The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

380 Chapter 10

Figure 10.10). Women are socialized to take

care of others, and taking care of others has

its costs. Although there are obvious health

benefits to involvement in social networks, re-

viewed in detail in Chapter 11, there is a down-

side to such involvement for women. For one,

social networks increase exposure to infectious

disease; thus women may sustain more minor

illnesses than men, such as colds and flu, be-

cause they spend more time around people, in

particular children, compared to men.

A specific hypothesis about how wom-

en’s involvement in relationships could be

hazardous to their health is thenurturant

role hypothesis(Gove, 1984; Gove & Hughes,

1979). According to the nurturant role hy-

pothesis, women’s roles require them to at-

tend to the needs of others, and taking care of

others interferes with taking care of oneself.

First, the nurturant role leads to caretaking

behavior, which results in fatigue and vulner-

ability to illness. Second, the nurturant role

leads to greater exposure to communicable

diseases. Finally, once sick, the nurturant role

prevents one from taking care of oneself.

In a classic study, Gove and Hughes

(1979) found that women suffered greater

health problems than men due to their nur-

turant roles. Specifically, women were more

likely than men to say they did not get enough

information. Women are designated as the

persons responsible for the family’s health

care. However, it is not the case that women’s

concerns with health lead them to engage in

all health promoting behaviors; for example,

women exercise less than men and have been

more reluctant than men to quit smoking.

By contrast, men are typically uncon-

cerned with health matters and associate

preventive health care with undermining

masculinity (Courtenay, 2000a). In fact, men

may brag about not having seen a doctor,

about not taking time off from work when

sick, and about engaging in risky activities

that undermine health. At times, there can

be serious health consequences for adher-

ing to the male gender role. For example,

men are less likely to use sunscreen than

women and more likely than women to get

skin cancer. Men may be especially less likely

than women to seek help for mental health

problems due to concerns that doing so un-

dermines traditional masculinity. Men are

more likely than women to attach a stigma

to mental health problems, and men are less

likely than women to seek help even when

they have more problems (Addis & Mahilik,

2003; Ojeda & Bergstresser, 2008). This dif-

ference is larger among White people than

African Americans or Latinos. One culture

in which the sex difference is larger is Asian

Americans. Asian American men not only

have concerns about maintaining their male

gender role but also have cultural concerns

revolved around how they are viewed by oth-

ers (Chang & Subramaniam, 2008). Asian

American men are less likely than European

American men to seek help for mental illness.

Nurturant Roles

One aspect of the female gender role poses a

risk to women’s health and may account for

some of women’s higher morbidity rates com-

pared to men: women’s nurturant role (see

FIGURE 10.10 Women traditionally hold

more nurturant roles than men.

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