Impact of mothers' life style on adolescent gender-role socialization

The perceptions and attitudes of 365 eighth-grade girls were surveyed to examine the direct and indirect impact of mothers' life style on adolescents' gender-role development. Among the hypotheses investigated were the following: (1) mothers' activity outside the home enhances her status and increases the likelihood of diminished gender-role differentiation in the family and (2) status and parental role differentiation explain a greater proportion of the variance in the gender-role socialization variables than maternal life style. Multiple regression analyses were carried out to determine which combination of life style and intervening variables would best predict gender-role responses. Collectively, the results indicated only modest relationships between maternal characteristics and girls' gender-role socialization. The appropriateness of this model for future research is discussed.Data reported here are from a study conducted while the senior author was a Charles Phelps Taft Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Sociology at the University of Cincinnati.     

Remember the Children,Honey! Spouses' Gender-Role Attitudes and Working Mothers' Work-to-Family Conflict

Work-to-family conflict (WFC) is a pressing issue for many working parents, in particular for working mothers, and hence, understanding the factors that contribute to WFC is important. We examined gender-role attitudes as antecedents of working mothers' WFC, focusing on both working mothers' own and their husbands' gender-role attitudes. Building on cognitive dissonance theory and crossover research, we assumed that working mothers who hold more traditional gender-role attitudes or who live with a husband who holds more traditional gender-role attitudes experience more WFC. Additionally, we assumed that the strength of these effects further depends on mothers' workload and the age of their children. We tested our hypotheses with several waves of recent data of 222 dual-earner couples, drawn from a representative sample of the Swiss Household Panel. Results showed that working mothers experienced more WFC if they held more traditional gender-role attitudes, but only if they had a high workload. Working mothers also experienced more WFC if their husbands held more traditional gender-role attitudes, however, independently of mothers' workload or age of the children. These results suggest that both spouses' gender-role attitudes influence working mothers' WFC, albeit in somewhat different ways.© 2018 International Association of Applied Psychology.     

BELIEFS AND ATTITUDES ABOUT SEXUAL AGGRESSION

This study investigated the correspondence between parents' and daughters' beliefs about sexual aggression and gender roles. The relationship between a woman's attitudes and her personal experiences with sexual victimization was also examined. The participants were 236 female undergraduates, 148 mothers, and 110 fathers. One hundred-three matching triads were collected. Participants evaluated victim responsibility for written scenarios depicting a date-rape victim. Information about gender-role attitudes, perceived family communication, and previous sexual experiences was also collected. Results indicated that daughter–mother, daughter–father, and mother–father dyads shared attitudes about gender roles and beliefs about victim responsibility. Parental attitudes also predicted daughters' attitudes, but family communication did not moderate the relationship between parental attitudes and daughters' attitudes. Mothers' and daughters' experiences of coerced sex were not associated. A relationship between attitudes and beliefs and experiences of coerced sex emerged only for mothers. Mothers with a history of coerced sex adhered to more traditional gender-role attitudes and assigned more responsibility to the date-rape victim. The need for further research in the area of familial attitudes about rape is discussed.     

THE IMPACT OF RELIGION ON GENDER-ROLE ATTITUDES

Given the apparently growing significance of religion in American life, the general problem addressed in this paper was the relation between religious orientation and gender-related attitudes and behaviors. More specifically, this study examined variation over a range of dimensions of gender-role attitudes held by women in predominantly female and predominantly male college majors using religious devoutness and other variables as predictors. Five dimensions of gender-role attitudes were used familial roles, extrafamilial roles, male/female stereotypes, social change, and gender-role preference. No significanct difference was found between women in the two types of majors on any dimension of gender-role attitudes. Multiple regression revealed that religious devoutness was the most important variable among all those utilized in consistently predicting all five dimensions of gender-role attitudes.     

Gender-Role Variables and Attitudes Toward Homosexuality

Two studies examined the relationships of gender-role variables to attitudes toward homosexuality. Study 1, a meta-analysis, found that endorsement of traditional gender-role beliefs, modern sexism, and hypermasculinity were related to attitudes, but that gender-role self-concept was not. Study 2 examined the relationships of endorsement of male role norms, attitudes toward women, hostile sexism, benevolent sexism, modern sexism, hypermasculinity, and hyperfemininity to attitudes toward homosexuality and self-reported antigay behaviors in a college student sample. The best predictors of attitudes were participant gender, endorsement of male role norms, attitudes toward women, benevolent sexism, and modern sexism. The best predictors of antigay behavior were participant gender and hyper-gender-role orientation; attitudes toward women and modern sexism were also predictors for men but not for women.     

Gender-role conflict scale: College men's fear of femininity

Gender-role conflict exists when gender roles have negative consequences for people. This research reports initial validity and reliability data on measures of gender-role conflict for men. Two measures, Gender Role Conflict Scale I and II (GRCS-I and GRCS-II) were constructed to assess patterns of gender-role conflict described in the literature. GRCS-I assesses men's personal gender-role attitudes, behaviors, and conflicts. GRCS-II assesses men's gender-role conflicts in specific gender-role conflict situations. Both GRCS measures and the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ) were administered to male college students (N=527). Initial factor-analytic data for GRCS-I and GRCS-II demonstrated eight meaningful factors. Acceptable test-retest and internal consistency reliabilities were found for both measures. MANOVA, ANOVA, and Tukey procedures indicated differences for subjects across the four PAQ categories. Significant gender-role conflict differences across the factors were found for men who were instrumental, expressive, or both instrumental and expressive. Results of these differences are reported, as well as implications for future development of both scales.The authors are indebted to Dr. Nancy Betz (Ohio State University) who generously gathered data for us during the Spring Semester, 1982. This research was supported by a grant from the General Research Fund of the University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas. This paper was presented at the American Psychological Association Annual Convention, Washington, DC, August 26, 1982.     

Mothers’ Gender-Role Attitudes and Their Responses to Young Children’s Hypothetical Display of Shy and Aggressive Behaviors

The purpose of this study was to investigate the role of child gender and maternal gender-role attitudes in mothers’ reactions to hypothetical vignettes depicting their preschool-aged child displaying aggressive and shy behaviors. Participants were 78 mothers of preschool-aged children (43 girls, 35 boys; M _age?=?47.44?months, SD?=?11.00) living in a mid-sized city in Ontario, Canada. Mothers provided reports of their gender-role attitudes and rated their expectancies and emotional/behavioral reactions following hypothetical vignettes depicting their child displaying physically aggressive and shy-withdrawn behaviors. It was hypothesized that mothers would respond with more negative (and less positive) emotions and expectancies in response to children’s gender-incongruent problem behaviors (i.e., shyness among boys, aggression among girls). It was further hypothesized that these gender effects would be more pronounced among mothers espousing more traditional (i.e., less egalitarian) gender-role attitudes. Results of multiple regression analyses indicated that mothers anticipated more negative consequences to aggression among boys than among girls. Several significant interaction effects also emerged between child gender and maternal gender-role attitudes, particularly with regards to children’s shyness. Among mothers of boys, a more egalitarian gender-role attitude was associated with greater anticipated benefits of shyness, and both more positive and more negative emotional responses to shyness. For mothers of girls, however, the opposite pattern emerged. Results provide some support for the notion that mothers may enforce gender-typical social behaviors in their children, particularly if they themselves hold more traditional gender-role attitudes.     

The Gender Belief System,Authoritarianism, Social Dominance Orientation,and Heterosexuals' Attitudes Toward Lesbians and Gay Men

We tested hypotheses drawn from three theoretical perspectives—gender belief system, authoritarianism, and social dominance—concerning heterosexuals' attitudes toward lesbians and gay men. Data from 122 male and 131 female heterosexual college students with mostly White, middle-class backgrounds indicated that constructs postulated by all three perspectives played important roles in predicting attitudes: Gender differences in attitudes toward lesbians and gay men were mediated by social dominance orientation and gender-role beliefs, indicating that gender role beliefs may act as legitimizing myths to justify antigay attitudes. Authoritarianism had both a direct relationship to attitudes toward lesbians and gay men and an indirect relationship mediated by gender-role beliefs.     

Influence of maternal gender-role beliefs and role satisfaction on daughters' vocational interests

We examined whether maternal gender-role ideologies and role satisfaction influence daughters' vocational interests. 152 female undergraduate students (Mage = 18.7 years), from predominantly white, middle- to upper-class homes, as well as their mothers and fathers, participated voluntarily. Students identified their career choices, completed a gender-role ideology scale and an identification with parents questionnaire, and reported their perceptions of their mothers' and fathers' gender-role ideologies and role satisfaction. Each parent completed a gender-role ideology scale and a role satisfaction questionnaire. Path analyses support a model in which actual and perceived maternal attitudes (n= 135) influence the gender-role ideologies of daughters, which in turn influence the gender stereotyped nature of daughters' career choices (Q= .90; W= 14.00, p> .05); furthermore daughters' maternal identification moderated the relationship between perceived maternal gender-role ideology and own gender-role ideology. A similar model substituting fathers' attitudes (n= 128) did not fit the data. The results indicate how maternal attitudes influence daughters' career choice, and support the role of family socialization on children's career aspirations.     

Gender Roles in the Arab World: Development and Psychometric Properties of the Arab Adolescents Gender Roles Attitude Scale

Scant research has been conducted on gender in the Arab world; one explanation is due to a lack of Arabic measures on gender-related issues. To advance scientific work on gender in the Arab world, we developed the Arab Adolescents Gender Roles Attitude Scale (AAGRAS), the first known reliable and valid Arabic measure of gender-role attitudes. To develop this measure, we conducted two studies based on data collected from 776 high school students 15–19 years-old from the state of Qatar. Exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis produced 12 items divided equally into two subscales. One subscale assesses traditional gender-role attitudes, whereas the other measures egalitarian gender-role attitudes. Our findings indicate that young men are more likely to resist gender equality than young women are. Moreover, those who hold traditional attitudes are more likely to disapprove of women occupying positions of authority. The AAGRAS is a useful assessment tool that policymakers, researchers, practitioners, and educators can use to study gender-role attitudes in the Arab world and to develop educational and intervention programs that encourage adolescents to identify, confront, and avoid prejudice and discrimination against women and ultimately adopt more egalitarian gender roles.     

PERSONAL ATTITUDES OR STRUCTURAL FACTORS? A CONTEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF BREASTFEEDING DURATION

A personal attitudes model (i.e., infant feeding choices are based on personal attitudes primarily) and a structural factors model (i.e., feeding choices are shaped by the structural contexts of women's lives, as much as personal attitudes) of women's breastfeeding behavior were tested by surveying a longitudinal sample of 548 mostly European American women recruited for the Wisconsin Maternity Leave and Health Project. Personal attitudes (enjoyment of breastfeeding, gender-role attitudes, and work and family salience) accounted for half as much variance in breastfeeding duration for women who were employed outside the home compared to those who were not. For women employed outside the home, both structural variables (length of maternity leave and workplace flexibility) and personal attitudes predicted duration. These results have implications for how we construct the issue of women's breastfeeding decisions.     

Gender-Role Attitudes and Earnings: A Multinational Study of Married Women and Men

This paper examines the impact of gender-role attitudes on earnings for married individuals. Using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) and nationally representative data, we tested our hypotheses on 4,785 males and 4,368 females from 28 countries located in North and South America, Eastern and Western Europe, the Mediterranean, Asia and the South Pacific. We found that compared to individuals in their own countries, women with egalitarian attitudes had significantly higher earnings then women with traditional attitudes. In addition, for both women and men, we found an interaction between gender-role attitudes and hours worked. Egalitarianism had a stronger positive effect on earnings among individuals who worked more hours.     

The Chinese in Canada: a study in ethnic change with emphasis on gender roles

The authors investigated the impact of ethnic change experienced by Chinese Canadian couples on gender-role attitude, household task-role expectations and performance. The authors presented acculturation and Chinese ethnic identification as the two discriminant facets of ethnic change. Results indicated a nonsignificant role of acculturation in bringing about modifications of the gender-role attitudes of husbands and of their household task-role expectations. In contrast, the acculturation of Chinese Canadian wives proved to be a significant factor in promoting more modern (less traditional) gender-role attitudes, which in turn led to role expectations that they should contribute less to the performance of the tasks that traditionally fall in the female domain whereas their husbands should contribute more. Subsequent results also revealed that the acculturation of wives was directly linked to the role expectation that they should assume a greater share of responsibility in taking care of the traditionally husband-responsible tasks whereas their husbands should contribute a smaller share. Moreover, Chinese ethnic identification emerged as a significant determinant of husbands' gender-role attitudes and influenced their role expectation that husbands should contribute more to the performance of the tasks that traditionally fall in the male domain whereas their wives should contribute less.     

Changing men's male gender-role attitudes by applying the elaboration likelihood model of attitude change

The traditional male gender role has been associated with a host of psychological and physical problems. In this study, 118 male university students viewed one of two videotaped interventions based on R. E. Petty and J. T. Cacioppo's [(1986) Communication and Persuasion: Central and Peripheral Routes to Attitude Change, New York: Springer-Verlag) elaboration likelihood model of attitude change (ELM) or were in a control group. One intervention was designed to create less traditional male gender-role attitudes, the other to enhance participants' attitudes toward seeking psychological help. Both interventions significantly changed male gender-role attitudes on Brannon Masculinity Scale scores, but not their Gender Role Conflict Scale—I scores, and neither influenced help-seeking attitudes. The overall pattern of scores suggests that men's attitudes about the male role may be less resistant to change than attitudes about one's own gender role or one's fear of femininity.     

Gender-Role Identity,Attitudes Toward Marriage,and Gender-Segregated School Backgrounds

The purpose of this study was twofold: (1) to investigate the relationship between gender-role identity and attitudes toward marriage by comparing Bem's gender schema theory and Spence's multifactorial model of gender identity; (2) to examine the effects of gender-segregated school backgrounds on gender-role identity and attitudes toward marriage. A total of 524 male and 696 female Japanese college students completed the Japanese version of the Bem Sex Role Inventory and a series of questions regarding attitudes toward marriage. Overall results were more supportive of Spence's multifactorial model. The effect of school background was found only in women; women without any coeducational school background had relatively strong masculinity and desired to marry at an older age, but tended to have a conservative opinion about men taking nontraditional roles.     

A Longitudinal Application of the Theory of Reasoned Action to Women's Career Behavior1

Based on the theory of reasoned action (TRA; Fishbein & Ajzen, 1975), we hypothesized that young women's career intentions would be predicted by their gender-role attitudes and perceptions of their boyfriends' and parents' career-related preferences for them. Career intention was expected to predict future career behavior. The model was tested using longitudinal data from 105 women studied in 1973 and followed up 14 years later in 1987. Data were analyzed using structural equation modeling. Results supported the TRA: women's gender-role attitudes and their perceptions of important others' preferences predicted their career intentions, which predicted career behavior 14 years later. Implications for the study of women's careers and the longitudinal application of the TRA are discussed.     

Flexibility and traditionality in children's gender roles

The present study examined the correlates of variability in children's gender-role preferences. A multidimensional test battery assessed the traditionality of preferences of 376 kindergarten and third grade children in five different gender role domains, and elicited information about three significant socialization agents (parents, peers, and media). Parents of the children (N = 358) were also interviewed with regard to their attitudes and sex role socialization practices. Predictions were generated from an existing theoretical developmental model. Boys exhibited stronger sex-typed preferences than did girls. Older girls were more flexible and older boys less flexible than were their younger counterparts. In accordance with prediction, two factors were obtained; the first relevant to current gender-related activities, the other to future expectations. Present-oriented gender preferences correlated best with peer perceptions, whereas future expectations (e.g. job aspirations) were best predicted by media choices. Parental data correlated with children's preferences but not as strongly as did the peer and media scales. Predictability of children's gender-role orientations was reasonably high when a number of factors were included, thus supporting the utility of a multidimensional approach.     

THE MEASUREMENT OF GENDER-ROLE ATTITUDES A Review and Commentary

This article reviews measures of gender-role attitudes with an emphasis on The Attitudes Toward Women Scale (AWS; Spence & Helmreich, 1972); the Sex Role Egalitarianism Scale (SRES; Beere, King, Beere, & King, 1984); the Modern Sexism Scale (MS; Swim, Aikin, Hall, & Hunter, 1995); the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (ASI; Glick & Fiske, 1996), and the Children's Occupational Activity Trait-Attitude Measure (COAT-AM; Bigler, Liben, Lobliner, & Yekel, 1995). The discussion of gender-role attitude measures focuses on the following themes: psychometric criteria; theoretical and conceptual distinctions among measures; domains of attitudes and behaviors included; relationship to other measures; and the meaningfulness and relevance of items. Gender-role attitude scales are viewed as measuring gender-role ideology in a particular sociohistorical context; context-specificity is viewed as contributing to the proliferation of scales, and as limiting the usefulness of scales across cultural and temporal boundaries.     

Gender-Role Attitudes in University Students in the United States, Slovenia, and Croatia

Determinants of gender-role attitudes were examined in samples of university students from Pittsburgh in the United States, Ljubljana in Slovenia, and Osijek in Croatia. Surveys including items from the Attitudes Toward Women Scale and the Neosexism Scale were administered to a total of 1,544 U.S. students, 912 Slovene students, and 996 Croatian students between the years of 1991 and 2000. As predicted, men held less egalitarian or more sexist attitudes about the appropriate roles for women and men, and those with more frequent attendance at religious services held more sexist attitudes. No changes in attitudes were found for women over time, but Slovene males were found to become more traditional over time.     

Graduating from high school: The role of gender-related attitudes,self-concept and goal clarity in a major transition in late adolescence

An 11-month longitudinal study (T1: N = 520, M _age = 19 years) investigated the role of gender-related self-concept and goal clarity during the transition period surrounding graduation from upper secondary school in Switzerland. The first assessment took place a few months before graduation and assessed participants' gender-related self-concept (instrumentality, expressivity), gender-role attitudes, goal clarity, and job-related aspirations. Despite the high level of education, gender-related differences in attitudes and self-concept showed that boys endorsed more traditional gender-role attitudes than girls. Relationships between gender-related self-concept and attitudes showed different patterns for girls and boys. Regarding adaptation to the transition, gender-related self-concept predicted change in career-related goal clarity, which, in turn, predicted an increase in life satisfaction over time. Our results highlight the important role of instrumentality, expressivity, and career-related goal clarity during the transition of graduating from high school.