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Psychology 320: Gender Psychology

Lecture 45

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Midterm

• The exam is worth 20% of your final grade.

• The exam will be scored out of 75 points.

• February 10: 35 multiple choice questions (1 point each), 5 definitions (2 points each).

• February 12: Short answer questions (ranging in value from 2-8 points).

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• Please arrive on time to facilitate rapid distribution of the exams.

• Bring a pencil, eraser, pen, and your student ID to the exam.

• All electronic devices must be put away; the time will be monitored in 5 minute increments on the overhead projector.

• Students may not leave the exam room during the last 10 minutes of the exam.

• Hats (e.g., baseball caps) should not be worn during the exam.

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Careers and Work:

1. What forms of discrimination are encountered in the workplace?

2. Do females and males experience similar levels of job satisfaction?

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What forms of discrimination are encountered in the workplace?

• There are two forms of discrimination that males and females encounter in the workplace.

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1. Access discrimination:

Occurs when hiring decisions are made (e.g., who is hired, what position s/he is offered).

More likely to occur when job qualifications are ambiguous.

Example: Rent-A-Center, 2002.

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2. Treatment discrimination:

Occurs after hiring decisions have been made (e.g., salary, opportunities for promotion, opportunities for professional development, working conditions).

Characterized by the “glass ceiling” and “glass escalator.”

Substantial research has examined one form of treatment discrimination—the pay disparity between

females and males.

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Males Females Percentage Gap

1981 1991 2001 1981 1991 2001 1981 1991 2001

Overall 40,131 36,405 36,536 29,744 29,211 29,995 25.0 19.8 17.9

No high school 36,603 32,022 30,478 23,993 22,835 22,019 34.5 28.7 27.8

High School 38,929 34,227 32,804 27,793 26,451 25,506 28.6 22.7 22.2

Non-University Post-Secondary Certificate

41,789 37,871 36,688 30,695 29,062 27,861 26.5 23.3 24.1

University Degree 44,652 42,219 45,054 37,684 37,066 36,782 15.6 12.2 18.4

Disparity in Mean Pay by Sex and Education Level, 1981-2001 (Statistics Canada, 2007)

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Discipline Males Females

Education 35,552 33,877

Arts 34,529 29,524

Humanities 36,420 33,214

Social Sciences 41,684 35,133

Commerce 47,967 40,191

Life Sciences 36,354 33,076

Engineering 52,067 44,867

Health 46,907 42,841

Math, Computer Sciences, Physical Sciences

49,534 41,301

Disparity in Mean Pay by Sex and Area of Study, 2001 (Statistics Canada, 2007)

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Weekly Earnings by Sex (US Department of Labor, 2006)

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Evidence of Treatment Discrimination at UBC (UBC Faculty Focus, 2009)

With respect to starting salary, female faculty are paid an average of $1,667 less than male faculty.

With respect to yearly salary, female faculty are paid an average of $14,827 less than male faculty.

Over a 35-year career, the average female professor makes $267,000 less than her male counterpart.

Average award amounts are 10% lower for female faculty than male faculty.

13% of female faculty achieve the rank of full professor, whereas 46% of male faculty achieve the rank of full professor.

Female faculty achieve the rank of full professor after an average of 13 years, Male faculty achieve the rank of full professor after an average of 10 years.

Although 44% of faculty are female, only 17% of heads and directors are female.

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Country Women’s % of Men’s Earnings

Country Women’s % of Men’s Earnings

Canada 65.8 Greece 83.8

United Kingdom 75.7 Italy 85.7

United States 77.9 Spain 86.8

Austria 78.9 France 89.2

Netherlands 78.9 Denmark 89.6

Ireland 80.2 Belgium 92.7

Germany 80.6 Portugal 94.1

Percent of Men’s Wages Earned by Women in Various Countries (International Labor Office, 2004; Statistics

Canada, 2004; US Department of Labor, 2003)

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Notably, the sex-related pay gap is smaller among ethnic minorities, younger (i.e., 16-24) populations, and those who are entering the workforce.

Two theories have been proposed to account for pay discrepancies across the sexes:

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(a) Supply-Side Theory (Human Capital Theory)

• Maintains that the characteristics of males and females account for pay inequities.

• Examples of characteristics of males and females (i.e., “supply-side characteristics”) that may

contribute to pay inequities:

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Number of hours worked.

Occupational experience.

Negotiation of salary: Females are less likely than males to engage in salary negotiation (Walters et al., 1998). Gerhart and Rynes (1991) found that

males’ negotiations led to a 4.3% yearly salary increase, whereas females’ negotiations led to a 2.7% yearly salary increase:

Occupational choice: Within occupations, however, females are paid less than males.

Educational background.

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0

50

100

150

200

250

300

25 35 45 55 65

FemaleMale

Sal

ary

(Tho

usan

ds o

f Dol

lars

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Projected Salary of a Male and Female Over the Ages of 25 to 65 with a 4.3% and 2.7% Salary Increase Per Year, Respectively

Age

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Females are less likely to engage in salary negotiation than males because: they are more likely to feel unsure of themselves, to believe that they do not deserve to be paid more than others, to believe that conflict will jeopardize the negotiation relationship, to believe in meritocracy, and to experience anxiety during the negotiation (Barron, 2003).

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(b) Demand-Side Theory

• Maintains that discrimination accounts for pay inequities.

• Examples of discrimination shown by employers:

Some employers pay females less than males because they believe that females are less likely to leave their position due to “family ties” (Helgeson, 2009).

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Some employers pay mothers less than fathers because they believe that mothers are the primary caregivers of their families and, thus, cannot be as productive as their male counterparts.

This phenomenon is known as the “motherhood penalty,” with many mothers encountering the “maternal wall.”

Several lines of evidence support the motherhood penalty:

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1. Employed mothers are perceived as less competent than individuals without children (Cuddy et al.,

2004).

2. Employed mothers are perceived as less competent and committed than employed fathers (Correll et al., 2007; Heilman & Okimoto, 2008).

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5. Sex differences in pay are larger for couples with children than couples without children:

4. Respondents indicate a preference to promote and train a woman without a child than a woman with a child, but a preference to promote and train a man with a child than a man without a child.

3. Respondents set more stringent hiring standards for women with children than women without children, but more lenient hiring standards for men with

children than men without children.

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0

300

600

900

1200

1500

1800

All WithChildren

WithoutChildren

FemaleMale

69% 77%63%

Wee

kly

Ear

ning

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Percent Pay Gap As a Function of Parental Status (Dey & Hill, 2007)

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“Motherhood is now the single greatest obstacle left in the path to economic equality for women” (Crittenden, 2001).

In her book The Price of Motherhood: Why the Most Important Job in the World Is Still the Least Valued, Crittenden (2001) states:

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Do females and males experience similar levels of job satisfaction?

• Although females are more likely than males to encounter discrimination in the workplace, research

reveals no sex differences in overall job satisfaction (Crosby, 1984; Martinez, 2005).

• Factors that may account for this finding include the following:

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(b) females report receiving greater social support in the workplace than males.

(c) females, like members of other disadvantaged groups, tend to deny personal experiences of discrimination:

(a) as noted already, females have lower salary expectations than males.

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Crosby (1984)

Found that female participants received between $5,000 and $8,000 less than their male

counterparts, demonstrating widespread treatment discrimination against the females surveyed.

Matched male and female participants on prestige of job, education, job experience, number of hours worked, age, and marital status (i.e., supply-side characteristics).

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Nevertheless, females did not report less job satisfaction or more grievances than males.

Moreover, although the vast majority of females agreed with the statement “Are women discriminated against?”, the vast majority of females disagreed with the statement “Are you at present the victim of sex discrimination.”

Thus, although the female participants recognized that women are subject to discrimination, they

denied the personal experience of discrimination.

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Careers and Work:

1. What forms of discrimination are encountered in the workplace?

2. Do females and males experience similar levels of job satisfaction?