especially in countries that show high gender inequality [ 54 ]. A recent analysis of print ads [ 55 ] confirmed that some stereotypes are still prominent and, in some cases, have shown a resurgence, such as portraying a woman as the queen of the home; the study also found representations of women in positions of empowerment are, however, showing a relative increase in frequency. Public support, combined with market logic, appears to be successfully pushing more progressive portrayals in this field [ 56 ].

Both skewed representation and the presence of stereotypes have been found to lead to several negative effects. Gender-unequal representation has been found to stifle political [ 57 ] and career [ 58 ] ambition, as well as foster organizational discrimination [ 59 ]. Heavy media use may further the belief in gender stereotypes and has been found to be linked to a stronger endorsement of traditional gender roles and norms [ 60 ], which in turn may be linked to a vast number of detrimental health effects. In women, adherence and internalization of traditional gender roles have been linked to greater symptoms of depression and anxiety, a higher likelihood of developing eating disorders, and lower self-esteem and self-efficacy [ 36 , 61 , 62 , 63 ]. In men as well, adherence to traditional masculine norms has been linked to negative mental health outcomes such as depression, psychological distress and substance abuse [ 64 ], while also increasing the perpetration of risky behaviors [ 65 , 66 ] and intimate partner violence [ 65 , 67 ].

2.2. Objectifying Portrayals

Non-sexual objectifying representations appear to have been studied relatively little. They have been found to be common in advertising, where women are often depicted as purely aesthetic models, motionless and decorative [ 68 ]. They may also include using a woman’s body as a supporting object for the advertised product, as a decorative object, as an ornament to draw attention to the ad, or as a prize to be won and associated with the consumption of the advertised product [ 55 ].

The vast majority of the literature has focused on the sexual objectification of women. This type of representation has been reported to be very common in a number of contexts and across different media [ 69 ], and several studies (see Calogero and colleagues’ or Roberts and colleagues’ review [ 69 , 70 ]) have found support for the original model’s pathway [ 35 ]. Following experimental models expanded on the original (e.g., Frederick and colleagues or Roberts and colleagues [ 69 , 71 ]), highlighting the role of factors such as the internalization of lean or muscular ideals of appearance, finding evidence for negative effects on well-being and mental health through the increase in self-objectification and the internalization of cultural ideals of appearance [ 71 , 72 ].

Sexual objectification also appears to be consistently linked to sexism. For both women and men, the perpetration of sexual objectification was significantly associated with hostile and benevolent sexism, as well as the enjoyment of sexualization [ 73 ]. Enjoyment of sexualization, in turn, has been found to be positively associated with hostile sexism in both men and women, positively associated with benevolent sexism in women and negatively in men [ 74 ].

Exposure to objectifying media in men has been found to increase the tendency to engage in sexual coercion and harassment, as well as increasing conformity to gender role norms [ 75 ]. Consistently with the finding that perpetration of objectification may be associated with a greater men’s proclivity for rape and sexual aggression [ 76 ], a study conducted by Hust and colleagues found that exposure to objectifying portrayals of women in alcohol advertising was also a moderator in the relationship between belief in gender stereotypes and intentions to sexually coerce. Specifically, participants who had a stronger belief in gender stereotypes reported stronger intentions to sexually coerce when exposed to slightly objectifying images of women. Highly objectifying images did not yield the same increase—a result interpreted by the authors to mean that highly objectified women were perceived as sexually available and as such less likely to need coercion, while slightly objectified women could be perceived as more likely to need coercion [ 53 ].

Research on objectification has primarily focused on women, in part due to numerous studies suggesting that women are more subject to sexual objectification [ 73 , 77 , 78 , 79 , 80 ], as well as suffering the consequences of sexual objectification more often [ 81 ]. However, sexually objectifying portrayals seem to have a role in producing negative effects on men as well, although with partially different pathways. In men, findings about media appearance pressures on body image appear to be mixed. Previous meta-analyses found either a small average effect [ 82 ] or no significant effect [ 72 ]. A recent study found them to be significantly associated with higher body surveillance, poorer body image quality of life and lower satisfaction with appearance [ 71 ]. Another study, however, found differing relationships regarding sexual objectification: an association was found between experiences of sexual objectification and internalization of cultural standards of appearance, body shame and drive for muscularity, but was not found between experiences of sexual objectification and self-objectification or body surveillance [ 83 ]: in the same study, gender role conflict [ 84 ] was positively associated to the internalization of sociocultural standards of appearance, self-objectification, body shame and drive for muscularity, suggesting the possibility that different pathways may be involved in producing negative effects on men. Men with body-image concerns experiencing gender role conflict may also be less likely to engage in help-seeking behaviors [ 85 , 86 ]. This is possibly due to restrictive emotionality associated with the male gender role leading to more negative attitudes toward help-seeking, as found in a recent study by Nagai, [ 87 ], although this study finds no association with help-seeking behavior, conflicting with previous ones, and more research is needed.

Finally, specificities related to sexual orientation regarding media and objectification appear to be present. A set of recent studies by Frederick and colleagues found that gay men, lesbian women and bisexual people share with heterosexual people many of the pathways that lead from sociocultural pressures to internalization of thin/muscular ideals, higher body surveillance and a lower body image quality of life [ 71 , 88 ], leading the authors to conclude that these factors’ influence applies regardless of sexual orientation. However, their relationship with media and objectification may vary. Gay and bisexual men may face objectification in social media and dating apps rather than in mainstream media and may experience more objectification than heterosexual men [ 89 ]. In Frederick and colleagues’ studies, gay men reported greater media pressures, body surveillance, thin-ideal internalization, and self-objectification compared to heterosexual men; moreover, bisexual men appeared to be more susceptible to ideal internalization, displaying stronger paths from media appearance pressures to muscular-ideal internalization compared to heterosexual men; lesbian women, instead, demonstrated weaker relationships between media pressures and body image outcomes [ 71 , 88 ]. Consistently with previous studies suggesting a heightened susceptibility to social pressures [ 90 ], bisexual women appeared to be more susceptible to media pressures relative to other groups [ 88 ]. Another recent study of lesbian and bisexual women supported previous evidence for the pathway from the internalization of cultural appearance standards to body surveillance, body shame and eating disorder symptoms; however, it found no significant connection between experiences of objectification and eating disorder symptoms [ 91 ].

2.3. Sexualized Portrayals

Several studies have found sexualizing media representations to be commonplace across a number of different media contents and across different target demographics (i.e., children, adolescents or adults) and genres. Reports of common sexualized representations of women are found in contexts such as television programs [ 92 ], movies [ 93 , 94 , 95 , 96 ], music videos [ 97 , 98 ], advertising [ 54 , 55 ], videogames [ 51 , 99 , 100 ], or magazines [ 101 ].

Exposure to sexualized media has been theorized to be an exogenous risk factor in the internalization of sexualized beliefs about women [ 41 ], as well as one of the pathways to the internalization of cultural appearance ideals [ 102 ]. Daily exposition to sexualized media content has been consistently linked to a number of negative effects. Specifically, it has been found to lead to higher levels of body dissatisfaction and distorted attitudes about eating through the internalization of cultural body ideals (e.g., lean or muscular) in both men and women [ 71 ]. It has also been associated with a higher chance of supporting sexist beliefs in boys [ 103 ], and of tolerance toward sexual violence in men [ 104 ]. Furthermore, exposure to sexualized images has been linked to a higher tolerance of sexual harassment and rape myth acceptance [ 76 ]. Exposure to reality TV programs consistently predicted self-sexualization for both women and men, while music videos did so for men only [ 103 ]. Internalized sexualization, in turn, has been linked to a stronger endorsement of sexist attitudes and acceptance of rape myths [ 105 ], while also being linked to higher levels of body surveillance and body shame in girls [ 106 ]. Internalization of media standards of appearance has been linked to body surveillance in both men and women, as well as body surveillance of the partner in men [ 107 ].

As a medium, videogames have been studied relatively little and have produced less definite results. This medium can offer the unique dynamic of embodiment in a virtual avatar, which has been hypothesized to be able to lead to a shift in self-perception (the “Proteus effect”, as formulated by Yee & Bailenson, [ 108 ]). While some studies have partially confirmed this effect, showing that exposure to sexualized videogame representations can increase self-objectification [ 109 , 110 , 111 ], others [ 112 ] have not found the same relationship. Furthermore, while a study has found an association between sexualized representations in videogames, tolerance of sexual abuse of women and rape myth acceptance [ 113 ], and in another, it was linked to a decreased real-life belief in women’s competence [ 114 ], a recent meta-analysis [ 115 ] found no effect of the presence of sexualized content on well-being, sexism or misogyny.

Research on social media has also shown some specificities. Social media offers the unique dynamic of being able to post and disseminate one’s own content and almost always includes built-in mechanisms for user-generated feedback (e.g., likes), as well as often being populated by one’s peers, friends and family rather than strangers. Sites focusing on image- or video-based content (e.g., Instagram, TikTok) may be more prone to eliciting social comparison and fostering the internalization of cultural appearance ideals, resulting in more associations to negative body image when compared to others that have the same capabilities but offer text-based content as well (e.g., Facebook) [ 116 ]. Social media appears to foster social comparison, which may increase appearance-based concerns [ 117 ]. Consistently with previous research, exposure to sexualized beauty ideals on social media appeared to be associated with lower body satisfaction; exposure to more diverse standards of appearance, instead, was associated with increased body satisfaction and positive mood, regardless of image sexualization [ 116 , 118 ].

3. Discussion

3.1. critical discussion of evidence.

The reviewed evidence (summarized in Table 1 ) points to the wide-ranging harmful effects of stereotyping, objectifying and sexualizing media portrayals, which are reported to be still both common and pervasive. The links to possible harms have also been well documented, with a few exceptions.

Summary of findings.

These representations, especially but not exclusively pertaining to women, have been under social scrutiny following women’s rights movements and activism [ 119 ] and can be perceived to be politically incorrect and undesirable, bringing an aspect of social desirability into the frame. Positive attitudes toward gender equality also appear to be at an all-time high across the western world [ 120 , 121 ], a change that has doubtlessly contributed to socio-cultural pressure to reduce harmful representations. Some media contexts (e.g., advertising and television) seem to have begun reflecting this change regarding stereotypes, attempting to either avoid harmful representations or push more progressive portrayals. However, these significant changes in stereotypes (e.g., regarding competence) have not necessarily been reflected in women’s lives, such as their participation in the labor force, leadership or decision-making [ 31 , 122 , 123 ]. Objectifying or sexualizing representations do not seem to be drastically reduced in prevalence. Certainly, many influences other than media representations are in play in this regard, but their effect on well-being has been found to be pervasive and consistent. Despite widespread positive attitudes toward gender equality, the persistence of stereotypical, objectifying and sexualizing representations may hint at the continued existence of an entrenched sexist culture which can translate into biases, discrimination and harm.

Despite some conflicting findings, the literature also hints at the existence of differences in how media pressures appear to affect men and women, as well as gay, lesbian and bisexual people. These may point to the possibility of some factors (e.g., objectification) playing a different role across different people in the examined pathways, an aspect that warrants caution when considering possible interventions and clinical implications. In some cases, the same relationship between exposure to media and well-being may exist, but it may follow different pathways from distal risk factors to proximal risk factors, as in the case of gender role conflict for men or body shame for lesbian and bisexual women. However, more research is needed to explore these recent findings.

Different media also appear to feature specificities for which more research is needed, such as videogames and social media. The more interactive experiences offered by these media may play an important role in determining their effects, and the type of social media needs to be taken into consideration as well (image- or video-based vs. text-based). Moreover, the experiences of exposure may not necessarily be homogenous, due to the presence of algorithms that determine what content is being shown in the case of social media, and due to the possibility of player interaction and avatar embodiment in the case of videogames.

Past findings [ 37 , 69 ] about links with other social issues such as sexism, harassment and violence appear to still be relevant [ 67 , 73 , 103 , 105 ]. The increases in both tolerance and prevalence of sexist and abusive attitudes resulting from exposure to problematic media representations impact the cultural climate in which these phenomena take place. Consequently, victims of discrimination and abuse living in a cultural climate more tolerant of sexist and abusive attitudes may experience lower social support, have a decreased chance of help-seeking and adopt restrictive definitions for what counts as discrimination and abuse, indirectly furthering gender inequalities.

Exploring ways of reducing risks to health, several authors [ 22 , 41 , 75 ] have discussed media literacy interventions—that is, interventions focused on teaching critical engagement with media—as a possible way of reducing the negative effects of problematic media portrayals. As reported in McLean and colleagues’ systematic review [ 124 ], these interventions have been previously shown to be effective at increasing media literacy, while also improving body-related outcomes such as body satisfaction in boys [ 125 ], internalization of the thinness ideal in girls [ 125 ], body size acceptance in girls [ 126 ] and drive for thinness in girls and boys [ 127 ]. More recently, they were also shown to be effective at reducing stereotypical gender role attitudes [ 128 ], as well as fostering unfavorable attitudes toward stereotypical portrayals and lack of realism [ 129 ]. Development and promotion of these interventions should be considered when attempting to reduce negative media-related influences on body image. It should be noted, however, that McLean and colleagues’ review found no effect of media literacy interventions on eating disorder symptomatology [ 124 ], which warrants more careful interventions.

Furthermore, both internal (e.g., new entrants’ attitudes in interpersonal or organizational contexts) and external (e.g., pressure from public opinion) sociocultural pressures appear to have a strong influence in reducing harmful representations [ 55 , 56 ]. Critically examining these representations when they appear, as well as voicing concerns toward examples of possibly harmful representations, may promote more healthy representations in media. As documented by some studies, the promotion of diverse body representations in media may also be effective in reducing negative effects [ 70 , 118 ].

3.2. Limitations

The current review synthesizes the latest evidence on stereotyping, objectifying and sexualizing media representations. However, limitations in its methodology are present and should be taken into consideration. It is not a systematic review and may not be construed to be a complete investigation of all the available evidence. Only articles written in the English language have been considered, which may have excluded potentially interesting findings written in other languages. Furthermore, it is not a meta-analysis, and as such cannot be used to draw statistical conclusions about the surveyed phenomena.

3.3. Future Directions

While this perception is limited by the non-systematic approach of the review, to what we know, very few studies appear to be available on the relationship between media representation and non-sexual objectification, which may provide interesting directions to explore in relation to autonomy, violability or subjectivity, as was attempted in the context of work and organizations [ 130 ].

More cross-cultural studies (e.g., Tartaglia & Rollero [ 54 ]) would also prove useful in exploring differences between cultural contexts, as well as the weight of different sociocultural factors in the relationship between media representation and gender.

More studies focusing on relatively new media (e.g., social media, videogames) would possibly help clear up some of the identified discrepancies and explore new directions for the field that take advantage of their interactivity. This is particularly true for niche but growing media such as virtual reality, in which the perception of embodiment in an avatar with different physical features than one’s own could prove to be important in sexualization and objectification. Only preliminary evidence [ 131 ] has been produced on the topic.

Studies to further explore the relationship between media representations, gender and sexual orientation would also be beneficial. As already highlighted by Frederick and colleagues [ 132 ], gay, lesbian and bisexual people may deal with a significantly different set of appearance norms and expectations [ 133 ], and face minority-related stresses [ 134 ] that can increase susceptibility to poorer body image and disordered eating [ 135 , 136 ]. Additionally, none of the reviewed studies had a particular focus on trans people, who may have different experiences relating to media and body image, as suggested by the differences in pathways found in a recent study [ 137 ]. Sexual orientation and gender identity should be kept into consideration when investigating these relationships, as their specificities may shed light on the different ways societal expectations influence the well-being of sexual minorities.

The examined literature on the topic also appears to feature specificities that need to be taken into account. As previously reported by Ward [ 37 ], the vast majority of the studies continue to be conducted in the United States, often on undergraduates, which limits the generalizability of the results to the global population. Given the abundance and complexity of the constructs, more studies examining the pathways from media exposure to well-being using methodologies such as path analysis and structural equation modeling may help clarify some of the discrepancies found in the literature about the same relationships.

Finally, as previously reported by many authors [ 37 , 69 , 138 ], sexualization, self-sexualization, objectification and self-objectification are sometimes either treated as synonymous or used with different definitions and criteria, which may add a layer of misdirection to studies on the subject. Given the divergences in the use of terminology, clearly stating one’s working definition of sexualization or objectification would possibly benefit academic clarity on the subject.

4. Conclusions

Consistent empirical evidence highlights the importance of media representations as a key part of sociocultural influences that may have consequences on well-being. Despite some notable progress, harmful representations with well-researched links to detrimental effects are still common across a number of different media. Exposure to stereotyping, objectifying and sexualized representations appears to consistently be linked to negative consequences on physical and mental health, as well as fostering sexism, violence and gender inequity. On a clinical level, interventions dealing with body image and body satisfaction should keep their influence into account. The promotion of institutional and organizational interventions, as well as policies aimed at reducing their influence, could also prove to be a protective factor against physical and mental health risks.

Funding Statement

This research received no external funding.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, F.S. and L.R.; methodology, T.T. and M.N.P.; writing—original draft preparation, F.S.; writing—review and editing, T.T. and M.N.P.; supervision, L.R. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

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Weird disconnect between gender stereotypes and leader preferences revealed by new psychology research

A new study published in Evolution and Human Behavior provides evidence of a surprising disconnection between leader stereotypes and leader preferences. While most people still imagine leaders as men, especially when thinking of dominant leaders, they actually tend to slightly prefer female leaders, particularly those who are prestigious rather than dominant.

Despite significant progress toward gender equality in the past century, women remain underrepresented in leadership positions. In 2021, women constituted only 7.4% of Fortune 500 CEOs, 26.9% of U.S. congressional representatives, and 30.3% of elected state executives. The underrepresentation of women in leadership roles persists across various sectors, prompting researchers to investigate the underlying causes.

One prevailing explanation for this underrepresentation is the stereotype that associates leadership with male and dominant characteristics, often referred to as the “think manager-think male” phenomenon. This stereotype suggests that people associate leadership with masculinity, which could influence their preferences and ultimately affect the selection and support of leaders. The researchers aimed to examine whether these stereotypes still hold true today and if they translate into actual preferences for leaders based on gender and dominance versus prestige.

“I’ve been interested in gender and leadership for several years now — initially as part of my undergraduate (and later, master’s) work in political science, after taking a women and politics course as a junior in college. Then, while I was in graduate school for my Ph.D. in social psychology, the 2016 elections reignited my interest in this topic,” said study author Adi Wiezel, an assistant professor of psychology at Elon University.

“Although most elections bring to bear questions about the kinds of traits people prefer in their leaders, the 2016 elections made this (and my prior research interests and training) especially salient when a mainstream female candidate lost the U.S. presidential race. So, I initially pitched a version of this project as part of a graduate seminar that I was taking with Douglas Kenrick at the time, and this turned into a broader research agenda between the two of us, Michael Barlev, and ultimately our undergraduate honors student, Christopher R. Martos.”

The researchers conducted a series of five studies to investigate how leader stereotypes influence preferences for male or female leaders.

The first study (Study 1A) involved 148 undergraduate students from Arizona State University. Participants were asked to imagine leaders with either dominant or prestigious traits and then indicate the gender of the leaders they envisioned. They also rated how much they would like to work for each imagined leader.

The researchers found that participants predominantly imagined leaders as men, confirming the persistence of the stereotype that associates leadership with maleness. When asked to envision a leader without specifying gender, 89.9% of participants imagined a dominant leader as a man, while 62.8% imagined a prestigious leader as a man.

Despite these stereotypes, the study revealed that participants did not prefer male leaders over female leaders. In fact, there was a slight overall preference for female leaders. When participants rated their willingness to work for the imagined leaders, they expressed a stronger preference for prestigious leaders (regardless of gender) over dominant leaders. Specifically, participants preferred prestigious leaders (with an average rating of 4.32 out of 5) significantly more than dominant leaders (with an average rating of 2.34 out of 5).

In another study (Study 1B), 220 undergraduate students were asked to imagine leaders in specific domains such as military, sports, business, politics, science, and the arts, and then identify the gender and rate the dominance and prestige of these leaders.

The researchers found that participants were more likely to imagine leaders as men across all domains, though the extent varied. For example, 89.5% of participants imagined military leaders as men, while 60% imagined leaders in the arts as men.

When asked about their willingness to be led by the imagined leaders, participants again showed a preference for prestigious leaders over dominant ones, regardless of the leader’s gender. This preference held true across all domains, reinforcing the finding from Study 1A that people favor leaders who exhibit prestigious qualities over those who are purely dominant.

In Study 2, the researchers analyzed archival data from a nationally representative survey conducted by the Pew Research Center. The survey included responses from 2,692 participants collected between June 19 and July 2, 2018. Participants were asked to compare the leadership approaches of men and women in top business and political positions.

The majority of respondents (64%) stated that neither men nor women had a better approach, indicating a move toward gender neutrality in perceptions of leadership capabilities. Among those who expressed a preference, more participants favored women over men in leadership roles. Specifically, 24.6% believed women had a better approach compared to 11.3% who favored men. This finding aligns with the slight preference for female leaders observed in Studies 1A and 1B, suggesting a broader societal shift in attitudes toward female leadership.

In Study 3, 461 undergraduate students were asked to imagine being part of an organization looking for a new leader and were presented with two equally qualified candidates: one described as dominant and the other as prestigious.

Participants were assigned to one of four conditions, varying both the sex and leadership style of the candidates. For example, one condition compared a dominant male candidate to a prestigious female candidate, while another compared a prestigious male candidate to a dominant female candidate. Participants rated each candidate on their willingness to be led by them, their effectiveness at task accomplishment, and other traits related to dominance and prestige.

The results showed a strong preference for prestigious leaders over dominant ones. While participants did not show a significant preference for male over female leaders, they did slightly prefer female leaders who were described as prestigious.

Finally, Study 4 involved 952 participants who evaluated photographs of male and female politicians, rating them on traits related to dominance and prestige and indicating their likelihood of voting for these politicians.

The researchers found that female politicians were rated higher on prestige traits, while male politicians were rated higher on dominance traits. This suggests that visual cues can influence perceptions of leadership characteristics, and in turn, preferences, as participants expressed a slight preference for voting for female politicians over male politicians. This preference was partly explained by the higher prestige ratings given to female politicians.

“Across five studies, although we found evidence that participants still stereotype leaders as male and to some extent as dominant, those very same participants did not prefer those leaders—rather, if anything, they showed a slight preference for female leaders, and a strong preference for prestigious ones,” Wiezel told PsyPost.

“In other words, our results are inconsistent with the idea that women are less preferred as leaders relative to (dominant) men. Thus, if part of the reason that fewer women run — or are nominated — for leadership positions is the belief that people don’t want women as leaders, it is worth noting that this belief is inconsistent with our findings.”

But the study, like all research, includes some caveats. The samples of three of the studies consisted of undergraduate students, which may not fully represent the general population. Additionally, the study’s reliance on self-reported preferences could be influenced by social desirability bias, where participants might respond in ways they believe are socially acceptable rather than reflecting their true preferences.

Although the researchers do note that the results seem consistent with studies of real voters, further work could also explore implicit attitudes toward leadership using methods that reduce social desirability bias, such as implicit association tests or real-world behavioral measures. Future research could also benefit from more diverse and representative samples, including older adults, professionals from various fields, and participants outside of the United States.

The study, “ Stereotypes versus preferences: Revisiting the role of alpha males in leadership ,” was authored by Adi Wiezel, Michael Barlev, Christopher R. Martos, and Douglas T. Kenrick.

The Impact of US V. Morrison on Federalism and Gender-Based Violence Legislation

This essay about the US v. Morrison Supreme Court decision explores its significant impact on American legal history, particularly regarding federalism and gender-based violence legislation. It details the case’s origins, the court’s decision, and the broader legal and societal implications. The essay also discusses Congress’s response in strengthening the Violence Against Women Act to address the constitutional issues raised by the decision and the ongoing debates it has sparked about federal and state powers.

How it works

The reverberations of US v. Morrison continue to permeate the annals of American legal history, casting a significant shadow over the complex relationship between federalism and gender-based violence legislation. This crucial Supreme Court decision not only tackled the severe issue of gender violence but also highlighted the ongoing tension between federal and state powers, ultimately reshaping the landscape of legislative authority and protection for victims nationwide.

At the heart of US v. Morrison (2000) was an examination of the constitutionality of certain elements within the seminal Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) of 1994.

Designed to address gender-based violence, VAWA provided essential support for victims and established severe penalties for offenders. Nevertheless, this case brought critical scrutiny to the federal government’s reach under the Commerce Clause, testing the limits of Congressional power.

The case originated from Christy Brzonkala’s brave lawsuit against Antonio Morrison and James Crawford, whom she accused of raping her while they were students at Virginia Polytechnic Institute. Brzonkala utilized VAWA’s civil rights remedy, asserting that the defendants had breached her federally protected rights. However, Morrison and Crawford contested the constitutionality of VAWA, arguing that Congress had exceeded its authority by regulating non-economic, violent criminal behavior through the Commerce Clause.

The Supreme Court, in a narrow 5-4 decision, ruled in favor of Morrison, declaring the civil rights remedy of VAWA unconstitutional. The majority held that the act’s linkage to interstate commerce was too indirect, asserting that such matters should fall within the states’ jurisdiction, traditionally responsible for handling criminal conduct. This pivotal decision marked a significant turn in the Court’s approach to federal power, reinforcing state sovereignty and setting boundaries on Congressional authority.

The impact of US v. Morrison was profound, sparking widespread debate over federalism, separation of powers, and the extent of Congressional jurisdiction. By upholding state primacy and limiting federal overreach, the ruling strengthened the foundations of dual federalism, where federal and state governments maintain distinct spheres of influence.

Critics of the ruling argued that it jeopardized national efforts to address gender-based violence. The invalidated civil rights remedy had provided a crucial mechanism for victims to seek redress and accountability, especially where local law enforcement was inadequate. By striking down this provision, the Supreme Court arguably diminished the federal government’s role in protecting vulnerable groups and enforcing civil rights.

In response to the ruling, Congress took steps to refine VAWA during its 2005 reauthorization, adding provisions to solidify its constitutional basis and extend protections for victims. These amendments included detailed findings that linked gender-based violence more directly to interstate commerce, aiming to establish a firmer ground for federal involvement.

Moreover, Congress introduced additional measures to fill the void left by the invalidated civil rights remedy, including funding for victim services, law enforcement training, and prevention programs. These efforts helped to alleviate some of the adverse effects of the Morrison decision, though the ruling remains a potent example of the ongoing conflict between federal authority and state rights.

US v. Morrison also sparked broader societal discussions on the nexus of gender, violence, and legal rights. It highlighted the challenges faced by survivors of sexual assault and domestic violence in a legal system often laden with institutional barriers. The case underscored the need for comprehensive legislative approaches that tackle the root causes of gender-based violence while respecting the tenets of federalism and individual freedoms.

In summation, US v. Morrison represents a defining moment in the evolution of federalism and gender-based violence legislation in the U.S. Although the decision restricted federal power, it also inspired renewed legislative efforts to address gender violence innovatively. As the legal and societal landscapes continue to shift, the legacy of US v. Morrison reminds us of the ongoing need to balance diverse interests and pursue justice for all affected individuals.

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A Conversation With

Hilary cass says u.s. doctors are ‘out of date’ on youth gender medicine.

Dr. Hilary Cass published a landmark report that led to restrictions on youth gender care in Britain. U.S. health groups said it did not change their support of the care.

By Azeen Ghorayshi

After 30 years as one of England’s top pediatricians, Dr. Hilary Cass was hoping to begin her retirement by learning to play the saxophone.

Instead, she took on a project that would throw her into an international fire: reviewing England’s treatment guidelines for the rapidly rising number of children with gender distress, known as dysphoria.

At the time, in 2020, England’s sole youth gender clinic was in disarray. The waiting list had swelled, leaving many young patients waiting years for an appointment. Staff members who said they felt pressure to approve children for puberty-blocking drugs had filed whistle-blower complaints that had spilled into public view. And a former patient had sued the clinic, claiming that she had transitioned as a teenager “after a series of superficial conversations with social workers.”

The National Health Service asked Dr. Cass, who had never treated children with gender dysphoria but had served as the president of the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health, to independently evaluate how the agency should proceed.

Over the next four years, Dr. Cass commissioned systematic reviews of scientific studies on youth gender treatments and international guidelines of care. She also met with young patients and their families, transgender adults, people who had detransitioned, advocacy groups and clinicians.

Her final report , published last month, concluded that the evidence supporting the use of puberty-blocking drugs and other hormonal medications in adolescents was “remarkably weak.” On her recommendation, the N.H.S. will no longer prescribe puberty blockers outside of clinical trials. Dr. Cass also recommended that testosterone and estrogen, which allow young people to develop the physical characteristics of the opposite sex, be prescribed with “extreme caution.”

Dr. Cass’s findings are in line with several European countries that have limited the treatments after scientific reviews . But in America, where nearly two dozen states have banned the care outright, medical groups have endorsed the treatments as evidence-based and necessary .

The American Academy of Pediatrics declined to comment on Dr. Cass’s specific findings, and condemned the state bans. “Politicians have inserted themselves into the exam room, which is dangerous for both physicians and for families,” Dr. Ben Hoffman, the organization’s president, said.

The Endocrine Society told The New York Times that Dr. Cass’s review “does not contain any new research” that would contradict its guidelines. The federal health department did not respond to requests for comment.

Dr. Cass spoke to The Times about her report and the response from the United States. This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.

What are your top takeaways from the report?

The most important concern for me is just how poor the evidence base is in this area. Some people have questioned, “Did we set a higher bar for this group of young people?” We absolutely didn’t. The real problem is that the evidence is very weak compared to many other areas of pediatric practice.

The second big takeaway for me is that we have to stop just seeing these young people through the lens of their gender and see them as whole people, and address the much broader range of challenges that they have, sometimes with their mental health, sometimes with undiagnosed neurodiversity. It’s really about helping them to thrive, not just saying “How do we address the gender?” in isolation.

You found that the quality of evidence in this space is “remarkably weak.” Can you explain what that means?

The assessment of studies looks at things like, do they follow up for long enough? Do they lose a lot of patients during the follow-up period? Do they have good comparison groups? All of those assessments are really objective. The reason the studies are weak is because they failed on one or more of those areas.

The most common criticism directed at your review is that it was in some way rigged because of the lack of randomized controlled trials, which compare two treatments or a treatment and a placebo, in this field. That, from the get-go, you knew you would find that there was low-quality evidence.

People were worried that we threw out anything that wasn’t a randomized controlled trial, which is the gold standard for study design. We didn’t, actually.

There weren’t any randomized controlled trials, but we still included about 58 percent of the studies that were identified, the ones that were high quality or moderate quality. The kinds of studies that aren’t R.C.T.s can give us some really good information, but they have to be well-conducted. The weakness was many were very poorly conducted.

There’s something I would like to say about the perception that this was rigged, as you say. We were really clear that this review was not about defining what trans means, negating anybody’s experiences or rolling back health care.

There are young people who absolutely benefit from a medical pathway, and we need to make sure that those young people have access — under a research protocol, because we need to improve the research — but not assume that that’s the right pathway for everyone.

Another criticism is that this field is being held to a higher standard than others, or being exceptionalized in some way. There are other areas of medicine, particularly in pediatrics, where doctors practice without high-quality evidence.

The University of York, which is kind of the home of systematic reviews, one of the key organizations that does them in this country, found that evidence in this field was strikingly lower than other areas — even in pediatrics.

I can’t think of any other situation where we give life-altering treatments and don’t have enough understanding about what’s happening to those young people in adulthood. I’ve spoken to young adults who are clearly thriving — a medical pathway has been the right thing for them. I’ve also spoken to young adults where it was the wrong decision, where they have regret, where they’ve detransitioned. The critical issue is trying to work out how we can best predict who’s going to thrive and who’s not going to do well.

In your report, you are also concerned about the rapid increase in numbers of teens who have sought out gender care over the last 10 years, most of whom were female at birth. I often hear two different explanations. On the one hand, there’s a positive story about social acceptance: that there have always been this many trans people, and kids today just feel freer to express who they are. The other story is a more fearful one: that this is a ‘contagion’ driven in large part by social media. How do you think about it?

There’s always two views because it’s never a simple answer. And probably elements of both of those things apply.

It doesn’t really make sense to have such a dramatic increase in numbers that has been exponential. This has happened in a really narrow time frame across the world. Social acceptance just doesn’t happen that way, so dramatically. So that doesn’t make sense as the full answer.

But equally, those who say this is just social contagion are also not taking account of how complex and nuanced this is.

Young people growing up now have a much more flexible view about gender — they’re not locked into gender stereotypes in the way my generation was. And that flexibility and fluidity are potentially beneficial because they break down barriers, combat misogyny, and so on. It only becomes a challenge if we’re medicalizing it, giving an irreversible treatment, for what might be just a normal range of gender expression.

What has the response to your report been like in Britain?

Both of our main parties have been supportive of the report, which has been great.

We have had a longstanding relationship with support and advocacy groups in the U.K. That’s not to say that they necessarily agree with all that we say. There’s much that they are less happy about. But we have had an open dialogue with them and have tried to address their questions throughout.

I think there is an appreciation that we are not about closing down health care for children. But there is fearfulness — about health care being shut down, and also about the report being weaponized to suggest that trans people don’t exist. And that’s really disappointing to me that that happens, because that’s absolutely not what we’re saying.

I’ve reached out to major medical groups in the United States about your findings. The American Academy of Pediatrics declined to comment on your report, citing its own research review that is underway . It said that its guidance, which it reaffirmed last year, was “grounded in evidence and science.”

The Endocrine Society said “we stand firm in our support of gender-affirming care,” which is “needed and often lifesaving.”

I think for a lot of people, this is kind of dizzying. We have medical groups in the United States and Britain looking at the same facts, the same scientific literature, and coming to very different conclusions. What do you make of those responses?

When I was president of the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health, we did some great work with the A.A.P. They are an organization that I have enormous respect for. But I respectfully disagree with them on holding on to a position that is now demonstrated to be out of date by multiple systematic reviews.

It wouldn’t be too much of a problem if people were saying “This is clinical consensus and we’re not sure.” But what some organizations are doing is doubling down on saying the evidence is good. And I think that’s where you’re misleading the public. You need to be honest about the strength of the evidence and say what you’re going to do to improve it.

I suspect that the A.A.P., which is an organization that does massive good for children worldwide, and I see as a fairly left-leaning organization, is fearful of making any moves that might jeopardize trans health care right now. And I wonder whether, if they weren’t feeling under such political duress, they would be able to be more nuanced, to say that multiple truths exist in this space — that there are children who are going to need medical treatment, and that there are other children who are going to resolve their distress in different ways.

Have you heard from the A.A.P. since your report was published?

They haven’t contacted us directly — no.

Have you heard from any other U.S. health bodies, like the Department of Health and Human Services, for example?

Have you heard from any U.S. lawmakers?

No. Not at all.

Pediatricians in the United States are in an incredibly tough position because of the political situation here. It affects what doctors feel comfortable saying publicly. Your report is now part of that evidence that they may fear will be weaponized. What would you say to American pediatricians about how to move forward?

Do what you’ve been trained to do. So that means that you approach any one of these young people as you would any other adolescent, taking a proper history, doing a proper assessment and maintaining a curiosity about what’s driving their distress. It may be about diagnosing autism, it may be about treating depression, it might be about treating an eating disorder.

What really worries me is that people just think: This is somebody who is trans, and the medical pathway is the right thing for them. They get put on a medical pathway, and then the problems that they think were going to be solved just don’t go away. And it’s because there’s this overshadowing of all the other problems.

So, yes, you can put someone on a medical pathway, but if at the end of it they can’t get out of their bedroom, they don’t have relationships, they’re not in school or ultimately in work, you haven’t done the right thing by them. So it really is about treating them as a whole person, taking a holistic approach, managing all of those things and not assuming they’ve all come about as a result of the gender distress.

I think some people get frustrated about the conclusion being, well, what these kids need is more holistic care and mental health support, when that system doesn’t exist. What do you say to that?

We’re failing these kids and we’re failing other kids in terms of the amount of mental health support we have available. That is a huge problem — not just for gender-questioning young people. And I think that’s partly a reflection of the fact that the system’s been caught out by a growth of demand that is completely outstripping the ability to provide it.

We don’t have a nationalized health care system here in the United States. We have a sprawling and fragmented system. Some people have reached the conclusion that, because of the realities of the American health care system, the only way forward is through political bans. What do you make of that argument?

Medicine should never be politically driven. It should be driven by evidence and ethics and shared decision-making with patients and listening to patients’ voices. Once it becomes politicized, then that’s seriously concerning, as you know well from the abortion situation in the United States.

So, what can I say, except that I’m glad that the U.K. system doesn’t work in the same way.

When asked after this interview about Dr. Cass’s comments, Dr. Hoffman, the A.A.P.’s president, said that the group had carefully reviewed her report and “added it to the evidence base undergoing a systematic review.” He also said that “Any suggestion the American Academy of Pediatrics is misleading families is false.”

Azeen Ghorayshi covers the intersection of sex, gender and science for The Times. More about Azeen Ghorayshi

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Gender Inequality in the WAEMU: Current Situation and Opportunities

Author/Editor:

Publication Date:

May 17, 2024

Electronic Access:

Free Download . Use the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to view this PDF file

This paper documents the current state of gender inequalities in the WAEMU by focusing on outcomes (health, education, labor market and financial inclusion) and opportunities (economic rights). The findings show that despite significant progress toward gender equality over the last three decades, there are still prevalent gender-based disparities, which prevent women from fulfilling their economic potential. Both empirical and model-based estimates suggest that the WAEMU can reap substantial economic gains by mitigating the existing gender gaps in schooling and labor market outcomes. Hence, achieving gender equality remains a macro-critical goal for the region. Going forward, the need for specific policies supportive of gender equality may vary in each member country, but a multifaceted and holistic approach is needed to unleash the related economic potential in the WAEMU as a whole.

Selected Issues Paper No. 2024/016

International organization Monetary policy

9798400276811/2958-7875

SIPEA2024016

Please address any questions about this title to [email protected]