Role Play
"You're Such a Girl!" The Psychological Drain of the Gender-Role Harassment of Men
Leah Funk & Cherie Werhun
Sex Roles, July 2011, Pages 13-22
Abstract:
Men experience gender-role harassment when they are ridiculed or ostracized for being "not man enough" (Berdahl 2007). Although men's emotional (e.g. shame and anxiety) and behavioural reactions (e.g. aggression) to gender-threatening feedback have been documented (Vandello et al. 2008), potential cognitive and self-regulatory consequences of this form of harassment have yet to be investigated. In the present experiment, 84 Introductory Psychology men at a Canadian university (Winnipeg, Manitoba) either experienced or did not experience gender-role harassment (i.e. told they squeezed a handgrip ‘like a girl') before completing a set of tests (an anagram test, a stroop color-naming task, and a subsequent handgrip task). To ensure our experimental manipulation invoked a threat to participant's sense of manliness, we also included an open-ended measure of self-identification. In accordance with Social Identity research (Ellemers, Spears, & Doosje, 2002), we anticipated that harassed men would affirm male self-aspects significantly more so than non-harassed men. Overall, results demonstrated that, as predicted, gender-role harassment significantly threatened participant's sense of manhood, compromised cognitive ability, and weakened attentional self-control compared to the no harassment control condition. However, contrary to predictions, harassment did not weaken self-regulatory physical strength: men in the harassment condition exhibited increased handgrip strength compared to men in the no harassment condition, suggesting potential compensatory reactions occurred, as well. Implications of gender-role harassment for men's psychological well-being, intellect, and impulse control are discussed and areas for future research are outlined.
----------------------
Don't Ask, Don't Tell? Does disclosure of gay identity affect partner performance?
Benjamin Everly, Margaret Shih & Geoffrey Ho
Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, forthcoming
Abstract:
Supporters of policies that force gay and lesbian individuals to conceal their sexual orientation in the workplace argue that working with openly gay individuals undermines performance. We examine this claim in two studies and find the opposite effect. Specifically, participants working with openly gay partners performed better on a cognitive task (i.e., a math test) and a sensory-motor task (i.e., a Wii shooting game) than individuals left to wonder about the sexual orientation of their partners. These results suggest that policies, such as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," that introduce uncertainty into social interactions harm rather than protect performance.
----------------------
Saul Miller, Jon Maner & James McNulty
Evolution and Human Behavior, forthcoming
Abstract:
Evolutionary theories (e.g., the challenge hypothesis) suggest that testosterone plays an important role in intrasexual competition. In addition, those theories suggest that testosterone responses during competition should depend upon the presence of potential, immediate mating opportunities associated with the competition. The current research tested the hypothesis that the sex composition of individuals at a competition (ratio of opposite-sex, potential mates to same-sex individuals) would influence changes in competitors' testosterone levels. Consistent with our hypotheses, higher ratios of opposite- to same-sex individuals at an ultimate frisbee tournament were associated with greater increases in salivary testosterone among competitors. The relationship between sex ratio and increased salivary testosterone was observed for both male and female competitors and occurred regardless of whether competitors won or lost. Findings are consistent with the hypothesis that testosterone responses during competition are influenced by cues of potential, immediate mating opportunities.
----------------------
Propose with a Rose? Signaling in Internet Dating Markets
Soohyung Lee et al.
NBER Working Paper, August 2011
Abstract:
The large literature on costly signaling and the somewhat scant literature on preference signaling had varying success in showing the effectiveness of signals. We use a field experiment to show that even when everyone can send a signal, signals are free and the only costs are opportunity costs, sending a signal increases the chances of success. In an online dating experiment, participants can attach "virtual roses" to a proposal to signal special interest in another participant. We find that attaching a rose to an offer substantially increases the chance of acceptance. This effect is driven by an increase in the acceptance rate when the offer is made to a participant who is less desirable than the proposer. Furthermore, participants endowed with more roses have more of their offers accepted than their counterparts.
----------------------
Overdoing Gender: A Test of the Masculine Overcompensation Thesis
Robb Willer et al.
University of California Working Paper, March 2011
Abstract:
The masculine overcompensation thesis asserts that men react to masculinity threats with extreme demonstrations of masculinity. This often-cited account for hypermasculine behaviors was tested across four studies. Study 1 was a laboratory experiment in which men and women were randomly given feedback on a gender identity survey suggesting they were either masculine or feminine. While women showed no effects, men given feedback suggesting they were feminine expressed more homophobic attitudes, support for the Iraq War, and interest in purchasing an SUV, all views associated with masculinity in the study population. Study 2 extended these findings, showing that threatened men expressed greater support for the existence of, and desire to advance in, dominance hierarchies. Study 3 showed in a nationally representative survey study that men who reported feeling that social changes threatened the status of men also reported more homophobic attitudes, support for war, belief in male superiority, and greater dominance attitudes. No effects were found for women. Finally, Study 4 tracked men's testosterone levels, finding that men high in testosterone showed significantly stronger reactions to masculinity threats than those low in testosterone. Together, these results support the masculine overcompensation thesis, suggest it may play a role in macrosocial patterns of political and cultural attitudes, and identify a hormonal factor influencing the effect.
----------------------
Barry Kuhle
Personality and Individual Differences, forthcoming
Abstract:
Abundant evidence suggests that between sex differences exist in the degree to which cues to sexual and emotional infidelity trigger jealousy. A criticism of this research is that this commonly found sex difference is a consequence of the hypothetical scenario and forced-choice methodology that is commonly employed. This study used a novel method to explore the nature of jealousy-fueled interrogations (N = 75) in the face of actual infidelities captured on video in the syndicated reality program Cheaters. Fifty-one episodes of Cheaters were content analyzed by six coders trained to watch each episode. As predicted, men were more likely than women to inquire about the sexual aspect of their partners' infidelities, whereas women were more likely than men to inquire about the emotional aspect of their partners' infidelities. These results suggest that humans have sex-differentiated damage assessment strategies dedicated to investigating the nature of their mates' extra-pair relationships. Although previous studies have found sex differences in jealousy using prospective and retrospective reports, this is the first study to demonstrate sex differences in romantic jealousy in vivo. These findings refute the criticism that sex differences in jealousy are mere methodological artifacts. Discussion focuses on the benefits and limitations of content-analyzing Cheaters.
----------------------
Inventing a Gay Agenda: Students' Perceptions of Lesbian and Gay Professors
Kristin Anderson & Melinda Kanner
Journal of Applied Social Psychology, June 2011, Pages 1538-1564
Abstract:
Students' perceptions of lesbian and gay professors were examined in 2 studies (Ns = 622 and 545). An ethnically diverse sample of undergraduates read and responded to a syllabus for a proposed Psychology of Human Sexuality course. Syllabuses varied according to the political ideology, carefulness, sexual orientation, and gender of the professor. Students rated professors on dimensions such as political bias, professional competence, and warmth. Lesbian and gay professors were rated as having a political agenda, compared to heterosexual professors with the same syllabus. Student responses differed according to their homonegativity and modern homonegativity scores. The findings from these studies suggest that students may use different criteria to evaluate lesbian, gay, and heterosexual professors' ability to approach courses objectively.
----------------------
Left-handedness and Male-Male Competition: Insights from Fighting and Hormonal Data
Charlotte Faurie et al.
Evolutionary Psychology, August 2011, Pages 354-370
Abstract:
Male-male competition can shape some behavioral or morphological traits of males. Here we investigate if this competition could play a role in the persistence of the polymorphism of handedness in human populations. A negative frequency-dependent selection mechanism has been hypothesized, based on the fact that left-handed men may benefit from a "surprise" advantage during fighting interactions because they are rare in human populations. This advantage may thereby enhance the probability of survival of left-handed men and/or their reproductive success through an increase in social status. In this study, we first explored the association between hand preference and lifetime fighting behavior in a population of 1,161 French men. No effect of hand preference on the probability of fighting was detected, suggesting that the innate propensity to fight does not differ between left- and right-handers. However, among men who had been involved in at least one fight during their lifetime, left-handers reported significantly more fights than right-handers. To explore the biological basis of this behavior, we also investigated the testosterone concentration in saliva samples from 64 French university students. Consistent with frequencies of fights, we found a significantly higher average testosterone concentration in left-handers than in right-handers. We suggest that these behavioral and hormonal differences may be acquired throughout life due to previous experiences in a social context and may favor the persistence of left-handers in humans.
----------------------
The very high sex ratio in rural China: Impact on the psychosocial wellbeing of unmarried men
Zhou Xu Dong et al.
Social Science & Medicine, forthcoming
Abstract:
China has the highest male to female sex ratio at birth (SRB) in the world, with levels highest in poor rural areas. Rural-to-urban migration also occurs on a huge scale, but household registration regulations prevent rural-dwellers from settling permanently in cities. However, urban registration can be acquired through marriage and many rural females now acquire urban residence through this route. The purpose of this study was to examine areas where there is a high degree of rural-urban migration and a pronounced imbalance in the sex ratio of the population in the reproductive age groups and to explore the effects of this situation on the psychosocial well-being of older unmarried men in rural Guizhou, one of the poorest provinces in China. The study drew on two sources of data: (1) routine demographic data from 36 villages, and (2) in-depth semi-structured qualitative interviews with 45 unmarried men aged over 30. Our results show high levels of rural-urban migration leaving inland villages depleted of young people, especially women. There is a strong gradient across the age range in the ratio of unmarried males to females in all the villages from a ratio of 1.9 in the 20-24 age group, to a ratio of 75.0 in the 35-39 age group. Interviews with the unmarried men showed they blamed their failure to marry on poverty and the ease with which local women can marry-up to urbanites. Most felt a profound sense of failure describing themselves variously as: aimless, hopeless, miserable, sad, angry and lonely. While the SRB has recently fallen slightly in China, the problem of the gender imbalance is likely to continue for at least a generation, since the SRB has been very high in parts of rural China for 20 years, and women will continue to migrate away from rural areas in far larger numbers than men.
----------------------
The Color of Children's Gender Stereotypes
Rachel Karniol
Sex Roles, July 2011, Pages 119-132
Abstract:
To examine the impact of gender and gender-related color stereotypes, 98 Israeli preschoolers and 3rd graders chose between booklets mismatched in the stereotypicality of color (pink vs. blue) versus illustration (Batman vs. Bratz) and subsequently colored gender-stereotyped versus gender-neutral illustrations with male and female-stereotyped color crayons. Color was ignored in booklet choice. More colors were used for figures stereotypically associated with one's own gender. Boys' use of female-stereotyped colors did not vary across figures and differed significantly from chance. Boys avoided coloring the female-stereotyped figure and using pink. Girls used fewer female-stereotyped colors for the male-stereotyped figure but used both types of color equally for the other figures. The results were discussed in terms of children's socialization into gender roles
----------------------
Romantic attraction and adolescent smoking trajectories
Michael Pollard et al.
Addictive Behaviors, forthcoming
Abstract:
Research on sexual orientation and substance use has established that lesbian, gay, and bisexual (LGB) individuals are more likely to smoke than heterosexuals. This analysis furthers the examination of smoking behaviors across sexual orientation groups by describing how same- and opposite-sex romantic attraction, and changes in romantic attraction, are associated with distinct six-year developmental trajectories of smoking. The National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health dataset is used to test our hypotheses. Multinomial logistic regressions predicting smoking trajectory membership as a function of romantic attraction were separately estimated for men and women. Romantic attraction effects were found only for women. The change from self-reported heterosexual attraction to lesbian or bisexual attraction was more predictive of higher smoking trajectories than was a consistent lesbian or bisexual attraction, with potentially important differences between the smoking patterns of these two groups.
----------------------
Widaad Zaman & Robyn Fivush
Journal of Research on Adolescence, September 2011, Pages 703-716
Abstract:
Narratives about parents may help adolescents navigate their own experiences. Yet, research has not examined what adolescents know about their intergenerational past. Sixty-five 14- to 16-year-old middle-class, racially diverse adolescents narrated two stories about each parent's childhood, and 2 positive personal stories. Narratives were coded for structure (length, elaboration), theme (affiliation, achievement), and internal states. Mothers' stories were more elaborative, affiliative, and emotionally rich than fathers', which were more achievement focused. Girls' personal narratives were longer, more elaborative, and more emotionally rich than boys' and resembled narratives about mothers but not fathers. Adolescents may be narrating parents' experiences through gendered lens of the parent but personal experiences through their own gendered lens. Implications of intergenerational narratives for adolescent identity are discussed.
----------------------
Marc-André Reinhard et al.
Swiss Journal of Psychology, September 2011, Pages 149-154
Abstract:
A great deal of research has been dedicated to the difficulties women face in business management domains because they lack the required "masculinity" in terms of masculine skills and traits. Previous work has shown that when males are judged, failures in typical feminine tasks can signal high masculinity and can therefore become an asset in terms of attributed occupational success in a typical masculine job (i.e., manager position). However, jobs at lower levels of organizational hierarchies differ in their trait requirements, with some jobs requiring mostly typical feminine traits and others mostly typical masculine traits. The present study therefore tested and found support for the hypothesis that personal weaknesses and strengths in a feminine or masculine domain guide recruiters' inferences about a candidate's gender prototypicality. These inferences, in turn, predict job-suitability ratings for sex-typed jobs. It is shown that for women, too, stating weaknesses can sometimes be more advantageous than stating strengths.
----------------------
Double Helix: Reciprocity between juvenile play and brain development
Bradley Cooke & Deep Shukla
Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, forthcoming
Abstract:
This review summarizes what is presently known about the function, sexual differentiation, and neural circuitry of juvenile rough-and-tumble play. Juvenile rough-and-tumble play is a unique motivated behavior that is widespread throughout the mammalian order and usually occurs more often in males. Immediate early gene studies indicate that cortical and subcortical circuits, many of which are sensitive to sex steroid hormones, mediate juvenile play. Sex differences in rough-and-tumble play are controlled in part by neonatal exposure to androgens or their estrogenic metabolites. Studies indicate that testicular androgens during play are also necessary to stimulate male-like levels of play initiation. The resemblance of rough-and-tumble play to aggression and sexual behavior has led some to question whether male-typical adult behavior is contingent upon the experience of play. Attempts to control the amount of play through social isolation showthat social experience during adolescence is critical for male-typical adult behaviors to be expressed. This well-established finding, together with evidence that play induces neural plasticity, supports the hypothesis that juvenile play contributes to male-typical brain development that ultimately enables the expression of adult social and reproductive behavior.
----------------------
Heather Corliss et al.
American Journal of Public Health, September 2011, Pages 1683-1689
Objectives: We compared the prevalence of current homelessness among adolescents reporting a minority sexual orientation (lesbian/gay, bisexual, unsure, or heterosexual with same-sex sexual partners) with that among exclusively heterosexual adolescents.
Methods: We combined data from the 2005 and 2007 Massachusetts Youth Risk Behavior Survey, a representative sample of public school students in grades 9 though 12 (n=6317).
Results: Approximately 25% of lesbian/gay, 15% of bisexual, and 3% of exclusively heterosexual Massachusetts public high school students were homeless. Sexual-minority males and females had an odds of reporting current homelessness that was between 4 and 13 times that of their exclusively heterosexual peers. Sexual-minority youths' greater likelihood of being homeless was driven by their increased risk of living separately from their parents or guardians.
Conclusions: Youth homelessness is linked with numerous threats such as violence, substance use, and mental health problems. Although discrimination and victimization related to minority sexual orientation status are believed to be important causal factors, research is needed to improve our understanding of the risks and protective factors for homelessness and to determine effective strategies to prevent homelessness in this population.
----------------------
"We Want Them to Be as Heterosexual as Possible": Fathers Talk about Their Teen Children's Sexuality
Nicholas Solebello & Sinikka Elliott
Gender & Society, June 2011, Pages 293-315
Abstract:
This article examines heterosexual fathers' descriptions of conversations with their teen children about sexuality and their perceptions of their teen children's sexual identities. We show that fathers construct their own identities as masculine and heterosexual in the context of these conversations and prefer that their children, especially sons, are heterosexual. Specifically, fathers feel accountable for their sons' sexuality and model and craft heterosexuality for them, even as many encourage their sons to stay away from heterosexual relationships and sex until they are older. Fathers are more accepting of homosexuality for their daughters yet question the authenticity of teen lesbian identity and do not recognize their daughters' sexuality as agentic. They instead construct their daughters as sexually passive and vulnerable and position themselves as their daughters' protectors. The findings illustrate the complexities of heteronormativity in a context of shifting, frequently contested gender and sexual landscapes.