Prejudice Toward Contemporary Outgroups as a Generalized Attitude

The interrelatedness of attitudes toward homosexuals, Blacks, women, and old people was studied, as well as attitude differences on demographic variables. Three hundred and nine White undergraduates responded to the Homosexual Attitude Scale, The Attitudes Toward Women Scale, Multifactor Racial Attitude Inventory, and two attitudes toward old people scales. Nine of the ten possible intercorrelations were significant beyond the .01 levels. Prejudice toward quite distinct outgroups appears to be a generalized attitude. Attitude differences were found on the demographic variables of sex, political party, and religion. Women expressed more tolerant attitudes than men toward all four outgroups studied. Republicans were more prejudiced toward homosexuals and women than were Democrats or Independents. Participants who identified themselves as Christians were less supportive of equality between the sexes than were Catholics, Protestants, or those with no religion Christians were also more prejudiced toward homosexuals than were Catholics or those with no religion.     

Toward a profile of the female voter: Sex differences in perceived physical attractiveness and competence of political candidates

Recent national attention has focused on women's voting behavior because of this group's increasing power to determine outcomes of local, state, and national elections. Research has not established whether males and females use the same decision rules in evaluating political candidates. Because of the link between perceived physical attractiveness and many positive attributes, the present study examined sex differences in ratings of attractiveness and competence of 44 men and women in the U.S. House of Representatives. Results indicated that males and females use similar rules in evaluating male politicans' attractiveness. Women show a pro-female sentiment in evaluating female politicians' competence. Physical attractiveness was positively related to perceived competence for both male and female politicians. Contrary to previous research, women voters showed a marked pro-female sentiment, and men were neutral, evaluating male and female politicians similarly.