The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

474 Chapter 12

TAKE HOME POINTS

■ Women suffer from both access discrimination and

treatment discrimination.

■ Treatment discrimination can take the form of the glass

ceiling, the glass escalator, and pay disparity.

■ The pay disparity between women and men can be ac-

counted for by factors that distinguish women and men

workers (supply-side theory) and the differences in the

ways that women and men are treated (demand-side

theory).

■ One factor that distinguishes male and female workers

and accounts for a large portion of the pay disparity

is that men enter occupations associated with higher

salaries than women. In addition, jobs held by men are

associated with higher pay than jobs held by women,

reflecting the salary estimation effect.

■ Sex differences in wages appear among women and

men in the same occupation, although the size of the

disparity is smaller.

■ The fact that women negotiate less than men and

women’s negotiations are less successful than those of

men also contributes to the pay gap.

■ Another factor that contributes to the pay gap is chil-

dren. Women take more time off from paid work for

children, and this differential work experience accounts

for a sizable difference in earnings. The presence of

children also indirectly contributes to the pay gap as it

undermines perceptions of competence for women but

not men. In fact, men’s salaries seem to benefit from

the presence of children, whereas women’s suffer.

■ Women are not as dissatisfied with the pay disparity

as one might expect. Part of the reason is that women

do not perceive themselves as victims of discrimination,

although they perceive thatother womenare victims of

discrimination.

■ One reason that women do not recognize a personal

pay disparity is that women compare their salary to

person’s behavior. Both males and females

may be concerned about consequences to

themselves as well as consequences to the

perpetrators.

Another reason women do not per-

ceive personal discrimination is that women

feel entitled to less pay than men. In two

laboratory studies, female college students

paid themselves less for the same task than

male college students (Desmarais & Curtis,

1997). One reason women feel less entitled

to equal pay is because they compare their

earnings to those of other women rather

than those of other men (Bylsma & Major,

1994). Because work is often segregated by

sex, women find other women more suitable

sources of comparison. A basic principle of

social comparison theory is that we compare

ourselves with “similar others.” Women per-

ceive similar others to be women in general

rather than men—even if they are working

along side men. Thus, members of disad-

vantaged groups—in this case, women—will

be satisfied with unfair treatment and may

even judge they deserve it. A study of col-

lege students showed that women expected

lower pay than men, and this expectation ac-

counted for about a third of the difference in

the actual salaries of the jobs students aimed

to find (Heckert et al., 2002). Heckert and

colleagues argued that women’s expectations

of a lower salary become self-fulfilling proph-

ecies. Women expect lower pay and are thus

satisfied with lower pay. For women to be

dissatisfied with less pay than men, compari-

sons to men need to be made salient and rel-

evant. When women compare themselves to

men, they become less satisfied. Recall from

Chapter 11 that the tendency of women to

compare themselves to women rather than

men was also used to explain why women are

satisfied with an unequal division of house-

hold responsibilities.

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