© 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


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Culture and Gender Stereotypes
Culture, Gender Role Ideology, and Self-Concept
Ethnicity and Gender Roles
Changing Cultures, Changing Gender Roles
 Conclusion
SEX AND GENDER
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
GENDER DIFFERENCES
ACROSS CULTURES
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”


High on masculinity:



Moralistic attitudes about sex; double standards
Encourages passive role of women
Low on masculinity:


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Degree to which a culture will foster, encourage, or
maintain differences between males and females
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


Women carry children, give birth, and breastfeed


Provide shelter, food, protection
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
CULTURE, GENDER ROLES,
AND STEREOTYPES
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 selfacceptance
CHANGING CULTURES,
CHANGING GENDER ROLES
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
CONCLUSION
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