Sex differences in work values

Sex differences in work values were investigated among 202 advanced undergraduate business students. Significant sex differences (p < .001) were found on 18 of 25 values using the P. J. Manhardt (1972, Personnel Psychology, 25, 361–368), scale with women rating 12 of these values higher than men. Some of the significant differences were consistent with stereotypical male and female value patterns (e.g., advancement and taking risks for men and comfortable work environment and pleasant associates for women), while others were in contrast to such stereotypes (e.g., security and leisure time for men and accomplishment and development of knowledge/skills for women). It was hypothesized that men and women with the same career orientation (i.e., those who ranked career, family, etc., as their primary source of life satisfaction) would not differ significantly in their work value preferences. No support was found for this hypothesis. Finally, despite item differences, there appears to be a clear trend toward similarity of the patterns of preferences in the importance of work outcomes among women and men. Rankings of work values from the present study and two previous studies, spanning approximately 16 years, indicated an average rank-order correlation between the rankings of men and women of .75 (p < .001).