Hostile and Benevolent Sexism and College Women’s STEM Outcomes

We examined associations of perceived ambivalent sexism with women’s outcomes in university Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) courses as a function of their STEM identity. Women (N = 592) who varied in STEM identification reported on their personal experiences with benevolent...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Psychology of women quarterly 2018-03, Vol.42 (1), p.72-87
Main Authors: Kuchynka, Sophie L., Salomon, Kristen, Bosson, Jennifer K., El-Hout, Mona, Kiebel, Elizabeth, Cooperman, Claudia, Toomey, Ryan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Academic achievement
Ambivalence
Attitudes
College students
Competence
Differentiation
Feminism
Feminist psychology
Gender stereotypes
Identity
Jokes
Mathematics
Paternalism
Personal experiences
Psychology
Science and technology
Self-efficacy
Sexism
STEM education
Technology
Women
Womens studies
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Summary:We examined associations of perceived ambivalent sexism with women’s outcomes in university Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) courses as a function of their STEM identity. Women (N = 592) who varied in STEM identification reported on their personal experiences with benevolent and hostile sexism and indicated their STEM major intentions, STEM self-efficacy, and STEM grade point average (GPA). Women perceived more benevolent sexism (i.e., protective paternalism and complementary gender differentiation) than hostile sexism in STEM courses, and their STEM identity moderated the associations between sexism and STEM outcomes. Among weakly-identified (but not strongly-identified) women, protective paternalism predicted lower STEM major intentions, STEM self-efficacy, and STEM GPA; hostile sexism predicted lower STEM GPA. Male STEM students (N = 163) reported more protective paternalism attitudes than hostile sexism attitudes, suggesting that women’s perceptions were not without warrant. We discuss implications of these results for understanding women’s underrepresentation in STEM and advise STEM educators to avoid well-intended, but paternalistic, messages that convey negative stereotypes about women’s STEM competence.
ISSN:0361-6843
1471-6402
DOI:10.1177/0361684317741889