Some Effects of Sex-Linked Clothing and Gender Schema on the Stereotyping of Infants

Abstract

Two predictions were evaluated: first, that given minimal information about an infant, individuals would use sex-related cues (i.e., clothing) to categorize, evaluate, and make attributions about the infant, and second, that gender schematic individuals would be more likely than gender aschematic individuals to use such sex-related cues. On the basis of the Bem Sex Role Inventory, American college students were classified as either gender schematic (masculine or feminine) or gender aschematic (undifferentiated or androgynous). The students categorized, evaluated, and made trait attributions about an infant dressed in male, female, or ambiguous clothing. Both gender schematic and gender aschematic individuals relied on sex-related cues in their perceptions of the infant.

Scent of a Woman—Or Man: Odors Influence Person Knowledge

“…The environmental cues to gender that signal masculine or feminine stereotypical constructs are quite diverse: Vocal quality [ 43 , 44 ], facial structure [ 45 ], facial coloring [ 46 ], handwriting [ 47 ], hairstyle [ 48 ], clothing [ 49 , 50 ], and the color of clothing or other objects associated with individuals [ 51 ]. The concept of masculinity or femininity that is marketed with a perfume seems able to trigger cross-modal odor-color gender stereotypes as well; a series of studies have demonstrated that when people smell a fine fragrance, a specific color comes to mind that differs based on whether the perfume is marketed to men (blues or greens) or women (pinks or yellow) [ 52 ].…”

Effects of Real Gender and Labeled Gender on Adults' Perceptions of Infants

“…The Journal of Genetic Psychologv unidentified infant as male or female (Hildebrandt & Fitzgerald, 1979;Leone & Robertson , 1989;Seavey, Katz, & Zalk , 1975). A fair summary of thi s literature is Bims 's ( 1976) conclusion that there are almost no consistent differences in the behavior of male and female infants but that adults' perceptions of infants and behaviors toward infants may reflect to varying degrees the existence of sex role stereotypes.…”

“…irl (Poludi & Gullo, 1986); or with a photograph (Bell, 1981 ;Hildebrandt & Fitzgerald, 1977 , audiotape (Bell, 1981 ;Rothbart & Maccoby, 1966) , or videotape (Condry & Condry, 1976;Gurwitz & Dodge , 1975 ;Haugh , Hoffman , & Cowan, 1980;Holman & Williamson , 1979;Leone & Robertson , 1989;Meyer & Sobieszek, 1972) of an infant labeled as male for some subjects and as female for others. With this method the stimulus is the same for all subjects (a lthough this is not completely true in all studies ; e. g., Zucker & Corter, 1980); therefore, any consistent differences in observers ' evaluations of the infant(s) as a function of labeling can be interpreted to show that their views about sex roles are stereotyped .…”

“…Subjects in these studies have included children (Haugh et al, 1980) , college students (Bell, 1981 ;Condry & Condry, 1976;Gurwitz & Dodge , 1975;Hildebrandt & Fitzgerald, 1979;Holman & Williamson , 1979;Seavey et al, 1975 ;Sidorowicz & Lunney, 1980;Zucker & Corter, 1980) , pregnant women (Bell & Carver, 1980), parents (Bell, 1981;Meyer & Sobieszek , 1972;Rothbart & Maccoby, 1966;Will et al , 1976), and nonparents (Seavey et al, 1975) . Unfortunately, the results have been as varied as the populations from which the subjects were selected (Stem & Karraker, 1989) , with some studies showing no significant effects as a result of labeled gender (Bell & Carver, 1980;Holman & Williamson, 1979;Meyer & Sobieszek , 1972;Zucker & Corter, 1980) and others showing main effects only for rated masculinity and femininity (Delk, Madden , Livingston, & Ryan , 1986;Gurwitz & Dodge , 1975), interactions of labeled sex and other variables (Bell , 1981 ;Gurwitz & Dodge, 1975 ;Meyer & Sobieszek, 1972;Rothbart & Maccoby, 1966) , or main effects on subjects' ratings or other behavior as a function of gender label (Condry & Condry, 1976;Haugh et We are gra teful to Joanne Buczkowska and Sally Andrews for testing subjects in Experiments 2 and 3, respectively; to Jan elle Ah Cann for coding data fo r Experiments 1 and 2; and to Kevin Bird, Richard Harris , and Terry Lewin for their statisa l. , 1980;Hildebrandt & Fitzgerald , 1979;Leone & Robertson , 1989;Seavey et a! , 1975 ;Sidorowicz & Lu...…”

“…To investigate whether any effects of real and labe led gender were consistent across different subject population s, we tes ted predictions based on this first study in Experiment 2 with mothers of 4-to 6-month-old babies . The third study followed from the previous two, usi ng a slightly different method -the unidentified infant method (Hildebrand t & Fitzgerald, 1977Leone & Robertson, 1989;Seavey et a! , 1975 )-to test university students' judgments of the gender of the same eight infants.…”