Traditional Gender Role Attitudes Research Articles

Managers’ Traditional Gender Role Attitudes

Managers’ Traditional Gender Role Attitudes

Investigation of Early Childhood and Primary School Education Teacher Candidates' Attitudes to Gender Roles in Terms of Gender, Grade, Mother’s and Father’s Education Levels

Gender inequality indeed persists as a pervasive issue worldwide, infiltrating numerous facets of society and impeding progress toward a more equitable and just world. Schools play a crucial role as essential institutions where children embark on their initial journey into social life, contributing to the formation of values, norms, and social relationships. During these early years, children observe, imitate, and internalize the words, behaviors, and attitudes of teachers, shaping their understanding of the world around them. Therefore, children's perceptions of gender and attitudes toward gender can be significantly influenced by the attitudes and behaviors of their teachers. This research aims to examine whether there are differences in the gender-role attitudes among pre-service early childhood and primary school teachers based on gender, grade level, mother's and father's education level. The study was designed as a cross-sectional survey model, and data were collected from 1st and 4th-grade students enrolled in Early Childhood and Primary School Education Programs at a university in Turkey. The data were collected using a Personal Information Form and the Gender Role Attitude Scale (GRAS). The data were analyzed using Kruskal-Wallis and Mann-Whitney U tests in SPSS 22.0, and effect sizes were calculated. Analysis indicated that there were statistically significant differences in gender role attitudes between genders, grade level, and mother’s education level. However, there was no statistically significant difference in the scores based on the father's education level. Female teacher candidates were found to have more egalitarian gender role attitudes compared to male teacher candidates, and 4th-grade students exhibited more egalitarian attitudes than 1st-grade students. Additionally, it was observed that teacher candidates whose mothers were illiterate tended to have more traditional gender role attitudes compared to those whose mothers had primary school, middle school, high school, or college degrees.

Who's doing more and when? Gender, parenting, and housework trajectories.

Drawing on five waves of longitudinal survey data (N = 520, 51% female, 39% with a university degree, 90% White), this study examined trajectories of women's and men's contributions to cooking, kitchen cleaning, grocery shopping, house cleaning, laundry, and overall housework from Age 25 to 50 years and explored time-invariant (traditional gender role attitudes, homemaker mother, mother and father education assessed at Age 18) and time-varying (raising children at Ages 25, 32, 43, and 50 years) predictors of housework trajectories. Growth curve analyses revealed that women contributed more to all housework tasks than men at Age 25, a gender gap maintained to Age 50. Housework increased to Age 32 and stabilized until Age 43 before declining by Age 50 for women's and men's laundry, women's kitchen cleaning, grocery shopping, and overall housework, and men's house cleaning. There was no change in women's and men's trajectory of cooking meals, women's house cleaning, and men's contributions to kitchen cleaning, grocery shopping, and overall housework. Traditional gender role attitudes, having a homemaker mother, and mother's and father's education inconsistently predicted women's and men's trajectories. Raising children, however, was consistently linked with within-person fluctuations in housework. When raising children, women contributed more than average to housework, whereas when men were raising children, they contributed less than normal. The results highlight a gendered pattern of housework evident in the twenties and persisting well into midlife, with parenthood widening the gap. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

Born to care (or not): How gender role attitudes affect occupational sorting

AbstractOccupation segregation explains a significant portion of the gender wage gap, with women working in lower paid female‐dominated occupations. We examine how childhood and adolescent exposure to gender biased norms about work influence this occupational sorting. We document that early life exposure to traditional gender role attitudes, which view women's role as caretakers, increase women's likelihood of employment in care occupations and decrease the likelihood for men, thereby increasing the gender care occupation gap. A decomposition of the factors affecting this sorting shows that a primary channel is through differences in the choice of post‐secondary field of study or major. Our results suggest that traditional gender role attitudes may work to segment the labor market for men and women and contribute to the gender wage gap. This suggests that more egalitarian gender role attitudes which increase the share of men entering care occupations would increase wages for both men and women, lowering the gender wage gap.

Women and Finance-Specific Human Capital: Impact of Gender Role Attitudes

The benefits and costs of investing in finance-specific human capital are affected by subjective attitudes about the expected improvement in consumption from higher-quality financial decisions and the expected psychic costs of investing. This study investigates how gender role attitudes of women predict their acquisition of finance-specific human capital. Results indicate that women with the most traditional gender role attitudes are less financially literate than women with non-traditional gender role attitudes and men. Gender role attitudes formed early in life explain differences in financial literacy between men and women observed in prior studies. Multivariate analyses that control for attained human capital suggest that traditional gender role attitudes affect finance-specific human capital investment and investment in formal education. Women with traditional gender role attitudes are the least knowledgeable and have the lowest confidence in applying their financial knowledge.

Filial Piety and the Development of Independence and Interdependence During Emerging Adulthood: A Longitudinal Study of Taiwanese Adolescents.

While filial piety has been widely studied in Confucian-influenced societies, little is known about how it may influence the development of emerging adults' independence and interdependence. Using a population-based longitudinal study in Taiwan (N = 3,149; 49.5% females), this study examined the association between filial piety in adolescence (aged 13-15) and independence and interdependence in emerging adulthood (aged 22). Results show that greater adherence to filial piety in adolescence predicts higher independence in emerging adulthood. Additionally, greater adherence to filial piety predicts higher interdependence for females, but not males, when parents hold traditional gender-role attitudes. This study underscores the significance of cultural norms and parental gender-role attitudes in shaping individuals' development during emerging adulthood.

Dating Violence and Mental Health in Emerging Adulthood.

Dating violence constitutes a serious social and health problem. This study aims to increase knowledge on dating violence in emerging adulthood by analysing the relevance of gender and of having or not having a current partner in the victimization and perpetration of such violence. It also analyses the association between dating violence and mental health, as well as the relevance of traditional gender role attitudes and the internalization of feminine/expressive and masculine/instrumental traits in the victimization and perpetration of such types of violence. The participants were 930 Spanish emerging adults who were assessed by six self-report questionnaires and scales. Men reported more psychological and physical violence victimization and physical violence perpetration than women, and women and men without a current partner reported more psychological and sexual violence than women and men with a current partner. Dating violence victimization was associated with more mental symptomatology, less life satisfaction, and lower self-esteem in men with a current partner and in women without a current partner. The main predictor of dating violence victimization was dating violence perpetration, and the main predictor of dating violence perpetration was victimization by such violence. More traditional gender role attitudes also predicted greater victimization and perpetration of dating violence, except among women without a current partner.

Youth educational mobility and the rural family in China

Urban-rural economic opportunity gaps drive rural youth to seek economic stability by migrating away from home and family. The links between educational attainment and economic outcomes for rural youth are well studied in China and elsewhere, but the implications of educational mobility for rural family relationships remain less understood. Extending tenets of second demographic transition theory, we posit that education sets the stage for “individualization:” geographic mobility for urban work distant from rural family networks. Educational mobility may thus set conditions for upending traditional family co-residence patterns, direct-support relationships, and family-gender attitudes. In this paper, we consider first whether educational advancement is associated with urban economic mobility for rural youth in young adulthood, and then ask whether education is linked to disruption of rural family relations. Specifically, using the case of children growing up in rural northwest China, we estimate relationships between secondary and tertiary educational attainment and (1) economic stability, (2) intergenerational geographic separation and material exchange, and (3) traditional family and gender role attitudes, after adjusting for potential confounders. Results show that for both men and women, education is associated with greater economic stability in young adulthood, across several measures, and with an erosion of adherence to traditional family and gender attitudes. Moreover, for men, education correlates to less family proximity and more material exchange.

Student and Teacher Culture and Composition and the Development of Gender Role Attitudes among Young Adolescents

Research has shown that gender role attitudes develop during adolescence; however, the relevant predictors remain a matter of debate. In adolescence, the school environment gains in importance. Thus, the present study investigates how students’ and especially teachers’ culture and composition predict the development of gender role attitudes in young adolescents. The study addresses this question using a sample of 7360 Flemish students (44.8% girls), who were surveyed three times after entering secondary education between 2012 (Mage = 13.14, SD = 0.56) and 2014. Latent change models reveal that boys’ initial gender role attitudes are associated with the students’ gender role culture; however, boys with more traditional gender role attitudes do not develop in an even more traditional direction at the beginning of secondary education. In contexts with a more privileged student SES composition, boys develop less traditional attitudes, while a traditional gender role culture among teachers supports the development of more traditional gender role attitudes among boys. Girls with more traditional gender role attitudes find themselves within student contexts with a more traditional culture. However, the development does not vary with the students’ gender role culture. Overall, boys seem more susceptible to students’ cultural and compositional characteristics.

Gender Role Attitudes and Prosecutorial Decision-Making in a Case of Intimate Partner Violence.

Intimate Partner Violence (IPV) is a pervasive public health crisis that impacts individuals across the gender spectrum. Traditionally, IPV is conceptualized through a gendered lens, with men as the perpetrators and women as the victims. The current study explored the association between perpetrator/victim sex, prosecutor gender role attitudes, and prosecutorial decision-making in a case of alleged IPV. We hypothesized that prosecutors with more traditional gender role attitudes would be more lenient, and this effect to be exacerbated in cases involving a female perpetrator. Criminal prosecutors across the United States (N = 94) completed the Male Role Norms Inventory-Revised and read case materials describing the alleged IPV between a heterosexual couple (e.g., arrest report, medical records). The victim/perpetrator sex was manipulated to involve either a female- (male victim) or male- (female victim) perpetrated IPV case. Results indicate that gender role attitudes were not associated with prosecutorial decision-making. However, prosecutors perceived the violence as more serious and the perpetrator as more likely to reoffend when the perpetrator was male; further, they attributed more blame to the female victim. An interaction between perpetrator sex and prosecutor gender role attitudes indicates those with more traditional beliefs were more likely to blame the female (rather than male) victim. These data suggest extralegal factors related to the perpetrator (i.e., perpetrator sex), rather than prosecutor individual differences (i.e., gender role attitudes), are associated with prosecutor discretionary decision-making. In tandem with real-world disparities in the prosecution of IPV based on perpetrator sex, the current research stresses the importance of exploring a diversity of factors that account for these observed differences.

Life satisfaction and unemployment—The role of gender attitudes and work identity

AbstractUnemployment has a strong negative effect on subjective well‐being, but the effect varies across groups. Using an event study approach, we explore the sources of heterogeneity in the effect of the transition into unemployment on life satisfaction, focusing on work identity and gender role attitudes. All experience a loss of life satisfaction when they become unemployed, but we find greater heterogeneity of experience among men: the losses in life satisfaction are greater if they hold egalitarian rather than traditional gender role attitudes, and if they have strong rather than weak work identity. Among women, those holding traditional gender role attitudes experience larger losses. We discuss possible reasons for these results.

Gender Preferences for Children and Gender Relations in Contemporary China

This study aims to investigate and compare the determinants of gender preference for children in rural and urban China under the values of children to parents (VOC) approach by focusing on the effects of attitudes to elder care and gender roles, and the attainment of insurance programs. Using pooled cross-sectional data from 2013 and 2015 of the Chinese General Social Surveys, we found that rural individuals expecting children responsible for old-age support exhibit daughter preference, followed by balance preference, whereas their urban counterparts show similar son preference and daughter preference. In addition, balance preference is associated with traditional gender role attitudes among rural individuals but correlated with more equal gender attitudes among urbanites. Furthermore, having more economic security decreases rural individuals’ preferences for having more daughters. The findings suggest that the prevalent balance preference and the rising preference for daughters have quite different implications on the gender relationship between rural and urban China, and traditionalism still drives gender preference in rural China. Policy implications are also discussed.

Mental Symptoms, Life Satisfaction and Sexual Orientation: A Gender Analysis.

Research has revealed that homosexual and bisexual people are at higher risk of mental health problems than heterosexual people. However, most studies have focused on differences in disorders and have not examined the intersection of gender and sexual orientation. The main aim of this study is to investigate the relevance of sexual orientation in women's and men's mental symptoms, life satisfaction, and self-esteem. A cross-sectional study was conducted with 309 women and men who were homosexual or bisexual and 309 women and men who were heterosexual, aged between 17 and 54. All participants were assessed by four self-reports measuring mental symptoms, life satisfaction, self-esteem, masculine/instrumental and feminine/expressive traits, and traditional gender role attitudes. Results showed an interaction between sexual orientation and gender, with lesbian or bisexual women scoring higher in severe depression symptoms and lower in life satisfaction than heterosexual women. Homosexual and bisexual people scored higher than heterosexuals in somatic symptoms, social dysfunction, and in self-esteem. Women scored higher than men in somatic, anxiety, and insomnia symptoms and in feminine/expressive traits, whereas men scored higher than women in traditional gender role attitudes. We conclude that sexual orientation and gender are relevant to the mental health and well-being of people.

Gender Role Attitudes Influence Vocal Masculine Preferences Among Gay Men in China.

Gender role attitudes refer to attitudes toward the appropriate roles, rights, and responsibilities of men and women in society. Evidence indicates that individuals with traditional gender role attitudes tend to prefer mates with sex-typical opposite-sex characteristics in heterosexual men and women. This study examined whether gender role attitudes were associated with vocal masculinity preference in gay men in China. Five hundred and sixty-seven participants aged between 16 and 49 years completed the vocal masculinity preference (voice pitch and vocal tract length; VTLs) and gender role attitudes scale. The results indicated that gay men generally preferred masculine voices (lower voice pitch and longer VTLs) and gender role attitudes were positively correlated with preferences for masculine cues in the voices of men. While individuals indicating an affinity with traditional gender roles exhibited stronger preferences for feminine voices, which were inconsistent with the present hypotheses. The results help us understand the role of traditional gender beliefs in the mate preferences of gay men in China. Furthermore, based on the results, understanding one's gender-role attitudes can help cultivate more diversified criteria for mate selection and facilitate gay men in better choosing suitable mates. Future longitudinal studies should examine the relationship between gender role attitudes and masculine preference changes over time. Whether this relationship differs in the different sexual roles of gay men should also be explored.

Paid Parental Leave in Correlation with Changing Gender Role Attitudes

In recent decades, several countries have implemented paid parental leave for parents. This paper discusses the correlation between paid parental leave—which in Austria corresponds with receiving childcare benefits—and changing gender role attitudes in different-gender parent couples. It draws on evidence from 42 semi-structured couple interviews (n = 42, 2021–2022) in which couples were asked how they arranged childcare, employment, and household chores and how they reached agreements with employers. The empirical data were first analyzed based on content and then by applying constructivist-informed grounded theory to investigate whether and how gender affected couples’ efforts to reconcile childcare, employment, and household chores and how employers responded to parental arrangements that challenged traditional gender role attitudes. Compared to other countries, Austria offers rather generous childcare benefits, including long leave periods. In addition, Austria has introduced a partnership bonus for parents who share childcare benefits 50:50 or 60:40. However, the number of couples who take advantage of these benefits is still low. In the presented research, parents who succeeded in sharing these childcare benefits were interviewed. All interviewees had taken at least five months of paid parental leave. The data were analyzed using a content-oriented approach and by applying informed grounded theory. The results show that a substantial number of fathers continued working in minor employment while receiving childcare benefits, in line with the prevailing assumption among employers that the man is the main family breadwinner. By contrast, mothers had to strongly insist that they could continue working during the early transition to parenthood. However, on an individual level and in specific domains, Austrian parents were able to successfully overcome traditional gender inequalities in reconciling work and family with the support of the newly implemented childcare benefits. The observation that in Austria, the share of fathers who take the income-related form of parental leave is higher than that of fathers who claim other forms of childcare benefits points to the importance of all parents having access to well-compensated parental leave, regardless of their income level before the birth of a child.

From attitudes to social networks: National gender-role attitudes and gender differences in late-life social relationships

Studies often find gender differences in social networks in later life, but are these findings universal, or do they differ in various cultural contexts? To address this research gap, the current study examines the association between gender differences in social relationships and country-level gender-role attitudes. We combined data from the Survey of Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) of individuals aged 50 years and older with country-level data on gender-role attitudes from the European Values Survey (EVS) for 15 European countries. We estimated a series of multivariate hierarchical regression models that predicted the size of the personal social network, its emotional closeness, and the proportion of the spouse, children, and friends in the network. The results indicated gender differences in social network characteristics. Women reported larger social networks and were more likely to have larger proportions of children and friends but smaller proportions of the spouse in their social networks. The magnitude of gender differences was associated with country-level gender-role attitudes. In countries with more egalitarian gender-role attitudes, women had larger networks with a larger proportion of friends compared to men. In countries with more traditional gender-role attitudes, women had larger proportions of their children and spouse in their social networks and had emotionally closer networks. Our findings suggest that the societal context and opportunity structures for social interactions play an important role in shaping the structure of women’s and men’s social relationships in later life.

When the context withholds girls from gender a‐typical conduct: Schools' gender role culture and disruptive school behaviour of boys and girls

AbstractOn average, boys display more disruptive school behaviour than girls. This study looks at this behaviour in the first place as gendered behaviour, investigating whether boys' and girls' disruptive behaviour is associated with their schools' student and teacher gender role culture. Multilevel analyses (HLM7) of representative Flemish data of 2706 male and 2436 female 8th grade students in resp. 57 and 49 secondary schools, and 1247 teachers gathered at the end of school‐year 2013/14, revealed that a more traditional student gender role culture is associated with less disruptive school behaviour in girls. As for boys, the positive association between traditional student gender role culture and disruptive school behaviour disappears when accounting for their individual gender role attitudes, which are significantly more traditional than those of girls. More traditional gender role attitudes coincide with more disruptive behaviour in boys and girls. Moreover, boys displaying less disruptive behaviour report a higher felt pressure for gender conformity. No impact is found of the homogeneity of teachers' gender role attitudes. The findings demonstrate that disruptive school behaviour can be looked at as gendered behaviour and can be tackled, at least partly, by discouraging gender stereotypical beliefs in students.

Parents’ Gender Role Attitudes and Child Adjustment: The Mediating Role of Parental Involvement

Parents’ gender role attitudes are pertinent to child adjustment. Importantly, parental involvement may help to explain the link between parents’ gender role attitudes and child adjustment. In this study, we investigated the differential contributions of mothers’ and fathers’ gender role attitudes on child adjustment, with the quality of mother and father involvement as mediators. Given that parental involvement is gender-differentiated in the Chinese context, actor and partner effects of mothers’ and fathers’ gender role attitudes on parental involvement were also examined. Participants were 211 maritally intact families from China, including mothers and fathers of children aged 4 to 7 years old. The findings based on structural equation modeling identified the actor and partner effects of fathers’ greater traditional gender role attitudes on a lower quality of mother and father involvement, whereas mothers’ greater traditional gender role attitudes were only related to a lower quality of mother involvement. Greater mother and father involvement was further associated with children’s greater prosocial behavior. The findings suggested the mediating role of the combined mother and father involvement between fathers’ gender role attitudes and children’s prosocial behavior. This study underscores the interdependent nature of mothers’ and fathers’ behavior on child adjustment. The findings inform researchers and practitioners of the importance of reducing both parents’ traditional gender role attitudes and enhancing the quality of parental involvement to foster child adjustment.

Factors Affecting Acceptance of Cosmetic Surgery As a Health Risk Behavior in Iranian Women: Investigating the Relationship Between Traditional Gender Role Attitudes and Body Image

Objectives: The present study aims to design and test a model of factors affecting the acceptance of cosmetic surgery in Iranian female students. Methods: A sample of 600 female students aged 18 to 35 were selected from Kharazmi University using cluster random sampling. The participants completed six questionnaires: The short version of the attitude toward women scale, the beliefs about appearance scale, the body areas satisfaction scale, the body image coping strategies inventory, the rhinoplasty outcome evaluation, and the acceptance of cosmetic surgery scale. A structural model was used to examine the relationships among research variables. Results: Results showed a good level of fit to the data and proposed that gender role attitudes can facilitate cosmetic surgery in women by mediator roles of dysfunctional appearance beliefs, body dissatisfaction, coping strategies, and outcome expectancy. Discussion: The study highlights the importance of traditional gender role attitudes in body dissatisfaction and cosmetic surgeries among Iranian women. Indeed, traditional gender role attitudes can encourage women to conform to beauty standards and undertake cosmetic procedures. These procedures can expose them to risks and unwanted consequences. Therefore, future research and prevention programs should be paid more attention to these traditional beliefs.

The Effects of Team Reflexivity and Gender-Role Attitudes on Female Nurses

Taiwan has significantly fewer senior nursing personnel than many other countries, which can be attributed in part to the prevalence of interpersonal stress and same-sex conflicts that often arise in female-dominated workplaces such as nursing. This study explored how team reflexivity and gender-role attitudes influence the stay intent of female nursing personnel using a cross-sectional design. Results showed group-level team reflexivity has more positive impact on nurses’ stay intent via team-based self-esteem than individual perceived team reflexivity, but traditional gender-role attitudes weaken this impact. Our findings indicate mutual understanding and trust is crucial for nursing teams to function effectively.