Attributional Modesty in Women

Gender Differences in Seff-Perceptions: Convergent Evidence from Three Measures of Accuracy and Bias

This research assessed gender differences in the accuracy of self-perceptions. Do males and females with equal ability have similar self-perceptions of their ability? Three measures of accuracy were used: accuracy of self-evaluations, calibration for individual questions, and response bias. As hypothesized, for a masculine task, significant gender differences were found for all three measures: Females' self-evaluations of performance were inaccurately low, their confidence statements for individual questions were less wel calibrated than males; and their response bias was more conservative than males'. None of these gender differences were found for feminine and neutral tasks. As hypothesized, strong self-consistency tendencies were found. Expectancies emerged as an important predictor of self-evaluations of performance for both genders and could account for females' inaccurately low self-evaluations on the masculine task. How females' inaccurate self-perceptions might negatively affect achievement behavior and curtail their participation in masculine domains is discussed.

Behavioral Manifestations of Modesty

Three studies examined the social manifestations of modesty in Chinese and Canadian cultures, conceptualizing and operationalizing it as a self-presentation tactic with communal functions. In Study 1, the authors developed a self-report Modest Behavior Scale (MBS) to tap the behavioral aspects of modesty and identified three factors: self-effacement, other-enhancement, and avoidance of attention-seeking. The authors validated the scale by establishing its nomological network with trait modesty, individuation, independent and interdependent self-construals, traditionality, and modernity, in both Hong Kong and Shanghai, which are culturally different regions of China. In Study 2, the MBS was supplemented with additional items, and a different set of predictors, including values, was used to predict the three factors in both Hong Kong and Beijing, China. In Study 3, we administered the MBS in Vancouver, Canada, adding emic items generated from this Canadian sample and using values and other variables as predictors. Gender differences are discussed in terms of the role played by modest self-presentations in promoting intragroup harmony in different cultural settings.