Sex roles and leadership revisited.

Replicated and extended E. I. Megargee's (1969) earlier work to reassess the part that sex roles play in the assumption of leadership. Megargee's original study indicated that women who had superior leadership ability failed to assert their sex roles in the presence of males in both masculine and neutral task situations. In the present Study 1, the Gough Dominance (DO) Scale was administered to 700 undergraduates; in Study 2, the scale was administered to 500 undergraduates. Ss were grouped into high- and low-DO pairs. Results of Study 1, which employed a masculine task, reveal that despite recent consciousness-raising, high-DO women paired with low-DO men were still significantly less likely to assume a leadership role than high-DO men or high-DO women who were paired with partners of the same sex. Study 2 used a task stereotypically associated with women to determine if behavior could be altered by task manipulation. Results indicate that the Magargee effect was specific to task; a majority of the high-DO Ss in all pairs took the leadership role. (4 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and power relationships in supervision.

Discusses the role of the supervisor based on gender issues. Issues in supervision of practitioners with a feminist perspective are explored, as well as how supervisors can assist the practitioner who has managerial aspirations. The role of supervision in dealing with stress and gender is considered. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and psychotherapy: A current appraisal.

Reviews the current status of research on the effects of sex-role stereotypes on mental health judgments. Studies in this area have addressed (a) whether there are different sex-role-related standards of mental health for men and women, (b) if violations of sex role norms result in adverse mental health judgments, and (c) if therapists set sex-role-related goals for their clients. It is concluded that sex-role stereotypes are strong mental health cues for nonprofessionals, with violations of sex-role norms leading to adverse mental health judgments, but that while professionals share the sex-role stereotypes of their lay contemporaries, the professionals are unaffected by them in making mental health judgments and in setting therapeutic goals. This discrepancy between stereotypes and behavior may be due to any of 3 factors: the methodological limitations of the studies, actual differences in mental health between men and women, or normal attitude–behavior discrepancies. (2 p ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Battered women: Sex roles and clinical issues.

Examines how sex role biases contribute to the origins of spousal violence, compound its psychological effects, and interfere with effective treatment for battered women. Issues that commonly arise during psychotherapy with battered women and their batterers are discussed, such as self-esteem, denial, manipulation, body integration and sexuality, and familial relationships. Clinical impressions are supported with preliminary results of data collected from 400 battered women. Suggestions are made for implementing effective, nonsexist treatment programs with preventive, secondary, and tertiary strategies. (18 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

A serendipitous finding: Sex roles and schizophrenia.

In a small group study of the family environment of the schizophrenic, the interaction profiles of 67 convalescent young adult schizophrenics, 40 male and 27 female, were compared with those of 56 nonpsychotic young adults of whom 31 were male and 25 were female. The profiles were derived from 48 min. of recorded interaction between father, mother, and young adults coded with a variation of the Bales interaction categories. The profiles of the male schizophrenics presented, as anticipated, an interaction equivalent of withdrawal, with low total activity rates and low dominance behaviors. In marked contrast, the female schizophrenics proved to be more active and dominating than the female normals. (19 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and mental health of women in prison.

Discusses special concerns regarding mental health for incarcerated women, including suicide, depression, and the use of psychotropic drugs. It is suggested that problems arise because of judicial selection in sentencing, inadequate medical services and programs, and negative effects of prison control methods. (15 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles, classroom instruction, and reading achievement.

Boys learn to read more slowly than girls in American schools, and for some years American educators have been concerned about this fact and the problems it poses. Several explanations have been advanced for sex differences in reading achievement, including hypotheses based on physical maturation, female teacher bias, teacher discrimination, feminization of reading, differential response to pupil behaviors, and sex-relevant teaching styles. Each of these hypotheses is conceptualized here, and evidence for and against each hypothesis is reviewed. Current evidence is found sufficient to reject only 2 of the hypotheses, and it is suggested that more than 1 of the remaining hypotheses may be needed to explain sex differences in reading achievement. (103 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and psychological well-being: Perspectives on methodology.

Discusses some sources of problematic methodology in recent research designed to relate current measures of sex-role orientation to indices of psychological well-being. Practices and procedures in sex-role research are examined in relation to orthogonal scales of sex-role orientation that provide independent measures of masculinity, femininity, and a newer assessment of androgyny. Directions for increased conceptual and methodological clarity include theoretical and psychometric definitions of androgyny, the relationship of sex-role typing to other aspects of interpersonal functioning, and varying procedures in sex-role and gender distinction, population sampling, and construct validation. Issues are raised concerning the generality of sex-role measures and the desirability of direct behavioral validation criteria. (38 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and unwanted pregnancy in adolescent and adult women.

Discusses the stresses of unwanted pregnancy for women, their partners and families, and health professionals. Psychologists are considered capable of reducing the likelihood of unwanted pregnancy as well as contributing to a constructive resolution of the crisis. Factors that are often associated with contraceptive use and nonuse are highlighted. It is also shown that socialization in traditional sex roles contributes to ineffective contraceptive protection. Problems associated with the resolution of unwanted pregnancy are presented, such as resentment toward the child, the sense of loss for the adopted child or the aborted fetus, and depression. (36 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex guilt and premarital sexual experiences of college students.

Investigated the relationship of sex guilt as a personality disposition to reports of previous sexual experiences, feelings following participation, or reasons for nonparticipation, and pre- and postmarital sexual standards for 60 male and 76 female undergraduates. Sex guilt was negatively correlated with the level of intimacy of premarital sexual experiences, and guilty Ss had less permissive premarital standards. The more guilty females gave moral beliefs as their reason for not participating in intercourse or more intimate forms of petting; the more guilty males reported that moral beliefs, respect for the girl, and fear of pregnancy or disease were their reasons for nonparticipation in intercourse or oral-genital relations. (15 ref.) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and gender differences in the experience of depression.

Studied sex differences and sex role correlates of depressive experiences in 82 female and 39 male college students. Gender differences in depressive experiences were found. These differences were consistent with societal sex role expectations. The level of depression on the Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale was negatively associated with sex role congruence, as assessed by the Sex-Role Stereotype Questionnaire, scored for Competency and Warmth–Expressiveness. Degree of sex role congruence within the male and female samples was also associated with different depressive experiences on the Depressive Experiences Questionnaire. The sex differences and the different intrasex correlations indicated that experiences of depression are associated with different facets of sex role stereotypes. (9 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sexuality and the dual-earner couple: Multiple roles and sexual functioning.

This article reports data testing predictions that a couple's sexual relationship suffers if the wife is employed, particularly if she is employed full time. The theoretical framework rests on the scarcity hypothesis and the enhancement hypothesis concerning multiple roles. Longitudinal data collected from a sample of more than 500 women and their husbands at 3 time points from pregnancy through a year after birth provide no support for the scarcity hypothesis. There were no significant differences between homemakers and women employed part time, full time, and high full time on measures of frequency of intercourse, sexual satisfaction, and decreased sexual desire. Work-role quality was a better predictor of sexual outcomes than hours of employment. Fatigue was associated with sexual outcomes for both employed women and homemakers. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex roles and social support as moderators of life stress adjustment.

In this study we used a longitudinal design to test the stress-buffering effects of sex role orientation in combination with perceived social support on measure of trait anxiety and depression. College undergraduates served as subjects. The cross-sectional analysis provided strong support for the hypothesis that masculinity would function as a life stress buffer. The hypothesis that social support would serve as a stress buffer when coupled with high masculinity was supported by one of the cross-sectional analyses as well as the longitudinal analysis. This pattern was found primarily for perceptions of tangible social support. The longitudinal analysis also revealed a significant interaction involving negative life events and masculinity and femininity. This interaction effect provided unexpected support for a balance model of androgyny, in that non-sex-typed subjects showed greater resilience to recent life stress than did sex-typed subjects. The findings are discussed in terms of their implications for the study of life stress adjustment. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Runaway ornament diversity caused by Fisherian sexual selection

Fisher's runaway process of sexual selection is potentially an important force generating character divergence between closely related populations. We investigated the evolution of multiple female preferences by Fisher's runaway process. There are two outcomes of runaway. The first is the evolution of mate preference to a stable equilibrium. This evolution occurs if the benefits of mate choice are sufficiently large relative to the cost of choice. Alternatively, mate preferences evolve cyclically. The rate and pattern of cyclic evolution depends primarily on the individual cost of choice and epistasis in the joint cost of choice. If there are small differences in natural selection (e.g., predation risk) between populations, cyclic evolution quickly leads to divergence in mate preferences and sexual ornaments and so to sexual isolation.     

Parasites, immunology of hosts, and host sexual selection

Parasite-mediated sexual selection is reviewed with special emphasis on the bird literature. Choosy females may benefit from choosing parasite-free mates if such males provide better parental care, do not transmit contagious parasites, or provide resistance genes to offspring. There is evidence in support of each of these mechanisms. The immunocompetence handicap hypothesis posits that secondary sexual characters reliably reveal the ability of males to resist parasites due to the immunosuppressive effects of testosterone and other biochemicals. Several aspects of these negative feedback mechanisms are supported by laboratory studies, but evidence from free-living animals is almost completely absent. Corticosterone rather than testosterone may potentially mediate the immunocompetence handicap mechanism. A simple version of the immunocompetence handicap is developed suggesting that body condition of male hosts is a sufficient mediator of the handicap mechanism of reliable sexual signaling. Sexual selection appears to be more intense in sexually dichromatic bird species, and comparative studies using pairwise comparisons of closely related taxa reveal that sexually dichromatic bird species have larger spleens, larger bursa of Fabricius, and higher concentrations of leukocytes than monochromatic species. Parasite-mediated sexual selection is proposed to affect parasite biology by increasing (1) the variance-to-mean ratio in parasite abundance, (2) variance in the intensity of natural selection affecting hosts, and (3) speciation rates among parasites exploiting hosts subject to intense sexual selection as compared to those subject to less intense selection.     

Buss and sexual selection: The issue of culture.

Comments on D. M. Buss' (see record 1995-21138-001) comment on A. H. Eagly's (see record 1995-21141-001) discussion comparing the sexes in scientific research. The author disputes Buss' use of particular assumptions as facts and his concepts of culture, social behavior, and sexual selection. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Interpersonal communication and sexual adjustment: The roles of understanding and agreement.

The influence of interpersonal communication on sexual adjustment in cohabiting heterosexual couples was investigated. Male and female partners from 76 heterosexual couples independently completed measures of their own and their partners' sexual preferences, as well as measures of sexual and general relationship adjustment, sexual difficulties, marital role preferences, depression, and social desirability. Results indicated that sexual satisfaction in both partners was associated with men's understanding of their partner's preferences and agreement between their preferences. The influential role of men's understanding was supported by hierarchical regression, convergent and discriminant evidence, and multiple regression models that accounted for 51% and 63% of variance in men's and women's sexual satisfaction. General relationship adjustment of both partners was associated with women's understanding of men's marital role preferences. An explanation of understanding's function is proposed, accounting for gender differences within and across sexual and general realms of relating. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Sex therapy: considerations in the selection of patients

Sex therapy has proven helpful for many patients with sexual dysfunctions. In judging the appropriateness of this new treatment procedure the clinician should determine the following: that a sexual dysfunction exists, that a stable couple relationship exists, that there are no major marital, psychiatric or physical problems that are etiologically important or that would interfere with treatment, and that both partners are willing to engage in a treatment program.     

Psychological sex differences: Origins through sexual selection.

Men and women clearly differ in some psychological domains. A. H. Eagly (see record 1995-21141-001) shows that these differences are not artifactual or unstable. Ideally, the next scientific step is to develop a cogent explanatory framework for understanding why the sexes differ in some psychological domains and not in others and for generating accurate predictions about sex differences as yet undiscovered. This article offers a brief outline of an explanatory framework for psychological sex differences—one that is anchored in the new theoretical paradigm of evolutionary psychology. Men and women differ, in this view, in domains in which they have faced different adaptive problems over human evolutionary history. In all other domains, the sexes are predicted to be psychologically similar. Evolutionary psychology jettisons the false dichotomy between biology and environment and provides a powerful metatheory of why sex differences exist, where they exist, and in what contexts they are expressed (D. M. Buss, 1995). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)