The Psychology of Gender 4th Edition

96 Chapter 3

TAKE HOME POINTS

■ Gender-role stereotypes are the beliefs that we hold

about female and male social roles.

■ The descriptive aspects of gender-role stereotypes repre-

sent how we believe men and womenarein our soci-

ety; the prescriptive aspects of gender-role stereotypes

represent how we believe men and womenought to be

in our society.

■ Stereotypes can be thought of as category-based ex-

pectancies. We rely on category-based expectancies, in

this case gender-role stereotypes, when we have little

information about a person. When provided with more

information, we rely on target-based expectancies—

meaning that we use what we know about the person

(target) to draw inferences.

■ People tend to see a greater correspondence between

the mentally healthy person and the mentally healthy

male than between the mentally healthy person and

the mentally healthy female. This suggests that we at-

tach greater value to the male than the female gender-

role stereotype.

■ Gender-role stereotypes are influenced by the age, race,

class, and sexual orientation of the target person.

■ In one sense, stereotypes are helpful; they simplify

information processing.

■ In another sense, stereotypes are harmful. Our ex-

pectations about people can influence how we be-

have toward them in such a way that they confirm

our initial expectancies. This is called a self-fulfilling

prophecy.

■ Stereotypes are difficult to alter. When confronted with

information that disconfirms a stereotype, we typically

ignore the information, fail to recall it, make a situ-

ational attribution for it, or create a subtype. In other

cases, we view the behavior as more extreme.

and obstetrician). By contrast, more recent

television shows reflect a range of roles.

The popular cartoonFamily Guyportrays

traditional male/female roles in which the

father works outside the home and the

mother stays home with the baby, whereas

Desperate Housewivesportrays a range of

roles for women in the form of a woman who

owns her own business, a teacher, and a stay-

at-home mom. The influence of the media on

gender roles is discussed in Chapter 5 when

we review gender-role socialization theories

of sex differences. Conduct Do Gender 3.5 to

see if you think stereotypes have changed.

DO GENDER 3.5

Stereotypes Obtained from

Media Portrayals of Men and Women

Examine a set of television shows to see

if and how the stereotypes of women and

men have changed. You may focus on

a particular type of program or sample

across a variety of programs (e.g., drama,

comedy, cartoon). Then, examine one epi-

sode of 10 different programs and record

the following for each character:

1. Character’s sex.


2. Character’s appearance.


3. Character’s role (housewife, doctor,
   detective).


4. Character’s personality traits.


5. Character’s behavior.
   If you are really energetic, conduct
   the same kind of experiment on a similar
   set of shows that appeared on television
   20 or 30 years ago. Then compare the
   two sets of stereotypes. A variation of this
   experiment is to review television com-
   mercials or magazine advertisements.

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