Are Sexist Attitudes and Gender Stereotypes Linked? A Critical Feminist Approach With a Spanish Sample

Gender role attitudes and well-being of German and refugee adolescents-same or different?

BACKGROUND

Assumed differences in gender role attitudes (GRAs) of German adolescents and refugee adolescents from the Middle East are often discussed, but rarely investigated. Presumed differences in GRAs across cultures and genders are assumed to be involved in emerging gender differences in well-being and mental health symptoms. Overall, appropriate measurements for investigating GRAs of adolescents with different cultural backgrounds are scarce.

METHODS

Hence, the present study exemplarily investigates (1) the measurement invariance (MI) of a German translation of the Social Role Questionnaire (SRQ) for German (n = 114) and German-speaking Middle Eastern refugee adolescents from Syria, Afghanistan, or Iraq (n = 115), using a Multiple Indicator Multiple Cause (MIMIC) model to account for age and gender. Moreover, (2) differences between GRAs of both groups, (3) relationships of GRAs with different facets of affective well-being, as well as (4) differences in these relationships between German and refugee adolescents are examined by extending the MIMIC-model to a full structural equation model (SEM).

RESULTS

Results indicate (1) that scalar MI for the SRQ can be assumed. Furthermore, (2) German adolescents show less traditional gender-linked GRAs than refugee adolescents, but no further differences in GRAs. Furthermore, no differences between the relationships of GRAs with well-being and mental health symptoms were found between the groups (4). Also, (3) GRAs showed no relation with any of the outcomes, but gender and age predicted mental health symptoms.

CONCLUSION

The findings show that the SRQ is a useful measurement for investigating the GRAs of adolescents living in Germany and could be used in further cross-cultural research.

Obstacles to Birth Surname Retention Upon Marriage: How Do Hostile Sexism and System Justification Predict Support for Marital Surname Change Among Women?

Despite the ongoing shift in societal norms and gender-discriminatory practices toward more equality, many heterosexual women worldwide, including in many Western societies, choose to replace their birth surname with the family name of their spouse upon marriage. Previous research has demonstrated that the adherence to sexist ideologies (i.e., a system of discriminatory gender-based beliefs) among women is associated with their greater endorsement of practices and policies that maintain gender inequality. By integrating the ideas from the system justification theory and the ambivalent sexism theory, we proposed that the more women adhere to hostile and benevolent sexist beliefs, the more likely they would be to justify existing gender relations in society, which in turn, would positively predict their support for traditional, husband-centered marital surname change. We further argued that hostile (as compared to benevolent) sexism could act as a particularly strong direct predictor of the support for marital surname change among women. We tested these possibilities across three cross-sectional studies conducted among women in Turkey (Study 1, N=118, self-identified feminist women; Study 2, N=131, female students) and the United States (Study 3, N=140, female students). Results of Studies 1 and 3 revealed that higher adherence to hostile (but not benevolent) sexism was associated with higher support for marital surname change indirectly through higher gender-based system justification. In Study 2, the hypothesized full mediation was not observed. Consistent with our predictions, in all three studies, hostile (but not benevolent) sexism was found to be a direct positive predictor of the support for marital surname change among women. We discuss the role of dominant ideologies surrounding marriage and inegalitarian naming conventions in different cultures as obstacles to women’s birth surname retention upon marriage.

When Are Sexist Attitudes Risk Factors for Dating Aggression? The Role of Moral Disengagement in Spanish Adolescents

This research aimed to explore the interplay of sexism and moral disengagement (MD) in the explanation of psychological and physical dating aggression. The sample comprised 1113 Spanish adolescents (49.2% girls, n = 552) between the ages of 12 to 17 (M = 14.44). A latent profile analysis conducted with sub-sample of 432 adolescents with sentimental experience identified four configurations: (1) benevolent; (2) less disengaged and sexist; (3) highly disengaged and sexist; and (4) moderately disengaged and sexist. Regarding gender and age, boys were more present than girls in the moderately disengaged and sexist group, as well as in the highly disengaged and sexist profile. The highly disengaged and sexist and benevolent groups were the youngest. Regarding dating aggression, the highly disengaged and sexist group had the highest engagement in physical and psychological aggression. However, the others three profiles showed a similar engagement in aggression. These findings confirmed the moderating role of MD on the relationship between sexism and dating aggression and suggested that the association between MD, sexism, and dating aggression was exponential; that is, the risk appeared when adolescents were extremely hostile and disengaged. The results have implications for the design of tailored dating aggression prevention programmes.