Development and validation of a behavioral sex-role inventory

To develop and validate a sex-role inventory of traditional versus nontraditional behaviors for women, 574 single and 265 married females as well as 407 males completed the Robinson Behavioral Inventory (RBI). Thirty-four-item final versions of the two forms were established through criteria requiring items to be both reliable and reported at differential rates by male versus female or by traditional versus nontraditional women. High reliability of the total scale was evident by a measure of internal consistency as well as by a measure of equivalence. The validity of the total scale was established by demonstrating the RBI as positively correlated with an attitudinal measure of women's roles but as showing discriminant validity with a social desirability scale, a political orientation scale, and an assertiveness scale. Age, income, and educational level were used as covariates to partial out possible confounding effects. Future use of the RBI would suggest extending the sample to less well-educated and a greater variety of SES populations and to women who are not members of organizations. The value of the measure lies in the collection of specific behavioral data as distinct from broad attitudinal constructs allowing for determining the attitude-behavior relationship in the area of sex roles. As a tool for evaluating outcome studies measuring changes in sex roles, this inventory is unique.     

Sex Role and Attitudinal Correlates of Desired Family Size

A survey conducted in 1971 with college students as respondents tested the hypothesis that persons approving of a relatively equivalent pattern of sex roles desire to have smaller families than do persons approving of less equivalent sex roles. Though the hypothesis was confirmed for the number of children that Ss desired to procreate, approval of sex role equivalence appeared to be only one component of a more general pattern in which Ss who desired to procreate fewer children were nontraditional in their attitudes. Thus, to the extent that Ss approved of equivalent sex roles, favored Women's Liberation, opposed conservatism, favored liberalism, and considered themselves nonreligious, they tended to have smaller family size goals for biological parenthood. However, the role and attitudinal predictors related less strongly to the total number of children desired (i.e., the sum total of the number of children desired as a biological parent plus the number of adoptions desired).     

Sharing of home responsibilities between professionally employed women and their husbands

A sample of 139 married couples with young children and with relatively equal status careers (wives were university professors or businesswomen) were interviewed about work and home life. Considerable, traditional inequity in the distribution of child-care tasks and chore responsibility was noted, but women were generally satisfied with their husbands' home involvement. In the academic sample, the longer hours each spouse worked, the more child care the other performed; in the business sample, child-care involvement was largely determined by the husband's work hours, income, and education. Overall, women were more self-critical than were men about their performance in home roles, and women's role performance was rated more highly by husbands than by themselves. Women professionals' continued use of traditional sex role standards and the importance of attending to both partners' perspectives in studies of married life are discussed.     

Social Acceptability of Hypothetical Married Couples and Their Relationships

The present experiment tested whether the physical attractiveness attributed to members of married couples would vary according to the social acceptability associated with their interconnected leader-follower roles. American college students rated female and male hypothetical stimulus persons who were described as married to each other. As predicted, both partners who were described as being in a traditional relationship with the husband as leader were stereotyped as being highly attractive. Partners in relationships that deviated from this pattern were stereotyped as being less attractive: Those enacting equal leadership roles were intermediate in attractiveness, and those with the wife as leader were least attractive. Gender identity also varied according to the social acceptability of the couple's roles, with the wife and husband in the traditional relationship being stereotyped as most highly sex typed. The personal attributes of self-esteem and social status were not affected by the social acceptability of the couple's relationship. Regardless of sex, these attributes varied according to the strength of the individual's leadership role. As a consequence, the husband's characteristics were either consistently positive or negative for the different leadership conditions; the wife's attributes were inconsistent.     

Sex-role self-concept and persistence in a traditional vs nontraditional college major for women

This article reports a 3-year follow-up study of a sample of women engineering and home economics majors who were previously studied as freshmen. It was hypothesized that persistence in the two curricula would be related to sex roles, with feminine-typed women more likely to leave engineering and masculine-typed women more likely to leave home economics. The findings did not generally support this hypothesis, however. Women in the two majors who persisted were not found to differ significantly from women who changed majors or dropped out on either sex roles or on ratings given as freshmen of their satisfaction with and certainty of college major. Persisters in engineering had higher college entrance SAT math scores than changers or dropouts. Those who changed majors from home economics tended to go into less traditional fields than home economics. Nearly all of the women who changed from engineering chose another nontraditional or male-dominated field as their second major.     

Nontraditional gender roles and the sexual experiences of heterosexual college students

The purposes of this study of heterosexual college students were (1) to specify gender differences and similarities in sexual beliefs and experiences, (2) to determine the prevalence of women enacting traditional male roles in dating and sexual interactions, and (3) to examine the relationship between women's enactment of traditional male roles and their sexual experiences. Findings for this predominantly Caucasian sample indicated that there were no significant gender differences in age of first intercourse, frequency of intercourse, oral sex participation, prevalence of coitus and anal sex, rating of how often sex partners satisfied their sex needs and desires, and reactions to recent intercourse. Although less than men's frequencies, sizable proportions of women acknowledged they had multiple sex partners and sex without emotional involvement. Support for an increased proportion of females engaging in the traditional male roles of initiating sexual involvement and dates and paying date expenses was also found. Findings also suggested that there are no simple patterns between women's sexual experience and nontraditional roles but that this association depends on the specific role as well as the status and quality of a woman's current sexual relationship. Findings were discussed in terms of their potential to contribute to women's sexual decisions.     

Employment Status and Sex Role Attitudes in Middle-class Suburban Mothers

Twenty-one employed and 31 nonemployed suburban mothers of 2nd and 6th grade children were administered the Bern Sex Role Inventory (BSRI), Welledey Role Orientation Scale (WROS), and items from the Traditional Family Inventory (TFI items). Employed mothers agreed with more nontraditional attitudes on the WROS and described themselves in more masculine or androgynous terms than did nonempldyed mothers. These differences were not affected by grade or sex of child. While the directionality of effect could not be established, it was clear that these employed women viewed themselves and their roles as wives and mothers differently than did their nonemployed counterparts. This was true despite differences in conditions of employment, and despite a more traditional overall attitude among these women than has been reported in studies using younger, upper middle-class university women. In this study, mothers employed part time were more traditional in their responses to TFI items concerned with child rearing attitudes than were mothers employed full time. Again, while directionality of effect could not be established, the decision to work part time and thus spend more time with the children is compatible with a more traditional attitude. The usefulness of these easily administered measures in dividing groups of women for further research on sex roles outside university communities is apparent.     

Children,television, and conceptions about chores: Attitudes and behaviors

This study examines the relationship between television viewing and sex role attitudes/behaviors from the perspective of cultivation theory. It uses a sample of fourth- and fifth grade children to examine if television viewing is related to children's attitudes and behaviors in relation to household chores that are typically viewed as something boys do or something girls do. The sample was equally divided into fourth and fifth graders as well as boys and girls; the racial distribution was 64% white, 21% black, and 14% other races. There were statistically significant relationships between television viewing and scores on an index of attitudes toward sex-stereotyped chores that maintained statistical significance under conditions of multiple controls. Although viewing was not related to which chores the children actually performed, there were statistically significant relationships between attitudes, behaviors, and viewing. For both the boys and girls there were moderate to strong statistically significant relationships which increased with television viewing, between attitudes about who should do certain chores, and about whether or not the children said they did chores typically associated with the other sex.     

Something Old, Something New: Evidence of Self-Accommodation to Gendered Social Change

Two studies examined how individuals adapt the self to social trends—in particular, when the social roles of the gender ingroup change, do people readily leave behind traditional roles in favor of nontraditional roles? We hypothesized that self-relevant cognitions and behaviors would accommodate to societal change, and we found that this accommodation took the shape of greater acceptance of nontraditional roles alongside continued acceptance of traditional roles. Experiment 1 included 112 undergraduates from the Midwestern U.S. who learned about social change or social stability by reading articles ostensibly published in a newspaper. Individuals who learned about social change for their gender ingroup, relative to those learning about social stability, projected greater personal success in careers, particularly for gender-nontraditional careers. Experiment 2 examined behavioral responses to social change in a sample of 198 female undergraduates from the Midwestern U.S. Participants learned about social change or social stability and then chose to view either a website focused on physical appearance (i.e., traditional choice) or leadership (i.e., nontraditional choice). Behavioral responses to social change reflected accommodation to the anticipated social structure: Individuals who learned about social change chose to view information about nontraditional rather than traditional roles. These studies provide initial experimental evidence investigating how individuals adapt the self to the social structure.     

The Married Professional Woman: An Examination of Her Role Conflicts and Coping Strategies

A group of 232 married women doctors, lawyers and professors were surveyed about their attitudes toward their roles and how they cope with role conflicts. Close to half of the women reported that it was impossible to rank the relative importance of their family and career roles, and a majority of women stated that they often experienced strains between these roles. Coping strategies such as having family members help with chores, having family members help resolve role conflicts, reducing standards within certain roles, considering personal interests important, and scheduling and organizing activities carefully were found to be significantly related to satisfaction. It is suggested that married professional women who develop effective coping strategies will find the challenge of combining a profession and a family a rewarding one.     

School stress reported by children in grades 4, 5, and 6.

Stress in the school environment of 269 elementary school children attending Grades 4, 5, and 6 of a metropolitan school district were assessed using the School Stress Questionnaire. The effects of sex, ethnic background (minority vs nonminority), type of classroom placement (regular education versus special education), and family structure (traditional versus nontraditional or divorced) were investigated. Children from nontraditional or divorced families had significantly higher school stress than children from intact families. The possibility that these results are a reflection of society's negative attitudes toward children living in nontraditional families is raised.     

Sex-role differentiation in contemporary communes

This research tests the hypothesis that the social interactions and sex roles of persons living in communes will become similar to those of persons in extended families, although the commune residents were raised in nuclear families. Commune residents and university students were asked to compare their present and their past social interactions in terms of 13 questions derived from established differences between nuclear and extended families. Commune residents, compared to students, described their present situation as less competitive, hostile, independent, and more cooperative. They also regard the statuses of men and women as more dissimilar than do students. Commune men are more likely to do more cross-sex-type chores than are male students, but still view their present and future status as higher than that of women. The findings confirm the hypothesis that communal social roles evolve to become similar to those in extended families, with the exception of work roles.This research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation Grant No. P2 S50810-000 and National Institute of Mental Health Grant No. R01 MH19589. Madison Holloway and Kathryn Gunning assisted in the data collection.     

The impact of exposure to nontraditional vocational role models on the vocational role preferences of five-year-old children

During a two-week period, 17 kindergarten children in an experimental group were exposed to nontraditional role models and curricular materials and a control group, consisting of 22 kindergarten children, was exposed to a curriculum unrelated to vocational or sex roles. A comparison of the pretest and posttest scores of the two groups, using a t-test for correlated means, indicated that neither group made a significant change in their vocational role preferences. The data indicated that following the treatment, the experimental females were slightly less traditional (p < .24) while the experimental males were more traditional (p < .09). These findings are related to developmental and socialization factors. Implications for further research and for family life education are presented.     

Changing Sex Roles and Worklife Flexibility

It has been hypothesized that the rise of women workers and nontraditional sex roles have fostered pressures for realignments of the amount and scheduling of work time. Data from exploratory survey research on a sample of 791 county employees supports and elaborates the existence of relationships between changing sex roles and preferences for alternative work patterns. Speculations are made about future sex roles and work time arrangements.     

Individual Differences in Children��s Occupational Aspirations as a Function of Parental Traditionality

The current study was designed to test the application of the social-cognitive theory of gender development in predicting the traditionality of children??s occupational aspirations (Bussey and Bandura 1999). Of primary interest was the influence of children??s efficacy for nontraditional tasks on their occupational aspirations. Participants were 150 children and their mothers from the southern United States. Mothers reported their gendered attitudes, their perception of their children??s skills, and their family??s division of paid and unpaid labor. Children reported their occupational aspirations and efficacy for traditional and nontraditional skills, occupations, and school topics. Mothers who reported nontraditional attitudes had children with nontraditional occupational aspirations. This association was mediated by children??s efficacy for nontraditional tasks, indicating some support for the social-cognitive theory.     

Locus of control and self-esteem as correlates of role orientation in traditional and nontraditional women

This research attempted to establish relationships between locus of control, self-esteem, and traditional-nontraditional behavior. It was hypothesized that (1) women tending toward internality and high self-esteem should be more likely to manifest nontraditional behaviors, as evidenced through career-oriented roles, and to rank these roles as their primary source of satisfaction; and (2) women tending toward externality and low self-esteem should be more likely to manifest traditional behavior, as evidenced through family-oriented roles, and to rank these roles as their primary source of satisfaction. The sample consisted of 91 White females in a southern metropolitan area. The data were collected using a survey design. As expected, high self-esteem internals were more likely to manifest nontraditional behavior. Contrary to expectation, low self-esteem externals were more nontraditional in role orientation.     

Predictors of Well‐Being Among Nontraditional Female Students With Children

Many nontraditional female students experience psychological distress related to balancing family and academic roles, whereas others benefit from managing multiple roles. This study of 209 nontraditional female undergraduate students with children investigated factors that influence their psychological well‐being. Results indicated that secure attachment, parent and student self‐efficacy, and social support contributed to the prediction of psychological distress (38%), self‐esteem (54%), and life satisfaction (35%). Recommendations are made to enhance counseling services for nontraditional female students.     

Tampering with Tradition: Rationales Concerning Women��s Married Names and Children��s Surnames

Despite advances in gender equality in recent decades, the majority of women continue to change their names upon marriage and parents overwhelmingly opt to give children the father??s surname. In two correlational studies, both involving undergraduate samples from Toronto, Canada, we examined gender differences in naming preferences and in justifications underlying a traditional name choice. Men were more likely to prefer traditional choices in both women??s married names (Study 1; N?=?68) and children??s surnames (Study 2; N?=?63), and were also more likely to endorse most potential rationales for these choices. Traditional choices were associated with such factors as concern regarding family dynamics, whereas nontraditional choices were associated with such factors as a desire to increase gender equality.     

Stereotypes about children with traditional and nontraditional gender roles

Two studies were done to assess different aspects of gender stereotypes about traditional and nontraditional girls and boys. In Study 1, 81 undergraduates (57 females, 24 males; 88% Caucasian, 12% Asian) rated the typicality and desirability of 25 personality traits and behaviors for boys and girls. Analyses showed that this sample believed that typical girls and boys differ on 24 out of the 25 behaviors and traits. There were fewer differences when they rated the desirability of the characteristics for each sex. In Study 2, 154 undergraduates (97 females, 57 males, 82% Caucasian, 18% Asian) estimated the percentage of occurrence of 26 traits and behaviors in traditional and nontraditional girls and boys (i.e., tomboys and sissies). These estimates were used to determine two aspects of stereotypes: the characteristics that are perceived to occur most often in a group and the characteristics that are particularly distinctive for a group. Again, stereotypes of girls and boys were found to be extensive. Percentage estimates, however, illustrated that stereotypes are probabilistic in that many boys and girls are believed to have both masculine and feminine characteristics. Stereotypes of nontraditional children were compared to stereotypes of traditional children. Analyses showed that tomboys were stereotyped similarly to traditional boys but sissies were not stereotyped similarly to traditional girls. Instead, the sissy stereotype was found to be very narrow. The advantage of using a variety of assessments methods is discussed.