Meaning-Making in Context: Thinking About and Researching Gendered Lives (original) (raw)
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The Social Psychology of Sex and Gender From Gender Differences to Doing Gender
Psychology of Women Quarterly, 2011
The social psychology of gender is a major, if qualified, success story of contemporary feminist psychology. The breadth and intellectual vigor of the field is reflected in the following six commentaries in the broadly defined area of the Social Psychology of Gender which were commissioned for this third of four 35 th anniversary sections to feature brief retrospectives by authors of highly-cited PWQ articles. Our goal in this section's introduction to is to provide a brief history of the development of this area, placing the articles described in the commentaries into this historical context. The six papers in this special section, individually and taken together, identify significant turning points in the social psychology of gender. We focus on how, within a few brief years, the study of gender in psychology underwent massive transformation. 1
1975
The philosophical proposition axiomatic in all gender difference research is examined in this paper. Research on gender differences is that which attempts to describe categorical differences between males and females, based on a designated po'ential for sexual reproduction. The methodological problems raised by this assumption include the presuMptions that masculinity and femininity are extreme opposites and that all persons in each group are more like, the persons in their own gender identification' group than they are like any One person in the other gender identification group. Anne Constantinople (1973) suggests that there is no rationale for believing that biological function is meaningful for understanding self-conception. This paper concludes by suggesting ±hat the a priori assumption of two and only two genders has little +o contribute beyond refinement of cultural prejudice and that the possibilities for use of such research by social planners is par.ticularly treacherous. (LL)
A World Without Gender The Social Construction of Gender
Gale Researchers, Cengage Publishers, 2017
ARTICLE SUMMARY To envision a post-gender world, it is important to pay some attention to the patterns of gender discrimination that operate in society. Gender is a social construction, meaning that masculinity and femininity are constructed and maintained through social interactions and socialization. The social constructionist framework of gender has created a binary between masculinity and femininity: for example, women are trained to be submissive and men to be aggressive. However there are avenues by which this inequality can be eradicated, both at the micro and the macro social level. Without giving attention to the patterns and systems of gender discrimination that exist in society, a post-gender world remains beyond reach. However, changes can be made at both the macro and the micro levels. At the micro level, it is important to alter the imbalance of labor within the household, where women disproportionately shoulder the household responsibilities. Parenting also operates on a micro level, and in order to attain a post-gender society it is vital to socialize children beyond the gender binaries. At the macro level, changes need to happen in the schools, workplace and media. Schools should discourage gender-based bullying, and workplaces need to reduce discrimination against women. Media portrayals of gender have also been problematic for a long time. Television shows and movies legitimize gender binaries, thereby reinforcing gender discrimination. To attain a gender-neutral society, the media rhetoric has to change. At the core of a post-gender society are intersectionality and an appreciation of diversity. As much as we discuss changes in gendered behavior institutionally, it is important to take into account race, nationality, sexuality, and other differences.
Gender Differences in Different Contexts
InTech eBooks, 2017
Gender differences are often seen as either biologically determined or culturally acquired or conditioned. However, in an age where gender equality is the main target, neither peer reviewers nor students show much interest in gender differences. Moreover, not only do people try to integrate their 'ying' and 'yang' in their personalities also transgender identities are publicly acknowledged, appreciated and respected. Thus, in this chapter, I argue that we need to downgrade gender differences to a statistical variable that explains variance, sharpens statistical effects and reveals strategies. I am giving examples from my developmental psychology research where the split-sample analysis by gender showed amazing and often unexpected effects.
Distinguishing Between Sex and Gender: History, Current Conceptualizations, and Implications
Sex Roles, 2011
Many psychologists, particularly feminist psychologists, have drawn a distinction between the term sex and the term gender. The purposes of this paper were to review the history of this distinction and to illustrate the varied and inconsistent ways in which these terms are used. Historically, this distinction began with John Money and his colleagues in the 1950s (Money et al. 1955a, b, 1957); they used the term sex to refer to individuals' physical characteristics and the term gender to refer to individuals' psychological characteristics and behavior. Two decades later, Rhoda Unger (1979) argued that the widespread use of the term sex implies biological causes and promotes the idea that differences between women and men are natural and immutable. She proposed the use of the term gender to refer to traits that are culturally assumed to be appropriate for women and men. Her work was influential in prompting a widespread shift from the use of the term sex to the use of the term gender in psychological texts. Nevertheless, current definitions of sex and gender vary widely. Some authors use the terms interchangeably. Of those who distinguish between the terms, most construe gender as more related to cultural influences and sex as more related to biology. There are numerous inconsistencies in authors' definitions, however. Additionally, in some cases, there appears to be a mismatch between how researchers define sex or gender and how they measure it. It seems likely that the distinction between the term sex and the term gender may become less meaningful and important over time.
Gender & Society, 2004
According to the perspective developed in this article, widely shared, hegemonic cultural beliefs about gender and their impact in what the authors call "social relational" contexts are among the core components that maintain and change the gender system. When gender is salient in these ubiquitous contexts, cultural beliefs about gender function as part of the rules of the game, biasing the behaviors, performances, and evaluations of otherwise similar men and women in systematic ways that the authors spec-if& While the biasing impact of gender beliefs may be small in any one instance, the consequences cumulate over individuals' lives and result in substantially different outcomes for men and women. After describing this perspective, the authors show how it sheds new light on some definingfeatures of the gender system and illustrate its implications for research into specific questions about gender inequality.
From “Gender Difference” to “Doing Gender” to “Gender and Structural Power” in Psychological Science
2020
In this chapter, Shields reviews how feminist-informed psychology in the US has conceptualized and studied gender since the early 1970s, and how her career both reflects and has affected the field. Toggling between her own experiences and the field, she organizes the story around three periods: the early 1970s and its emphasis on androgyny; the late 1980s to 1990s and growing focus on gender as a socially constructed practice; and present-day intersectionality-informed views of gender as but one dimension of interlocking social identities that define axes of sociostructural power. She concludes with cautions and hopes. She cautions readers about the “gender differences paradigm” that continues to dominate psychological research on gender. Shields finds hope in the continued growth of the international community of feminist psychologists.
The meaning of difference: Gender theory, postmodernism, and psychology
American Psychologist, 1988
Two recent postmodern movements, constructivism and deconstruction, challenge the idea of a single meaning of reality and suggest that meanings result from social experience. We show how these postmodern approaches can be applied to the psychology of gender. ...