Individual Differences In Gender Research Articles

Does Humor Mediate the Relationship Between Positive Personality and Well-Being? The Moderating Role of Gender and Health

This study examined the relationship between humor styles, positive personality (optimism and self-esteem), social support and both subjective and psychological well-being. Structural equation modelling was used with a sample of 468 adults; some had a good health status while others suffered from different medical conditions. The best model is the one that proposes that humor styles were associated with SWB and PWB through personality characteristics and social support. This model indicated that humor styles had an indirect effect on SWB through optimism and an indirect effect on PWB through self-esteem. The component of self-oriented humor explained well-being to a greater extent than the component oriented towards interpersonal relations. However, the relationships between the variables included in the model depended on individual differences in gender and health status. Results showed that self-enhancing humor and self-defeating humor predicted SWB through optimism and predicted PWB through self-esteem and social support for women and healthy individuals. Practical implications of the present findings are discussed.

A clash of constructs? Re-examining grit in light of academic buoyancy and future time perspective

Grit, defined as perseverance and passion for long-term goals, has been found to be a powerful predictor of student success and persistence. Yet, it has been a recently scrutinized construct due to weaknesses in its discriminant and predictive validity. To investigate these issues further, we examined grit, its dimensions (perseverance of effort and consistency of interest), and other motivational factors—academic buoyancy and future time perspective—to test whether they were distinct constructs, and whether they were predictors of academic achievement, incorporating individual differences in gender, ethnicity, and major. The current study revealed that grit positively predicted undergraduates’ GPA (N = 328, Mage = 20.88, SDage = 1.70) over and beyond demographic and other motivational variables. Regarding individual differences, men and women differed on subscales of future time perspective, and Asian Americans reported lower grit compared to White and Hispanic students, despite higher GPA compared to Hispanics. The relevance of the findings is discussed along with implications for research and practice.

Gender differences in demographic and clinical characteristics of patients with opioid use disorder entering a comparative effectiveness medication trial.

We investigated gender differences in individuals with opioid use disorder (OUD) receiving inpatient services and entering a randomized controlled trial comparing extended-release naltrexone to buprenorphine. Participants (N = 570) provided demographic, substance use, and psychiatric information. Women were significantly younger, more likely to identify as bisexual, live with a sexual partner, be financially dependent, and less likely employed. Women reported significantly greater psychiatric comorbidity and risk behaviors, shorter duration but similar age of onset of opioid use. Findings underscore economic, psychiatric, and infection vulnerability among women with OUD. Interventions targeting these disparities should be explored, as women may face complicated treatment initiation, retention, and recovery. (Am J Addict 2018;27:465-470).

Investigating the impact of citizens’ trust toward the successful adoption of e-government: A multigroup analysis of gender, age, and internet experience

ABSTRACTThis research particularly aims to investigate how the individual differences in gender, age, and internet experience influence citizens’ trust in e-government’s adoption. The findings of the study revealed that females are confident and have a more positive evaluation of online services compared to males. Interestingly, this study found that old people display greater trust in e-government as compared to the levels of trust reported by younger people. The results also show that internet experience influences citizens’ trust positively.

Gendered Space‐Time Constraints, Activity Participation and Household Structure: A Case Study Using A GPS‐Based Activity Survey in Suburban Beijing, China

AbstractSpace‐time constraints imposed by employment and household responsibilities may lead to greater gender differences in individuals’ participation in daily activities. However, few studies have directly examined the impact of household structure on the gender differences in space‐time constraints associated with various daily activities due to the lack of accurate space‐time data. Using a 7‐day GPS‐based activity‐travel diary dataset collected in Beijing, this paper investigates how household structure influences men's and women's space‐time constraints and reduces the related gender differences in daily activity participation. The results suggest that gender and household structure matters. Getting help from retired parents reduces the level of fixity household heads perceive and decreases gender differences in space‐time constraints. However, the degree of the impact differs among activities and retired parents’ age, and fixity level depends on the individual and household background of the person initiating the activity.

Rape Myth Consistency and Gender Differences in Perceiving Rape Victims

An overview discusses feminist analyses of oppression, attitudes toward rape victims, and previously studied predictors of individuals' attitudes toward rape victims. To better understand such attitudes, this meta-analysis examines the moderating influences of various rape victim, perpetrator, and crime characteristics' rape myth consistency on gender differences in individuals' perceptions of rape victims (i.e., victim responsibility and blame attributions and rape minimizing attitudes). Consistent with feminist theoretical predictions, results indicated that, overall, men perceived rape victims more negatively than women did. However, this sex difference was moderated by the rape myth consistency within the rape vignettes. Implications for research are discussed.

Gender Differences in Individuals at High‐Risk of Psychosis: A Comprehensive Literature Review

Introduction. To date, few studies have focused on the characterization of clinical phenomenology regarding gender in population at high-risk of psychosis. This paper is an attempt to summarize the findings found in the scientific literature regarding gender differences in high-risk populations, taking into account parameters studied in populations with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, such as incidence, clinical expression, duration of untreated illness (DUI), social functioning, and cognitive impairment prior to full-blown psychosis development. Method. Studies were systematically searched in PubMed. Studies using gender variable as a control variable were excluded. 12 studies met inclusion criteria. Results. Most of the studies found a differential pattern between women and men as regards clinical, social, and cognitive variables in the prodromal phase, with worse performance in men except in cognitive functioning (more severe negative symptoms, worse social functioning, and longer DUI in men). Similar conversion rates over time were found between men and women. Conclusions. Many of the studies analyzed suggest that differences between men and women in the expression of psychosis extend across a continuum, from the subclinical forms of illness to the debut of psychosis. However, the small number of studies and their significant methodological and clinical limitations do not allow for firm conclusions.

Women and Entrepreneurship: A Gender Comparison in Spain

In the institutionalization of men’s and women’s roles in today’s society, three key issues affect women’s entrepreneurial capacity. First, women seek to balance their family and professional lives. Second, capitalist society uses male-dominated values and instrumental rationality to pre-define success. Third, according to the literature, women possess less human capital than men do. Nevertheless, this study does not corroborate the finding that women possess less human capital than men do. Furthermore, results reveal non-significant gender differences in individuals’ perceptions of whether women have the necessary skills to become entrepreneurs and whether society positively values entrepreneurship. This study shows that women’s entrepreneurial potential is very similar to that of men. The study was carried out using data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) for the period 2001–2010.

Social partners and momentary affect in the oldest-old: The presence of others benefits affect depending on who we are and who we are with.

Links between social relationships and emotional well-being in old age are well documented, but little is known about daily life fluctuations in momentary affective experiences of the oldest-old while interacting with specific social partners. We examined associations between the presence of different types of social partners and moment-to-moment fluctuations in affect in the oldest-old, taking into account individual differences in gender, neuroticism, depressive symptoms, chronic health conditions, and loneliness. Participants (N = 74, M age = 88.7 years, range = 84-102 years, 68% women) provided self-reports concurrently on the presence of social partners and subjective affective states 6 times a day for each of 7 consecutive days (3,071 occasions, in total). Relative to being with other people, time spent alone was associated with lower positive affect in the oldest-old. Being with other family members and friends was associated with more positive affective experiences. Compared with men, women reported more negative affective experiences when they were with their spouses than when their spouses were not present. Individuals with more chronic health problems reported more negative affective experiences when they were with their spouses than not. Participants higher in neuroticism reported more positive affective experiences when they were with their friends, compared with times when their friends were not present. Finally, lonelier individuals reported more positive affective experiences when they were with their spouses than when they were not. These findings suggest that affective experience is a function of individual differences and the type of social partners oldest-old adults interact with in everyday life. We discuss how our findings can be generalized to oldest-olds of different marital statuses, taking into account the proportion of widows in our sample as well as measurement specifics.

A research on comprehension differences between print and screen reading

Since the 1980s, extensive research has been conducted comparing reading comprehension from printed text and computer screens. The conclusions, however, are not very consistent. As reading from computer screens requires a certain degree of individual technical skill, such variables should be objectively taken into consideration when conducting an experiment regarding the comparison between print and screen reading. This study analyses the difference in the level of understanding of the two presentational formats (text on printed pages and hypertext on computer screens) for people between 45-54 years of age (i.e. “middleaged” adults). In our experimental findings there were no significant differences between the levels of comprehension for print and screen presentations. With regard to individual differences in gender, age group and educational level, the findings are as follows: gender and education effects on print reading comprehension performance were significant, while those on screen reading comprehension performance were not. For middle-aged computer learners, the main effect of age group on both print and screen reading comprehension performance was insignificant. In contrast, linear texts of traditional paper-based material are better for middle-aged readers’ literal text comprehension, while hypertext is beneficial to their inferential text comprehension. It is also suggested that hypermedia could be used as a cognitive tool for improving middle-aged adults’ inferential abilities on reading comprehension, provided that they were trained adequately to use available computers.

Keeping Up With The Joneses

Most prior research on preventing phishing attacks focuses on technology to identify and prevent the delivery of phishing emails. The current study supports an ongoing effort to develop a user-profile that predicts when phishing attacks will be successful. We sought to identify the behavioral, cognitive and perceptual attributes that make some individuals more vulnerable to phishing attack than others. Fifty-three participants responded to a number of self-report measures ( e.g., dispositional trust) and completed the ‘Bob Jones’ email task that was designed to empirically evaluate phishing susceptibility. Over 92% of participants were to some extent vulnerable to phishing attacks. Additionally, individual differences in gender, trust, and personality were associated with phishing vulnerability. Application and implications for future research are discussed.

The comparative biology of environmental stress: behavioural endocrinology and variation in ability to cope with novel, changing environments

Coping with perturbations of the environment such as severe storms and other climatic extremes, habitat degradation, changes in predator numbers, invasive species and social disruption is one of the most essential physiological and behavioural processes. The palaeontological record shows that organisms have had to cope with environmental perturbations throughout the history of life on Earth. These ancient processes show highly conserved mechanisms, but also great flexibility in responses to social and physical environment challenges. Adrenocortical responses to perturbations can trigger a coping response called the emergency life history stage (EHLS). However, if the adaptive value of the ELHS declines because of trade-offs with other life history stages such as breeding, then the adrenocortical response to acute perturbations (stress) can be modulated. Mechanisms involve allostasis and reactive scope with three foci of regulation: hormone secretion, transport and response. It is now well known that modulation of the adrenocortical responses to perturbations occur through gene–environment interactions during development and throughout the life cycle. These modulations involve individual differences in gender, age, experience and condition as well as latitudinal, altitudinal and hemispheric variations. Dramatic consequences of human-induced rapid environmental change such as increasing frequency and intensity of environmental perturbations will likely have implications for continued adaptation to extreme events. Note that modulation of the stress response also involves three major processes: modulation of robustness (i.e. become more resistant to acute stress); modulation of responsiveness (i.e. modulate the actual response to stress for more flexibility); and modulation of resilience (i.e. how quickly and completely the recovery is after the perturbation has passed). Mechanisms underlying these modulations remain largely unexplored.

Infants' social-emotional adjustment within a childcare context of Korea

In a child day-care setting, the naturally occurring social-emotional behaviours and play interaction of 51 infants were observed and recorded. Individual differences in gender, age, temperament, and maternal parenting behaviours were examined to understand how these variables might be related to social-emotional adjustment of infants. The measures used in this study were Social-emotional Behaviour, Play Interaction, Temperament, and Parenting Behaviour. Results indicate that boys showed externalizing problem behaviours more than girls, and the 2-year-olds showed more internalizing problem behaviours such as withdrawal/separation than 1-year-olds. Additionally, adaptability of infants showed a negative correlation with externalizing problem behaviours. Maternal behaviours of over-protectiveness/permissiveness had relations with a low social capability and refusal/neglect had relations with high externalizing problem behaviours. The results suggest that individual differences in social-emotional adjustment are variously determined.

Status Struggles

Literature on aggression often suggests that individual deficiencies, such as social incompetence, psychological difficulties, or troublesome home environments, are responsible for aggressive behavior. In this article, by contrast, we examine aggression from a social network perspective, arguing that social network centrality, our primary measure of peer status, increases the capacity for aggression and that competition to gain or maintain status motivates its use. We test these arguments using a unique longitudinal dataset that enables separate consideration of same- and cross-gender aggression. We find that aggression is generally not a maladjusted reaction typical of the socially marginal; instead, aggression is intrinsic to status and escalates with increases in peer status until the pinnacle of the social hierarchy is attained. Over time, individuals at the very bottom and those at the very top of a hierarchy become the least aggressive youth. We also find that aggression is influenced not so much by individual gender differences as by relationships with the other gender and patterns of gender segregation at school. When cross-gender interactions are plentiful, aggression is diminished. Yet these factors are also jointly implicated in peer status: in schools where cross-gender interactions are rare, cross-gender friendships create status distinctions that magnify the consequences of network centrality.

Dating Relationships in College Students with Childhood-Onset Asthma

Objective. The current study investigated whether differences existed in dating anxiety and fear of intimacy between individuals with childhood-onset asthma and individuals without a chronic illness. Analyses were also conducted to determine if dating anxiety or fear of intimacy were predictors of health-related quality of life in individuals with asthma and healthy controls. Additionally, potential gender differences in dating anxiety and fear of intimacy in individuals with childhood-onset asthma were explored. Methods. College undergraduates at least 17 years of age who self-identified as having childhood asthma were randomly matched by age and gender to healthy control participants. Participants completed a demographic form, the Dating Anxiety Scale for Adolescents, the Fear of Intimacy Scale, and the SF-36 Health Survey, a measure of health-related quality of life. Results. There were no significant differences between self-identified participants with asthma and matched healthy controls on the Dating Anxiety Scale or Fear of Intimacy Scale. However, dating anxiety was a significant predictor of mental health-related quality of life in participants with asthma but not in matched health controls. Fear of intimacy was not a significant predictor of mental or physical health-related quality of life in individuals with asthma. In addition, women with asthma endorsed significantly more dating anxiety and lower physical health-related quality of life than males with asthma. Conclusion. College students with asthma appear to experience similar levels of dating anxiety and fear of intimacy than healthy college students; however, their anxiety about dating may have a larger effect on health-related quality of life than healthy individuals. Additional examination of dating and interpersonal relationships among individuals with asthma appears warranted, particularly as it concerns possible gender differences in individuals with childhood-onset asthma.

A new approach for measuring human perception in relation to reading comprehension performance

Reading comprehension is the process of understanding and constructing meaning from a piece of text, involving complex human perception systems. Although research on comparing print and screen reading performance has largely been carried out during the past decades, the findings seem rather inconclusive and inconsistent. Dissimilar to previous research in the literature, this study proposes a grey relational analysis model to measure human perception in relation to reading comprehension performances of the two presentational formatstext on printed pages and hypertext on computer screens. The proposed model was used to analyze the perceptive correlations among different subject groups' reading comprehension performances. Through the empirical study, individual differences in gender,age group, and education effects on reading comprehension performance were also derived.

Individual Task Choice and the Division of Challenging Tasks Between Men and Women

Challenging experiences are considered important for career development, and previous studies have suggested that women have fewer o f those experiences in their jobs than men have. However, the nature and possible determinants of this gender gap in job challenge have hardly been empirically studied. In the present study, the authors examine (a) gender differences in individuals’ choice to perform challenging tasks and (b) gender differences in the allocation of challenging tasks in opposite-sex dyads. Results show that the men and women in the sample did not differ in their individual choice to perform challenging tasks, but after task allocation in opposite-sex dyads men ended up with more of the challenging tasks, whereas women ended up with more of the nonchallenging tasks. The authors discuss the possible consequences of these results for women’s career development.

On-line learning performance and computer anxiety measure for unemployed adult novices using a grey relation entropy method

On-line learning is an asynchronous computer-based learning mode that allows learners to learn anytime and anywhere in their own environment using information and communication technology. It can be considered as a way to bridge the digital gap. How a computer novice performs in such virtual and asynchronous learning environments is an interesting issue in human–computer interaction research. This paper presents the results of a study to investigate on-line learning performance and computer anxiety for unemployed adult novices. In this study, we propose a novel idea that integrates the concept of Shannon entropy into a grey relational analysis model. The proposed method was used to measure human information behavior in relation to on-line learning performance and computer anxiety. A total of 115 unemployed adults voluntarily participated in the experimental study. All experimental subjects were divided into groups according to individual differences in gender, age ranges, educational levels, and learning performances. Taking advantage of the grey relation entropy operation, we derived the perceptive correlations among different classified groups in terms of the accessibility of on-line learning and computer anxiety scales, respectively. Through the empirical study, certain on-line learning characteristics were also identified.

Basal and suppressed salivary cortisol in female Vietnam nurse veterans with and without PTSD

It has been suggested that discrepant findings regarding low basal cortisol levels and enhanced suppression of cortisol in response to dexamethasone (DEX) administration in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) may reflect individual differences in gender, trauma type, stage of development at trauma occurrence (e.g., childhood vs. adulthood), early pre-traumatic risk factors, or other individual differences. This study examined salivary cortisol levels at 08.00h and 16.00h as well as cortisol response to 0.50 mg DEX in 40 female Vietnam nurse veterans who had current, chronic PTSD (Current) vs. 43 who never had PTSD (Never). Repeated measures analyses of covariance did not reveal significant group differences in cortisol levels or cortisol suppression. Given that nurses who served in Vietnam had similar exposures, ages at exposure, and duration since exposure to previously studied male Vietnam combat veterans, the present lack of evidence for low cortisol and cortisol hyper-suppression in nurses with PTSD suggests that previous findings of low cortisol and cortisol hyper-suppression in male Vietnam veterans, females sexually abused as children, and other populations may reflect risk factors beyond simply having PTSD.

The Politics of Gender in Dance Pedagogy

Dance education researchers interested in pedagogy have drawn considerable energy from the area of social foundations in education, especially in terms of schooling and its impact on gender identity. Borrowing from feminist thought, critical theory, gender studies, critical pedagogy, and most recently, men's studies, dance pedagogy literature has begun to articulate the ways in which socially embedded assumptions about gender and dominant structural power relations produce unjust educational and socio-cultural outcomes. Because traditional dance pedagogy schools for obedience and emphasizes silent conformity in which dancers reproduce what they receive, rather than critique, question, or create it, some approaches for confronting gender bias and inequity in dance teaching and curriculum have been identified. Key to these strategies is a committed effort to position the social construction of gender as a conscious variable in all aspects of dance pedagogy, as well as the validation and affirmation of individual differences in gender and culture. However, further pedagogical considerations in dance are necessary in terms of gendered teaching and gender asymmetries inherent in the dance population's teachers and learners.