Perceptions of Femininity in Leadership: Modern Trend or Classic Component?

Recently, leadership theorists have commonly suggested that leaders should demonstrate new, arguably feminine, leadership behaviors. This contrasts with traditional stereotypes of leadership as strictly masculine. However, leadership research has a long history of recognizing two categories of leade...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sex roles 2008-06, Vol.58 (11-12), p.784-789
Main Author: Johanson, John C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Association (Psychology)
Behavioral Science and Psychology
Biological and medical sciences
Factor Structure
Females
Femininity
Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology
Gender
Gender Studies
Leaders
Leadership
Leadership Effectiveness
Males
Masculinity
Medicine/Public Health
Meta Analysis
Original Article
Perceptions
Personality
Personality traits
Psychology
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychology. Psychophysiology
Resistance (Psychology)
Social psychology
Social role. Sex role
Sociology
Trends
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Summary:Recently, leadership theorists have commonly suggested that leaders should demonstrate new, arguably feminine, leadership behaviors. This contrasts with traditional stereotypes of leadership as strictly masculine. However, leadership research has a long history of recognizing two categories of leadership behaviors, initiation of structure and consideration, which appear to reflect stereotypically masculine and feminine behaviors. In the current study, 24 undergraduate volunteers rated traits of purported leaders based solely upon their viewing of the leaders’ faces. These faces were visually impoverished so that the raters had to rely on implicit personality theories of leaders to guide their ratings. The results demonstrate that participants’ ratings of purported leaders’ masculinity and femininity indeed correlate very closely with their ratings of initiation of structure and consideration respectively.
ISSN:0360-0025
1573-2762
DOI:10.1007/s11199-008-9398-2