Gender Stereotypes: How Can Gender Stereotypes Affect People's Choices?

Overview

Objectives/Goals The objective of this study was to determine some of the variables that make up gender stereotypes and whether people's choices can be affected by them. Methods/Materials 10 test subjects of each gender ranging in age from 8-62 presented with three tasks. Participants first presented with a series of images of 10 athletes of each gender who played one of 10 sports, which were all listed before the participant, and then had to guess which sport each athlete played. Next participants given 50 notecards, each with one word on it that might suggest a gender stereotype, and had to sort all the words into sections of male or female as fast as possible and then repeat this activity, this time given much more time and an added section for both genders. Lastly, participants presented with images of 6 different toys and asked which they would give to a young boy, young girl, and an 8 year old child. Results Subjects did base their choices off of gender stereotypes, in the first and third tasks subjects were more stereotypical towards feminine ideas, subjects of different cultural backgrounds were more stereotypical in the first and second tasks, and teenagers were slightly less stereotypical, especially in the second task. In the first task sports that might be considered as being "feminine" such as dance were guessed the most for female athletes and the least for male athletes and vice versa. In the second task, both the first and second times subjects abided by gender stereotypes, however much more so in the first. The second time, terms that had been sorted as being for females were integrated much more easily into being associated with both genders, however even more male stereotypes arose as being strictly masculine. The third task really represented the impact of gender stereotypical marketing, as almost all subjects abided to them, aside from a few coming from different cultural backgrounds. Conclusions/Discussion This data shows that gender stereotypes do impact us and play a role in the choices that we make, in numerous ways, and that when dealing with people in real life, it is important to consider these findings so that we as a society might be able to reduce the impact and importance of these restraining norms.

Competition history

• CSEF 2016 Behavioral & Social Sciences · Entry J0407

Resources

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