© 2013 Cengage Learning

Outline  Sex and Gender  Gender Differences Across Cultures  Hofstede’s Study  Cognitive Differences  Conformity and Obedience  Aggressiveness

Outline (cont’d.)  Gender Differences Across Cultures (cont’d.)  Personality  Sex and Sexuality  Mate Selection, Mate Poaching, and Jealousy  Division of Labor  Summary

Outline (cont’d.)  Culture, Gender Roles, and Stereotypes  Culture and Gender Stereotypes  Culture, Gender Role Ideology, and Self-Concept  Ethnicity and Gender Roles  Changing Cultures, Changing Gender Roles  Conclusion

S EX AND G ENDER

Sex and Gender  Sex: physical characteristics and differences between men and women  Sex roles: behaviors men and women engage in directly related to biological differences and process of reproduction  Gender: behaviors that culture deems appropriate for men and women  Gender roles: degree to which person adopts gender-specific behaviors ascribed by his/her culture

Sex and Gender (cont’d.)  Gender identity: degree to which person has awareness or recognition that he or she adopts a particular gender role  Gender stereotypes: psychological or behavioral characteristics typically associated with men and women

G ENDER D IFFERENCES A CROSS C ULTURES

Gender Differences Across Cultures  Studies in US demonstrate how men and women are different, or not, on variety of psychological and behavioral outcomes  Do same differences occur in other cultures?  To what degree do differences occur?

Hofstede’s Study  “Masculinity v. Femininity”  Degree to which a culture will foster, encourage, or maintain differences between males and females  High on masculinity:  Moralistic attitudes about sex; double standards  Encourages passive role of women  Low on masculinity:  Matter-of-fact attitudes about sex; single standard  Encourages active role of women  See Table 6.1 in text

Cognitive Differences  Common folklore that males are better at mathematical and spatial reasoning tasks, and females better at verbal comprehension tasks  Male superiority on tasks found in tight sedentary, agriculturally based cultures  Female superiority found in cultures that are loose, nomadic, and based on hunting and gathering

Conformity and Obedience  One common stereotype is that females are more conforming and obedient than males  In actuality, degree to which difference in conformation occurs varies among cultures  Tight cultures foster greater gender difference on conformity, with females more conformist than males  Loose cultures foster less gender difference on conformity, sometimes with males more conforming than females

Aggressiveness  Common gender stereotype is that males are more aggressive than females  Support for this stereotype in all cultures exists  Males account for disproportionate amount of violent crime in industrialized and nonindustrialized societies  Hormones may contribute, to some degree, to aggressiveness  Culture and environment can act to encourage or discourage emergence of aggressiveness

Personality  Five Factor Model of Personality  Women universally reported higher scores on Neuroticism, Agreeableness, Warmth, and Openness to Feelings  Men scored higher on Assertiveness and Openness to Ideas  Differences between men and women were largest in Europe and U.S.

Sex and Sexuality  Major cultural differences in degree of importance placed on values concerning chastity, especially for women  Many traditional, conservative cultures view chastity as virtue among non-married women  Other cultures more open and explicit about sex, approving of sexual partners before marriage  Cultural differences in attitudes toward sex also related to attitudes toward sexual orientation  Culture affects practice of circumcision and FGM

Mate Selection, Mate Poaching, and Jealousy  Cultural differences in mate poaching and jealousy explained by evolutionary model:  Males look for younger, chaste mates to bear offspring; females look for mates that can provide resources for offspring  Males more jealous about sexual infidelity; females more jealous of emotional infidelity:  Women sleeping with others threaten man’s ability to create offspring; men falling in love with other women threatens woman’s family

Division of Labor  Biological differences between men and women lead to division of labor in evolutionary history  Men generally physically bigger and stronger  Provide shelter, food, protection  Women carry children, give birth, and breastfeed  Care for infants and newborns  Biggest cultural differences between men and women is division of labor in house  However, women take brunt of housework in all societies

Division of Labor (cont’d.)  See Figure 6.2 in text: family roles of mothers  See Table 6.1 in text: average percentage of male participation in activities in societies

Summary  How does culture influence gender?  Process of learning gender roles begins very early in life  American culture: boys and girls given different types of toys and dressed according to gender  Gender is construct that develops in children as they are socialized in their environments  Different cultures must deal with different external factors; thus, gender differences vary by culture

C ULTURE, G ENDER R OLES, AND S TEREOTYPES

Culture and Gender Stereotypes  Many gender-related stereotypes universally held across cultures  Williams and Best (1982):  High degree of pancultural agreement across all countries studied in characteristics associated with men and women  Characteristics associated with men were stronger and more active than those associated with women across all countries  Cultural differences exist for favorability

Culture and Gender Role Ideology  Gender role ideology: judgments about what males and females ought to be like or do  Williams and Best (1990):  Traditional scores  Egalitarian scores  Masculinity/femininity  Gibbons (studies in younger populations):  Being “kind and honest” is universal for boys and girls  Adolescents from wealthy/individualistic countries were less traditional than those from poorer countries

Ethnicity and Gender Roles  Androgyny: gender identity involving endorsement of male and female characteristics  Gender identities of African Americans are more androgynous than those of European Americans  Adolescent girls with androgynous identity have higher levels of self-acceptance than either feminine or masculine girls  For boys, masculine, not androgynous, identity is associated with highest level of self- acceptance

C HANGING C ULTURES, C HANGING G ENDER R OLES

Changing Cultures, Changing Gender Roles  United Nations: commitment to equal rights and opportunities for men and women  Obstacle to this is violence against women  Despite desires for equality, inequality still persists strongly around world  People of different ethnic backgrounds in U.S. have different gender role expectations  Much of cultural changes due to economics give rise to tensions between tradition and progress, conservatism, and liberalism

C ONCLUSION

Conclusion  Gender and its permutations—roles, identities, stereotypes—share important link with culture  Gender roles are different for males and females in all cultures  Some stereotypic notions about gender differences are universal across cultures  Studying gender differences in U.S. is challenging because of cultural and ethnic diversity  All cultures help to define roles, duties, and responsibilities appropriate for males or females