Sex typing and the perception of body outlines

Does sex typing influence one's direct perception of gender from physical body cues? To answer this question, a study was conducted in which 47 female and 39 male subjects, after filling out the Bem Sex Role Inventory, viewed 24 body outlines varying in waist and shoulder width. Subjects were asked to indicate whether each body was female or male, or whether they were uncertain about its gender. Subjects also selected what they judged to be the most attractive and most typical female and male bodies from among the 24 body outlines. Finally, the actual shoulder, waist, and hip widths of 66 subjects were measured as a normative comparison to subjects' judgments of “typical” and “attractive” body proportions. Analyses indicated that sex-typed subjects used the “uncertain” rating less than did non-sex-typed subjects, and that males used that rating less than females did. Thus, sex-typed subjects and males showed a stronger tendency to classify stimuli by gender. Sex-typed subjects also tended to nominate more physically divergent male and female bodies as attractive than did non-sex-typed subjects; however, there were no effects of assessed masculinity or femininity on nominations of typical male and female bodies. In addition, the data provide evidence that subjects judged there to be greater physical differences between the sexes than actually exist. The results are discussed in terms of recent research on gender schemas and prototypes in person perception.     

Learning directions of objects specified by vision,spatial audition,or auditory spatial language

The modality by which object azimuths (directions) are presented affects learning of multiple locations. In Experiment 1, participants learned sets of three and five object azimuths specified by a visual virtual environment, spatial audition (3D sound), or auditory spatial language. Five azimuths were learned faster when specified by spatial modalities (vision, audition) than by language. Experiment 2 equated the modalities for proprioceptive cues and eliminated spatial cues unique to vision (optic flow) and audition (differential binaural signals). There remained a learning disadvantage for spatial language. We attribute this result to the cost of indirect processing from words to spatial representations.     

How Do Lay People Weight Information About Instrumentality, Expressiveness, and Gender-Typed Hobbies When Judging Masculinity–Femininity in Themselves, Best Friends, and Strangers?

To study how people weight information when judging their own and others’ masculinity–femininity (M–F), I asked 170 male and 205 female participants to rate themselves and their best friends on M–F, instrumentality, expressiveness, and gender-typed hobby preferences. Also, each participant judged the M–F of eight fictitious women (or men) described as possessing low or high instrumentality, low or high expressiveness, and hobbies typical of men or women. Regression analyses showed that gender-typed hobby preferences predicted M–F ratings of self and friends more strongly than instrumentality or expressiveness did. Similarly, analyses of participants’ judgments of fictitious people showed that participants weighted gender-typed hobbies more strongly than instrumentality and expressiveness when judging targets’ M–F. All results converged to show that lay people’s judgments of M–F are based more on information about gender-typed interests than on information about instrumentality or expressiveness.     

Gender-related traits in gay men, lesbian women, and heterosexual men and women: the virtual identify of homosexual-heterosexual diagnosticity and gender diagnosticity

Three studies investigated the relationship between gender-related traits and sexual orientation. Study 1 showed that gay men and lesbians in an unselected sample of 721 college students differed from same-sex heterosexuals most strongly on gender diagnosticity (GD) measures, which assess male- versus female-typicality of interests (effect sizes of 2.70 for men and .96 for women) and least strongly on measures of instrumentality (I) and expressiveness (E). In Study 2, GD measures showed large differences between 95 gay and 136 heterosexual men (effect sizes of 1.61 and 1.83) and between 46 lesbian and 225 heterosexual women (effect sizes of .98 and 1.28), whereas I and E showed much smaller differences. In Study 3, GD showed large differences between 90 gay and 81 heterosexual men (effect sizes of 1.76 and 1.97) and between 82 lesbians and 108 heterosexual women (effect sizes 1.67 and 1.70). whereas I and E showed much smaller differences. Using data from Studies 2 and 3, "gay-heterosexual diagnosticity" measures were computed for men and "lesbian-heterosexual diagnosticity" measures for women, based on occupational and hobby preferences. These measures correlated very strongly with GD measures.     

Gender, Personality, and Prejudice: The Display of Authoritarianism and Social Dominance in Interviews with College Men and Women

One hundred fifty-five men and 256 women were assessed on authoritarianism, social dominance, and other personality traits. Authoritarianism showed few correlations with personality measures; however, social dominance correlated with disagreeableness, coldness, vindictiveness, and aggressiveness for all participants and with masculine interests for men. Ninety-three questionnaire participants (47 men and 46 women) were interviewed and rated on various personality traits. Both authoritarianism and social dominance were highly judgable from interviews. Authoritarian individuals, especially men, were judged to be defensive, maladjusted, and prejudiced. Socially dominant individuals, especially women, were judged to be disagreeable, cold, and prejudiced. Authoritarianism correlated particularly strongly with negative attitudes toward homosexuality, and social dominance with the endorsement of gender inequality. Results are discussed in terms of two kinds of dispositional prejudice.     

The naive perception of masculinity-femininity on the basis of expressive cues

Groups of naive judges rated 18 videotaped stimulus persons on masculinity, femininity, “dominance, assertiveness,” and “compassion, sensitivity to others.” Stimulus persons were broken down by sex and sex-typing—half were male, half female—and within sexes one third were classified as masculine, feminine, and androgynous on the basis of their scores on the Bem Sex Role Inventory. Two experiments are reported in which groups of judges rate stimulus persons on the basis of such different expressive information as videotaped pictures and recorded voices, videotaped pictures alone, videotaped bodies, videotaped heads, recorded voices, and still photos. The results showed: (1) Judges reliably rated masculinity-femininity from largely expressive cues: (2) judgments of masculinity-femininity were not predominantly determined by judgments of sex role-related traits: (3) the naive judgment of masculinity-femininity significantly corresponded to stimulus subjects' assessed sex roles; (4) stimulus subjects (particulary males) showed a consistent display of masculinity-femininity across expressive channels; and (5) judges used different expressive cues in judging masculinity-femininity in males and females. These results are related to broader questions concerning the relation between expressive behavior and personality.     

Expressive control,expressive consistency,and the correspondence between expressive behavior and personality1

Does expressive behavior reflect personality? This paper proposes that expressive control is an important “moderating variable” affecting expressive behavior, expressive consistency, and the correspondence between expressive behavior and personality. To demonstrate this, a study was carried out in which 68 subjects were selected, according to a 2×2×2 factorial design, who were low and high on assessed extraversion, neuroticism, and self-monitoring (a measure of expressive control). Subjects were then videotaped as they role-played being teachers. A number of specific expressive behaviors were measured (subjects' stride length, graphic expansiveness, percent of forward eye-contact, and percent of time talking), and also groups of naive judges rated how “extraverted” and “anxious” subjects appeared. The following results supported our hypothesis: (1) Self-monitoring was significantly related to subjects' expressive behaviors and judged personalities, while assessed extraversion and anxiety were not. (2) Expressive control was used to suppress the “accurate” display of anxiety but not extraversion. (3) Bodily expression was less controlled than facial or vocal expression. And (4), persons low and high on self-monitoring showed different patterns of cross-situational and cross-channel (face, body, voice) expressive consistency.     

S-R compatibility effects due to context-dependent spatial stimulus coding

Responses are faster with spatial S-R correspondence than with noncorrespondence (spatial compatibility effect), even if stimulus location is irrelevant (Simon effect). In two experiments, we sought to determine whether stimuli located above and below a fixation point are coded as left and right (and thus affect the selection of left and right responses) if the visual context suggests such a coding. So, stimuli appeared on the left or right eye of a face’s image that was tilted by 90° to one side or the other (Experiment 1) or varied between upright and 45° or 90° tilting (Experiment 2). Whether stimulus location was relevant (Experiment 1) or not (Experiment 2), responses were faster with correspondence of (face-based) stimulus location and (egocentrically defined) response location, even if stimulus and response locations varied on physically orthogonal dimensions. This suggests that object-based spatial stimulus codes are formed automatically and thus influence the speed of response selection.