Gender and Emotion: Beyond Stereotypes

Stereotypes about gender and emotional expression tend to be imprecise and misleading. They fail to acknowledge situational, individual, and cultural variations in males' and females' emotional expressiveness. They also tend to generalize across emotional intensity and frequency, as well as across different modalities of emotional expression, e.g. verbal vs. behavioral modalities. Moreover, they tend to exaggerate the extent of gender differences in emotional expression. I argue that when gender differences in emotional expression do occur, they can be traced to social processes such as dissimilar gender roles, status and power imbalances, and differing socialization histories of males and females. These processes may predispose some males and females to express emotions differently in some cultures and in some contexts. To support this argument, I present data from two studies, one showing that the amount of time fathers spend with their children relates to the gender stereotypic nature of their children's emotional expressiveness; and the other showing that gender differences in emotional expressiveness are culturally specific in a sample of Asian international, Asian‐American, and European-American college students. Finally, I note the potentially destructive limitations imposed by stereotypes on males' and females' interpersonal functioning as well as on their mental and physical health.     

Attitudes, Stereotypes and Anti-Discriminatory Education: Developing Themes from Sullivan

Correspondence to Richard Pugh NEWI, Plas Coch Campus. Mold Road, Wrexham LL11 2AW, Wales, UK. Summary This paper acknowledges the importance of the issues that Sullivan(1998) raises, but questions assumptions made about the natureof anti-discriminatory practice and is critical of the way inwhich shifts in attitudes are interpreted as evidence of furtherproblematic discrimination. It suggests alternative interpretationsfor Sullivan's examples, and questions the conceptions of attitudesand the model of self presented in Sullivan's account of attitudechange. The paper considers stereotyping as a cognitive processand whether it is an inevitable, or invariable, phenomenon.It reviews the nature and goals of anti-discriminatory education,contending that discrimination arises not from the holding ofstrong attitudes perse, but from the nature of, and the consequencesthat follow from, particular attitudes. Finally, it makes recommendationsfor educators and provides suggestions for further developmentof the anti-discriminatory perspective.     

Cultural Stereotypes and Positioning Theory

This paper addresses the application of positioning theory , a new emerging theoretical scheme on the issue of cultural stereotyping. First, a critical conceptual analysis of the words'cultural stereotype'is presented. Secondly, the basic tenets of positioning theory are outlined. Finally, it will be demonstrated how the framework of positioning theory can be used to analytically refine the concept of cultural stereotype. The main upshot of the article is that within social psychology, the concept of cultural stereotype is used in a conceptually vague and blurred way and that, with the necessary conceptual refinements, other research-agendas on stereotypes will have to be tackled if social psychologists want to contribute anything to the societal efforts of changing stereotypes.     

马克思与犹太人问题

这是作者的一次学术演讲,围绕着现代性问题展开了对马克思<论犹太人问题>的分析,并通过这一分析彰显出宗教与政治、神圣与世俗、群体与个人、市民社会与国家政权之间的矛盾冲突,为理解马克思为什么在1844年前后转入对资本主义经济关系的论述提供了一种与"犹太人问题"有关的参照.     

Sex Role Stereotypes and Middle and Old Age

Previous research focused on elderly as a generalized target group, with little differentiation between stereotypes of elderly men and elderly women. Similarly, research literature on sex-role stereotypes rarely makes reference to age of targets. To join the areas of attitude research in gerontology and sex-role stereotype research, 534 university students rated middle-aged or old man, woman, or person on a stereotype scale. A difference between male and female targets was found on only 3 adjective pairs, and age/sex interactions were found on 3. The few differences fit traditional sex-role stereotypes. Explanations for sparse sex differences and age/sex interactions are suggested.     

Allport's Legacy and the Situational Press of Stereotypes

This article focuses on two aspects of Allport's (1954) investigation of the psychology of being a target of prejudice. Whereas most researchers in this area view Allport as an expectancy theorist, we revisit another aspect of Allport's theory: the situational threat posed by negative stereotypes. First, we examine this issue, as it applies to the academic underachievement of negatively stereotyped groups, by contrasting the situational threat posed by stereotypes with traditional and current expectancy-oriented conceptions. Second, we show that stereotypes do not appear to affect self-expectations; instead, they appear to foster a climate of mistrust that results in depressed performance. Finally, we discuss how interventions that ameliorate the climate of mistrust, such as the presence of educators who are competent minority group members, tend to raise levels of performance.     

Exploring Children's Stereotypes Through Drawings: The Case of Musical Performance

Drawings of 'a person' and of 'a person playing music' were collected from children aged seven to eight years and 10–11 years to discover whether children's musical representations would reflect gender differences evident in musical learning and performance, and the increased gender rigidity with age found in instrument preferences. As in previous drawing studies, same sex figures were overwhelmingly portrayed, although older girls drew more opposite sex figures than the other children. All except the older girls overwhelmingly drew same sex musicians irrespective of the gender stereotype of the instrument portrayed. The older girls drew similar numbers of male and female figures playing masculine instruments. Fewer feminine instruments were drawn by older than by younger boys. The increased gender rigidity with age accords with the results of the preference studies, but gender stereotyping was much weaker. This is discussed in relation to what the different methodologies measure.     

Coping With Ethnic Stereotypes in the Academic Domain: Perceived Injustice and Psychological Disengagement

Psychological disengagement is the defensive detachment of self-esteem from a particular domain. In the academic arena, disengagement can result from devaluing academic success or discounting the validity of academic outcomes. We review evidence for ethnic differences in these two processes of psychological disengagement and present results of a multiethnic study examining perceived ethnic injustice and academic performance as predictors of devaluing and discounting. Among African American students, beliefs about ethnic injustice (but not academic performance) predicted greater discounting and devaluing. Among European American students, poor academic performance (but not beliefs about ethnic injustice) predicted greater devaluing and discounting. Among Latino/a students, beliefs about ethnic injustice were associated with greater discounting, whereas poorer academic performance was associated with increased devaluing.