Are men or women more reluctant to marry in couples sharing a non-marital birth?

In this paper I examine whether one gender is driving the “retreat from marriage” among unmarried parents. I use a sample of romantically involved unmarried parents—taken from the Fragile Families and Child Well-Being Survey—to examine whether a gender difference exists in marriage attitudes that are current-relationship specific and not relationship specific, with and without controls of current relationship quality. Using ordered logistical analysis, I find that, net of other factors, men are more positive regarding marriage and their current relationship than their female partners. She earned her M.A. in sociology from Northwestern University in 2004. Her research interests include gender and the family.     

Jocks, nerds, babes and thugs: A research note on regional differences in adolescent gender norms

We use data from 1,755 college students to explore regional differences in adolescent gender norms. Students attending four Northern universities and three Southern universities during the 1997–1998 academic year provided information on the ways that adolescents in their high schools had gained prestige with peers. The analyses revealed significant gender differences on fourteen of the fifteen most common avenues to prestige. Leading avenues to prestige for boys—sports, grades, and intelligence—did not vary by region. Leading avenues to prestige for girls—physical attractiveness, grades, and intelligence—also did not vary by region. However, consistent with the stronger emphasis on traditional moral views generally found in the South than the North, regional differences were found for several other avenues to prestige. Her work focuses on the effects of status transitions on intergenerational relations, social support networks, and marital quality. In collaboration with Karl Pillemer, she is currently studying caregivers' social networks during bereavement, and relations between caregivers and nursing home staff. Her research interests include gender stratification, family, and education. Currently, she is a Research Associate on a project examining health consequences of Mexican migration, funded primarily by the Hewlett Foundation (Co-PIs: Katherine M. Donato, (LSU), and Shawn Malia Kanaiaupuni, University of Wisconsin-Madison). Her dissertation is entitled “Wages and Domestic Labor: Explaining the Gender Gap in Earnings.     

Gender role attitudes and college students’ work and family expectations

Work and family issues are becoming increasingly important for both women and men. This study examines college students' plans and attitudes concerning work and family, gender differences in attitudes and expectations, and the effect of gender role attitudes on future expectations. Findings indicate that a majority of men and women expect to marry, have children, and work full-time. While men expect to work more hours at a job, there are no gender differences in ideal work hours. Women who hold more egalitarian gender role attitudes are less definitive in their plans to marry and have children. Egalitarian men expect to work fewer hours and are more willing to stay at home than their traditional counterparts. Her research interests include gender, family, demography, aging, and the life course. She is currently working on a study of fathers' experiences with work-family conflict and adaptive strategies for balancing the two domains, which is being funded by the American Sociological Association.     

The spousal SROK revisited: A comparison of Chicago and Houston intimate partner homicide ratios

Based on the work of Wilson and Daly (1992) and Gauthier and Bankston (1997), the major objective of the present study was to determine how the spousal sex ratios of killing (SROKs)—the number of female perpetrators for every 100 male perpetrators—compare between two geographically disparate, major U.S. cities—Chicago and Houston. The results of the analysis reported add to our general understanding of the problem of intimate partner violence, in that the relative proportions of females and males killing intimate partners were similar along at least three important dimensions. The SROKs in both cities were only high for the killing of spouses and children; we did not observe a convergence of SROKs in the killing of other blood relatives, nor acquaintances or strangers. Our analysis also strongly indicates that men’s relative risk of intimate partner homicide victimization in both cities decreases dramatically when the two parties are estranged in some way. Another major finding is that large SROKs observed in the present analysis of Chicago and Houston are primarily a Black phenomenon. The lowest SROKs were found for Hispanics, followed by non-Hispanic Whites. The article concludes with suggestions for further research in this area. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the annual symposium of the Homicide Research Working Group in Ann Arbor, Michigan. His research interests include homicide, the role of the media in violent crime, crime mapping and policing. His work appears in Policing and Society. Her research interests are in the areas of interpersonal violence and health-related issues of incarcerated women. Her work appears in journals including Criminal Justice Policy Review, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency and Violence against Women.     

The different voices of helping: Gender differences in recounting dilemmas

Carol Gilligan (1977, 1982) has proposed fundamental gender differences. Women typically conceptualize interpersonal dilemmas in terms of people and their relationships, whereas men often orient to dilemmas as practical problems. Although considerable research has explored these gender differences, they have usually been treated as psychological traits or abstract moral orientations. In this article we show how Gilligan’s theory accounts for gender differences when interviewees described their efforts to prevent others from driving under the influence (DUI intervention). This result extends Gilligan's theory by showing how it can account for real life differences between men and women. By demonstrating the relevance of Gilligan's gender differences to everyday life, we lay a foundation for further sociological exploration of her ideas. His interests include divorce, social demography, and research methods. His book on the intergenerational transmission of divorce will be published by Stanford University Press. Jerome Rabow has been a professor of sociology at the University of California-Los Angeles since 1965. He has published more than 100 articles in the areas of drunk driving intervention, gender and money, education, and race relations. He recently completed Tutoring Matters: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About How to Tutor (Temple University Press, 1999), a book based on the tutoring experiences of his UCLA students. Professor Rabow is also a psychotherapist in private practice in Los Angeles. He is also Research Psychologist and co-director of the Substance Abuse Research Center in the Psychology Department at the University of California, Los Angeles. Professor Newcomb has published over 200 papers and chapters and has written three books. His research interests include: etiology and the consequences of adolescent drug abuse; structural equation modeling, methodology, and multivariate analysis; human sexuality; health psychology; attitudes and affect related to nuclear war; and cohabitation, marriage, and divorce.     

Helping hands: A study of altruistic behavior

The purpose of this paper is to better understand how altruistic behavior varies by gender, race, age, and dress. Eagly & Crowley’s (1986) social role theory maintains that the traditional male sex role promotes heroic and chivalrous helping behavior. Based on this theoretical insight, we hypothesized that men would be more likely to exhibit helping behavior than women (regardless of their race, age, or dress), especially if the person requiring assistance was a woman. We also expected that fewer women than men would offer assistance to another, especially if the person in need of help was a man. To test our hypotheses, we went to the downtown Waterside Festival Marketplace, where male and female actors “dropped” a stack of books. We found no significant differences in helping behavior between male and female subjects, all else being equal. Elizabeth Monk-Turner is professor of sociology and criminal justice, and chair at Her primary research interests are in education, gender, and labor markets. A developing research interest is in better understanding the factors that shape altruistic behavior.     

Consent or coercion? Sexual relationships between college faculty and students

The issue of sexual harassment has gained in prominence over the last few decades. On some college campuses, this has resulted in attempts to put a ban on consensual relations between college faculty and students. Proponents of such a ban argue that students can never give consent, hence all sexual relationships are coercive and exploitative in nature. In this paper, I explore the issues of power and consent in student-faculty relationships, arguing that students can give true consent for such relations. I also examine some possible consequences of such a ban, arguing that eventually such policies will harm the very women they seek to protect. In conclusion, I assert that future debate in this area must be shaped by the results of empirical research rather than conflicting personal opinions. Afshan Jafar is a doctoral student in sociology at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst. In addition to the issue of consensual relationships in higher education, her research interests include Pakistani immigrants in the United States and gender and development in third-world countries. Her dissertation examines the role of women's NGOs.     

The meaning of womanhood in the neoliberal age: Class and age-based narratives of chilean Women

This article explores the transformations in the meaning of womanhood in Chile as articulated by women of different class backgrounds and age cohorts. It argues that the political and economic changes the country has experienced in the last three decades—specifically the drive to modernize and the adoption of a free-market approach to economic and social development—have clearly influenced women's gendered expectations and ideals. Market dynamics infuse social relations with values of self-sufficiency and individualism, which engender new roles and demands for women. At the same time, family and work responsibilities have created contradictions in the lives of women, generating a critical assessment and a redefinition of their social place in contemporary Chile. Chilean women's narratives suggest that personal development and growth, autonomy, and independence, often obtained as a result of paid work, are important sources of gender identity. At the same time, motherhood and home-life remain strongholds of womanhood, particularly for working class women and the older cohorts. This work proposes that social class and lived historical context provide women with different resources that allow them to sift through cultural ideals that privilege neoliberal values regarding femininity. Ultimately, women's uneven participation in the process of modernization results in diverse women's dissimilar emphasis on motherhood, domesticity and work as sources of gender identity. Her research interests include gender, work, race and ethnicity. She is currently editing a book on domestic work in Latin America and developing a project on south-to-south migration. The author wishes to thank Margaret Power (IIT, Chicago) for her helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper. Rosalba Todaro (CEM, Chile), and Maritsa Poros (CUNY), also provided insights and support.     

Son preference and educational opportunities of children in China— “I wish you were a boy!”

Gender bias in family formation, such as sex selected-abortion, imbalance of the sex ratio, child abandonment, and sibling size/order in relation to fertility is well documented in China. Much less is known about continued gender bias after birth in relation to children's status inside the family. In particular, there is a relative scarcity of research on the impact of the parental son preference in determining differential educational opportunities of male and female children. Continued and fast economic growth in China is not accompanied by the dramatic change in traditional value, and many peasants still hold son preference value. Using 1990 China census data and drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Beijing and its suburbs, I examine children's educational opportunities, and investigate the relationship between parents who hold the son preference value and their unequal treatment when rearing children. The results demonstrated that the continued son preference value, based on traditional views as well as on perceived financial returns to families, leads to a lower level of educational attainment among daughters in rural areas of China. The lower educational attainment and higher labor force participation rates of rural female adolescents reflect unequal opportunities provided by their parents in addition to social inequality in China. Children who live in urban areas with educated parents received better educational opportunities and experience less gender bias. She received her Ph.D. in sociology from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1993. Her research interests include social demography, social deviance, social psychology, race and ethnicity, and quantitative sociology. Her recent publications include illegal drug rehabilitation and detoxification, international migration, sociology of emotions, and gender inequality.     

Doing technology, doing gender: Teaching gendered technoculture

This article explores the intersection between gender and technology in a Women's and Gender Studies course. It explores the pedagogical methodologies of the course, as well as the ways in which students engage in the process of learning how society genders technology and then uses these gender roles to create a technological hierarchy. where she holds a joint appointment in the Women’s and Gender Studies Program and the History Department. She teaches courses in women’s history, gay and lesbian history, feminist theories, sexual politics, gender and popular culture, and gender and technology. Her current research interests include study of the uses of image, the body, and the media in the first and second waves of the feminist movements. Her essays have appeared in NWSA Journal and Transformations: The Journal of Inclusive Scholarship and Pedagogy.     

Married Persons’ Subjective Class Identification: The Role of Individual Gender Ideologies from 1972 to 2002

This study examined married men and women’s subjective class identification between 1972 and 2002, and the role of individual gender ideologies in married persons’ shifting status-evaluation models. We used nationally representative trend data gathered as part of the General Social Survey. Consistent with previous theoretical predictions, results indicated that overall, husbands and wives used status-sharing models of status-evaluation. Interestingly, however, in the late 1990s and early 2000s women shifted toward a status-borrowing model of status-evaluation. Results suggested that gender ideologies did not explain recent trends in the importance of wives’ and husbands’ class attributes for models of status-evaluation. We concluded that shifts in hegemonic gender beliefs, rather than individual gender ideologies, are a more likely explanation of changes in couples’ models of status-evaluation.

A cross-national look at married women's earnings dependency

Using the Luxembourg Income Study data we examine married women's dependency on their husbands' earnings in nine Western industrialized countries: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Finland, Germany, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, and the United States. When we examine the level and degree of dependency, and the labor force participation of married women across countries, the nine countries fall into the three clusters delineated in Esping-Andersen's welfare states typology. But when we examine the determinants of the dependency within each country, the clustering disappears. Wives' dependency increases with age, the presence of young children, and the number of children. It is reduced when wives' labor force participation and education are high relative to their husbands' and in families that rely more on unearned sources of income. The similarity of patterns across countries suggests that gender differences in the work-family nexus are deeply entrenched in all countries and continue even in the face of very active social policy to minize their effects. This is a revised version of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, August 1995, Washington DC. Her current research focuses on gender inequality and parents' time allocation between work and family. She conducts research on various aspects of family demography, including household and family characteristics, co-resident grandparent families, cohabitation, and child care. With Suzanne Bianchi, she is completing a research monograph on trends in the American family. Her research focuses on gender, work, and family issues.     

Female Status and Infant and Child Homicide Victimization in Rural and Urban Counties in the U.S.

Studies consistently show that female labor force participation is a correlate of infant and child homicide victimization. Research and theory supports the notion that as women’s economic status improves, children are safer. Yet few existing studies make use of feminist perspectives to explain child homicide. Further, homicide studies have focused heavily on urban areas leaving a lacuna of understanding in the literature regarding rural areas. This study explores the connection between absolute and relative female economic status and infant and child homicide victimization in both rural and urban U.S. counties. Results show that absolute female economic status is positively associated with infant and child homicide in urban areas, but not in rural areas. I argue that in rural areas, stronger collective sentiment and less differentiation diminishes the effect of women’s status on child homicide. While rural areas are characterized by harsh economic realities, these realities are nevertheless shared among men and women, decentering the link between child victimization and women status.

Women,islam, and the state in Pakistan

In this paper, I outline the history of Pakistan’s experience with “Islamic” laws and their impact on women. I also trace the links between the state, nationalism, religion, and women’s organizations, and demonstrate how they have shaped women's lives in Pakistan. I focus mainly on General Zia ul-Haq’s influence in fostering and reinforcing certain detrimental ideologies and policies regarding women. I argue that a close examination of the state, nationalism, the search for cultural authenticity in post-colonial nations, and the struggles and dilemmas of women's activism in Muslim cultures are all central to advancing the discussion of women in islam. With chains of matrimony and modesty You can shackle my feet The fear will still haunt you That crippled, unable to walk I shall continue to think. (Kishwar Naheed, a contemporary poet, quoted in Mumtaz and Shaheed 1987: 77) Her current research interests include gender and development in third-world countries and transnational feminist movements. Her dissertation examines the role of women's non-governmental organizations in Pakistan.     

The Congruence Between Adolescents and Their Parents’ Gender-Role Attitudes in Urban Slums of Allahabad,India

Gender role differentiation intensifies during adolescence. The current study explores gender-role attitudes among unmarried young men and women aged 15–21 residing in the slums of Allahabad, India. The survey asked a series of questions about gender role attitudes to young men and women and to their parents (relating to work and educational attainment for girls, marriage and husband–wife relations). Since either the father or mother responded to the parent questionnaire, data analyses are based on subsets of mother–daughter pairs (n = 2124), mother–son pairs (n = 2135), father–son pairs (n = 788), and father–daughter pairs (n = 452). No significant differences emerged in terms of adolescent background characteristics of the four groups and the adolescent population of the study. A fair amount of congruence in gender role attitudes was found in the mother–daughter and father–son pairs for most items. However, a similar pattern was not visible in the father–daughter or mother–son pairs. Multivariate regression analysis indicated strong influence of parental attitudes on the adolescent’s attitudes. While education led to a shift in girls’ attitudes to gender egalitarian ones, it did not impact the attitudes of adolescent boys.     

Wearing gender and sexuality “On your sleeve”: Dress norms and the importance of occupational and organizational culture at work

Gender scholars have long argued that workplace culture is an important key to understanding how informal norms create, maintain, and sometimes undermine gender and sexual inequality at work. Although most studies have defined workplace culture as occupational culture, less emphasis has been placed on the importance of organizational culture. This article addresses the importance of both aspects of workplace culture by examining the occupational and organizational dress and appearance norms of men and women who work as editors and accountants at a heterosexual men's pornographic magazine and at a feminist magazine. This comparative case study demonstrates that workers face different expectations about the appropriate split between “personal” and work identities, depending on what they do and where they work. These informal, unwritten occupational and organizational norms play a large part in workers' definitions of appropriate and inappropriate expressions of gender and sexuality at work and should be attended to more carefully in attempts to achieve equality for men and women in all workplaces. Kirsten Dellinger is an assistant professor of sociology at the University of Mississippi. Her research focuses on gender and sexuality in the workplace. She has published on organizational culture and sexual harassment (Social Problems, 2002), organizational sexuality (American Review of Sociology, 1999), and make-up at work (Gender & Society, 1997).     

Gender identity,nationalism, and social action among Jewish and Arab women in Israel: redefining the social order?

In the study this article explores, the meaning of gender identity for religious and seclar Jewish and Arab women in Israeli society is examined. The study focuses on how Israeli women rank gender identity relative to other identities like being Jewish/Arab, being Israeli/Palestinian, religious or secular, of a certain ethnic group, and political identity. It examines the characteristics of gender identity and the attitudes that are associated with it. The analysis shows that the hierarchies of identities are different for religious and secular Jewish and Arab women, and that this is related to having different sociopolitical attitudes (e.g., Women’s social and political involvement, social obedience, social influence). Thus, the hierarchy of identities and the sociopolitical attitudes of religious women indicate a more consensual acceptance of the social order than the hierarchy of identities and the sociopolitical attitudes of secular women, especially among Arab women. Her main fields of interest are sociopolitical attitudes, perceptions of justice and gender issues. She is currently conducting a comparative research on the attitudes, beliefs and stereotypes of Jewish, Arabs, and Palestinian high school students. Dr. Moore is also an advisor to the Israeli Parliament (the Knesset) Committee for Women's Status. The research was financed by the Eshkol Institute for Social, Political, and Economic Research. We are grateful to Hanna Levinson and Majid al-Haj who managed data collection at the Guttman Institute of Applied Research.     

Will unwed new mothers seek employment?: The role of government and social support

In this paper, we use recent data on unwed new mothers living in urban cities to examine employment plans of low-income women the year following childbirth. We conceptually distinguish work expectations, a cognition; from work, a behavior. We argue that government support and social support are related to the work expectations of unwed new mothers. The results provide evidence that the receipt of various forms of government and social support are positively associated with work expectations. The only variations from this pattern were found for government medical assistance and support from the baby's father. Overall, these findings are contrary to the idea that self-sufficiency is more likely to be achieved when support is denied. Our results suggest that any effort to engage lowincome unwed mothers in work activity should consider the importance of support for employment. Rebecca S. Powers is an assistant professor in the Department of Sociology at East Carolina University. Her research interests include social inequality, gender, work, and immigration. She is currently studying the effects of gender norms and employment outcomes for single mothers. Michelle M. Livermore is an assistant professor in the School of Social Work at Louisiana State University. Her work focuses on poverty and related policies, in particular factors related to work among poor women and social capital in poor communities.     

Doing the daily grind: The effects of domestic labor on professional,managerial, and technical workers’ earnings

Using two waves of data from the National Survey of Families and Households, I examined how domestic labor tasks including daily grind tasks, female-type and male-type tasks affected the earnings of workers in professional, managerial, and technical occupations in the short and long term. The results show that performing daily grind tasks reduces the earnings of college-educated workers in high prestige occupations immediately and over time. Further, domestic labor explained an additional 19 percent of the gap between the earnings of women and men in professional, managerial, and technical occupations. These results suggest that despite having jobs that offer higher pay and more autonomy, the time spent doing the daily grind, negatively affects earnings, especially for women in professional, managerial, and technical occupations. Rebecca S. Powers ia an assistant professor at East Carolina University. Her research interests include social inequality, gender, immigration, and work. Currently, she is examining differences in gender norms and studying relationships between employers and Hispanic workers in new destination sites.     

Examining Sex Differences in the Use of Direct and Indirect Aggression

Direct and indirect aggressive behaviors were studied using surveys and interviews of students in two public schools. The variables of “sex-of-aggressor” and “sex-of-target” were included. Claims in previous research that girls engage in far more indirect aggression than boys are not supported. Further, it was found that girls are more likely to target the opposite sex with direct aggression than boys. This suggests more gender fluidity in the use of aggression by girls and adds to a growing body of research that dispels the notion that direct and indirect aggression can be neatly sorted into male and female categories of behavior.