Biological Sex, Adherence to Traditional Gender Roles, and Attitudes Toward Persons with Mental Illness: An Exploratory Investigation

Abstract

Undergraduate students (n = 86) responded to the Community Attitudes Toward the Mentally Ill (CAMI) questionnaire and The Hypergender Ideology Scale, which measures the degree to which they adhered to traditional gender roles. Results indicated that males were significantly more likely than females to endorse intolerant attitudes toward persons with mental illnesses. However, when adherence to hypergender ideology was controlled for, no significant differences emerged between the genders. It was determined that strict gender-role adherence, rather than biological sex, accounted for the variance in CAMI scores. Implications for mental health counselors and for selecting predictor variables for future research are discussed.