Social Psychology and Gender

1
Social Psychology and Gender

• Principle Applications in the Real World

2
Topics for Discussion

• Social Comparison Theory and Body Image
• Attractiveness and Performance Evaluations
• Women, Men, and Power

3
Social Comparison Theory

• Festinger (1954)
• We compare ourselves with other people as a
  source of information when judging attributes
  about the self
• More likely when objective information is
  unavailable
• Similar others offer a more informative
  comparison

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Social Comparison Theory

• Accuracy, Inspiration, or Ego-Boost?

But what happens when we are constantly
confronted with upward comparison that is
unattainable?
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Social Comparison Body Image
Thin Ideal unrealistically slender body type
disseminated through the media as the standard of
attractiveness for women -------------------------
--------------
Do women use these images as a source for social
comparison?
6
Social Comparison Body Image

• Greater media exposure related to greater body
  dissatisfaction and desire for thinness
• Viewing thin models leads to decreases in
  self-esteem and lower satisfaction with
  weight/body image
• ________________________________
• Media images function as detrimental upward
  comparisons for women

7
Social Comparison Body Image

• Downward social comparison
• Exposure to overweight individuals does not
  improve self-esteem or body image satisfaction
• Peers who are thin and
• heavy have same experimental effects as media
  images

8
Social Comparison Body Image

• Hollywood Pregnancy
• The average celebrity loses her baby weight in
  one-two months
• The average women takes about a year

9
Social Comparison Body Image

• What about men?
• Difference between ideal and achievable body
  not as great
• Minimal or no effects on self-esteem and body
  image

10
Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Beauty is a greater recommendation than any
  letter of introduction
• Aristotle
• Rarely do great beauty and great virtue dwell
  together
• Petrarch

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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• What is beautiful is good (Dion,
  Bercheid Walster, 1972)
• Traits like sociability, extraversion, happiness
  and assertiveness are attributed more to the
  attractive
• What about intelligence?

12
Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Does attractiveness affect intelligence?
• Attractive children rated as more intelligent
  than unattractive children
• Attractive kids earned higher grades and
  achievement scores
• Note Teachers made these ratings and
  assigned grades any problem?

13
Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Influence on Information Processing
• Children make less mistakes when good traits are
  paired with an attractive person than when bad
  traits are paired with an attractive person
• Effect only for female children and adults, not
  for males

14
Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations
Perceptions of Intelligence Related Attributes By
Gender and Attractiveness
(Chia, et al, 1998)
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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Attractive women are rated less qualified and are
  less likely to be recommended for hire to high
  status positions than unattractive women

Youre .. .hired?
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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Attractive men and women are seen as being less
  causal in achieving their position of status
  than unattractive colleagues

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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Are we doomed?
• Attractiveness effects diminished with knowledge
  of past performance
• But, some evidence suggests that high past
  performance favors the unattractive, while low
  past performance favors the attractive

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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Blonde or Brunettes?
• Men judged blondes to be less intelligent than
  either redheads or brunettes
• Women did not differ in their judgments of
  intelligence based on hair color

Weir Fine-Davis, 1989
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Physical Attractiveness and Performance
Evaluations

• Thinking blonde?
• Men exposed to pictures of women prior to general
  knowledge test
• Those shown a blonde scored lower on the test

Meyer, 2007
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Women, Men, and Power
21

• It's just the way our culture has evolved. It's
  the way the country is.  It's like almost an
  addiction that some people have to what I call
  the perfection that Hollywood presents of
  successful, beautiful, fun-loving people.  So the
  question is this Will this country want to
  actually watch a woman get older before their
  eyes on a daily basis?   But men aging makes
  them look more authoritative, accomplished,
  distinguished.  Sadly, it's not that way for
  women, and they will tell you. .. Will
  Americans want to watch a woman get older before
  their eyes on a daily basis?  And that woman, by
  the way, is not going to want to look like she's
  getting older, because it will impact poll
  numbers. It will impact perceptions.
• Rush Limbaugh (Dec. 17, 2007) 

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Women, Men and Power

• Goldberg Paradigm
• Present written speech to participants
• Vary whether attributed to a man or a woman
• Ratings are lower for womans speech than mans

Goldberg, 1968
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Women, Men and Power

• Feminists judged unlikable and unattractive
  compared to housewives
• Feminists judged most negatively by men

(Haddock Zanna, 1994)
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Women, Men and Power

• Acting the part ..
• Women (but not men) not liked and considered less
  hireable if brash and self-promoting
  (Rudman, 1998)
• Women evincing direct and masculine style of
  leadership judged less likable than men similarly
  described
• Particularly in male professions
  (Eagly, et al., 1992)

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Women, Men and Power

• Taking the Lead
• Women can be seen as competent (masculine) or
  likeable (feminine), but not both
• Women leaders take less bribes, more altruistic
• First time electees judged to be worse than men
• Second time electees judged to be the same as
  men
• Companies with women on their boards perform
  worse than those with all-male boards

(Duflo, 2006 Judges, 2003)
26
Women, Men and Power

• From Glass Ceiling to the Glass Cliff
• Women appointed to leadership positions in
  companies are more likely to be appointed
  following a period of financial decline
• Grad students, law students and high school
  students were more likely to select a female to
  fill a precarious position than a male

(Ryan Haslam, 2005)
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Conclusions Principles of psychology can have
different implications for men and women in the
real world

• Media images are detrimental for womens body
  image and self-esteem
• Physical attractiveness can influence perceptions
  of intelligence and competence
• Women face stereotypes and bias in their quest
  for leadership