Children with “merciful” sexist views are also likely to have “hostile” views

As the team of psychologists discovered, even seemingly positive and “merciful” views of women are likely to be negative. Their results also show the differences between boys and girls in how these views change over time.

“It may seem cute when a boy behaves bravely against a girl, or when a girl pretends to be a princess waiting for the prince to save her,” said Associate Professor of Psychology, New York University. Andrey Simpian says of the authors of the research published in the journal Role of sex. “Often, this is play and has no profound meaning, but these behaviors have a negative view that children are weak, incompetent, and unable to survive women, even if they do not look uncomfortable. May indicate what you are looking at or prosper without the help of a person. “

“ This work also reveals how these attitudes change with the age of boys and girls, ” said Matthew Hammond, first author, senior lecturer at the School of Psychology at the University of Victoria, Wellington, New Zealand. It is encouraging to point out. ”

Cimpian and Hammond observe that many understand the term “sexism” and refer to an overt negative attitude towards women. These may include the perception that a woman is weak, incompetent, or overly emotional. But they note that there is another aspect of gender discrimination that is often overlooked-researchers, especially Susan Fiske and Peter Glick, call it “merciful sexism.” This may seem positive, but is still composed of a weakening and patronizing attitude towards women. For example, a woman must be warm, caring, pure and deserving of a pedestal.

Previous studies have shown that adults with a hostile sexist view also have a benevolent view. However, it is less clear whether children also have these perceptions at the same time, and whether these views change throughout childhood.

To address this, researchers looked at the attitudes of more than 200 children aged 5 to 11 at two locations in New York City and Urbana Champaign, Illinois. I was asked if a series of statements was “correct” or “wrong”. The statement includes both a merciful view (such as “Men need to protect women from danger”) and a hostile view (for example, “Women get angry about being smaller than men”) It was

In analyzing children’s consent and disagreement to these statements, the researchers found that they showed a statistically clear pattern of response to statements expressing hostile and benevolent views about women. discovered. Importantly, however, they have also found a link between these types of views.

“This is something we hadn’t previously known about the gender attitudes of young children,” observes Cimpian.

In addition, the results show that both boys and girls have reduced hostile sex discrimination in their children with age. However, benevolent sex discrimination decreased with age in girls only, not boys.

“Boys may be less likely to recognize that their benevolent attitude towards women is in fact favored,” Cimpian suggests. “For example, this view is in line with social norms and may be strengthened through upbringing, so men may retain the belief that women should be protected.”

The authors of the study view the current situation as an opportunity to address the concerns raised by the findings of the study.

“Recently, parents and children spend a lot of time together, so there are plenty of conversation opportunities,” Hammond says. “It may be worth spending a few minutes for them to discuss what men and women should be.”

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This work was supported by a grant from the National Science Foundation (BCS-1530669, BCS-1733897).

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