Unpacking Backlash: Individual and Contextual Moderators of Bias against Female Professors

This research unpacks backlash against female professors by examining how individual characteristics and social context interact to predict student evaluations on RateMyProfessors.com. As predicted, students evaluated female professors in high-status departments more negatively than female professors in low-status departments, and this backlash effect was attenuated when the female professor was “hot.” Moreover, backlash was most pronounced for female professors who had been hired more recently and who were tough graders. A follow-up experiment replicated the main findings concerning status and attractiveness and suggested that perceived gender nonconformity may help to explain backlash against female professors.     

Student prejudice against gay male and lesbian lecturers

The authors examined whether gay men and lesbians are evaluated more negatively than individuals of unspecified sexual orientation when attributional ambiguity surrounds evaluations and whether they are evaluated similarly to unspecified others when no attributional ambiguity is present. One male and one female lecturer delivered either a strong or a weak lecture to students who either (a) believed that the lecturer was a gay man or a lesbian or (b) did not receive sexual orientation information. Contrary to predictions, the quality of the lecture did not influence the ratings of known gay male and lesbian lecturers, although lecture quality strongly influenced ratings of lecturers whose sexual orientation was unspecified. After strong lectures, participants rated known gay male and lesbian lecturers more negatively than they did lecturers whose sexual orientation was unspecified. After weak lectures, participants rated known gay male and lesbian lecturers more positively than they did the others. The authors discussed the possibility that students might moderate their ratings to avoid discriminating against gay and lesbian lecturers.     

Detecting salary discrimination against male and female managers

This paper reports two experiments that examine factors influencing the detection of salary discrimination in organizations. Subjects were presented with information about the qualifications and salaries of female and male managers in 10 departments of an hypothetical company and were asked to judge the fairness of these salaries. It was hypothesized that the amount of information and the format in which it is presented influence fairness judgments. Moreover it was hypothesized that males and females differ in their fairness judgments. The two experiments corroborate these hypotheses. The results are interpreted in terms of two possible information processing biases: encoding bias and attributional bias.     

Training educators to implement functional analyses

The present study examined the use of an instructional workshop for training educators to conduct functional analyses. Results indicated that 2 of 3 participants met the accuracy criterion following group training, whereas 1 participant required direct verbal feedback. During generalization probes, one participant accurately conducted sessions with a student in her classroom.     

Project in-step: training tomorrow's special educators

Current concerns about the efficacy of special classes for the handicapped, the widening gap between demands for professional personnel and the numbers of trained persons to meet such demands, and the narrowing financial base for training programs require the development of new models for training professional personnel. Project In-STEP is one new alternative model for training tomorow's special education professionals. Emphasizing flexible training, heavy field experience, and careful programmatic evaluation, In-STEP is seeking to point the way to new directions in training. Preliminary evaluation indicates that In-STEP offers promise of being a viable model.     

Predicting laboratory aggression against female and male targets: Implications for sexual aggression

This study assessed the ability of several variables to predict men's laboratory aggression against female and male victims. The predictors were chosen on the basis of their associations with sexual aggression against women in naturalistic settings. On the whole, these variables successfully predicted laboratory aggression against the female target but were not similarly related to aggression against the male. The data supported the view that specific factors uniquely contribute to aggression against women. It is suggested that, at least in part, such aggression needs to be examined within the larger context of sexist relations.     

Introducing educators to a psychodynamically informed teaching practice

Abstract

Prompted by the observation that many recently trained teachers find themselves unprepared to cope with many aspects of classroom life despite considerable subject matter competence and technical proficiency, this paper proposes and describes a brief instructional programme designed to enhance teachers' understanding of classroom interactions from a psychodynamic perspective. Published autobiographical accounts of gifted teachers serve as texts for reading and discussion. These personal narratives are conceptualized within psychodynamic frameworks illuminating in meaningful fashion mundane as well dramatic moments in classroom interaction. The course is intended to enhance teacher competence and morale, to stimulate further reflection and to facilitate professional discourse about children and teaching.     

Backlash,Repetition, Untimeliness: The Temporal Dynamics of Feminist Politics

Susan Faludi's Backlash, first published in 1991, offers a compelling account of feminism being forced to repeat itself in an era hostile to its transformative potentials and ambitions. Twenty years on, this paper offers a philosophical reading of Faludi's text, unpacking the model of social and historical change that underlies the “backlash” thesis. It focuses specifically on the tension between Faludi's ideal model of social change as a movement of linear, step‐by‐step, continuous progress, and her depiction of feminist history in terms of endless repetition. If we uphold a linear, teleological ideal of social change, I argue, repetition can only be thought of in negative terms—as a step backwards or a waste of time—which in turn has a negative and demoralizing impact within feminism itself. To explore an alternative model of historical time and change, I turn to the work of feminist philosopher Christine Battersby, who rethinks repetition through the Kierkegaardian mode of “recollecting forwards,” and the Nietzschean notion of “untimeliness.” I suggest that Battersby's philosophical reconceptualization of historical repetition, as a potentially creative, productive phenomenon, can be of great utility to feminists as we enact and negotiate the dynamics of backlash politics.     

A group-theoretical invariant for elementary equivalence and its role in representations of elementary classes

There is a natural map which assigns to every modelU of typeτ, (U ε St^τ) a groupG (U) in such a way that elementarily equivalent models are mapped into isomorphic groups.G(U) is a subset of a collection whose members are called Fraisse arrows (they are decreasing sequences of sets of partial isomorphisms) and which arise in connection with the Fraisse characterization of elementary equivalence. LetEC _λ ^U be defined as {U εStr ^τ: ℬ ≡U and |ℬ|=λ; thenEG _λ ^U can be faithfully (i.e. 1-1) represented onto G(U) ×π ^*, whereπ ^*, is a collection of partitions over λ∪λ²∪....