The differential assessment of males and females as prospective employees by a sample of nonworking women

Sex Roles, Vol. 7, No. 8, 1981

The Differential Assessment of Males and Females as Prospective Employees by a Sample of Nonworking Women

Colleen Ward 1

University of Durham

Thirty-eight women, members o f a local parents' group, role-played personnel managers, assessing prospective employees in 12 occupations, defined a priori as masculine or feminine, and ranking the occupations in terms o f a prestige hierarchy. Candidates described as female were somewhat devalued in high status masculine careers, but this trend was not consistent. Highly qualified applicants were preferred overall, but level o f competence did not induce differential appraisals by sex o f applicant. Failure to discover a more pervasive prefudice against women was postulated as reliant on subject sample, and exploitative advantage to the assessor was suggested as the strongest predictor o f a promale bias.

Original studies concerning the differential evaluation of male and female expertise have been based both in conception and design on Goldberg's (1968) investigation, which demonstrated a pervasive devaluation of women in areas of academic excellence. Goldberg requested 40 college women to read and critically evaluate a series of academic articles. Although the articles were identical, half were allegedly male authored and half female authored. Goldberg found that works attributed to women were consistently devalued in both traditionally masculine areas, such as law and city planning, as well as traditionally feminine endeavors, such as dietetics and primary education; he ascribed the causes to prejudice and sex-role stereotyping. Subsequently, Dorros and Follett (1969)

t Correspondence may be sent to Dr. Ward, who is now at the School of Comparative Social Science, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Minden, Penang, Malaysia.

811 0360-0025/81/0800-0811503.00/0 © 1981 Plenum Publishing Corporation

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obtained the same antifemale bias with male subjects, and the Goldberg results have been replicated with both sexes by Etaugh and Rose (1975), Etaugh and Sanders (1974) and Gold (1972); more recently, Goldberg's experimental design has been expanded to include a variety of stimulus objects such as paintings (Pheterson, Kiesler, & Goldberg, 1971) and poetry (Starer & Denmark, 1974), as well as appraisals o f candidates for academic programs (Deaux & Taynor, 1973) and employment positions.

The investigations which focus on the appraisal of occupational candidates, however, differ in essence from the Goldberg study in that the individual per se rather than the academic or artistic output is critically assessed. These investigations commenced as field studies highlighting discrimination against women in career onset and advancement. For example, Fidell (1970) verified sex discrimination in hiring practices for academic psychology by forwarding resum6s of hypothetical psychologists to departmental chairpersons in over 200 universities and asking them to judge, as part of a longitudinal study of careers in psychology, the probability of each applicant receiving a full-time position in their department. Results indicated that candidates when described as female were offered lower positions than when depicted as male, the modal level of the offer for the former set at assistant professor as contrasted with associate professor for the latter. Likewise, Rosen and Jerdee (1974) reported that average male applicants are more frequently accepted as managers and are more highly evaluated on general suitability than females.

Role-playing studies, however, have not demonstrated a pervasive antifemale bias, but the influence of independent factors such as sex appropriateness of endeavor, occupational prestige, level of competence and status of assessor. Brief and Wallace (1976) maintain that a sex bias against women is not apparent in neutral sex-typed occupations as in sex-atypical circumstances. Designing an evaluative study, they found that male and female library administrators were not appraised significantly differently on employee performance. Likewise, Jones (1970) reported antifemale discrimination only in male dominated professions. Brief and Wallace subsequently argue that studies of differential evaluations in occupational suitability should be focused on job sex-typing phenomena rather than general, person-centered stereotypes.

As with sex appropriateness, occupational prestige plays a large part in the evaluation of vocational suitability; stereotypically, men are assumed to be found predominantly in prestigious endeavors. Hamner, Kim, Baird, and Bigoness (1974) reported that female grocery clerks were more favorably assessed on task performance than males. With these results, Hamner et al. (1974) postulate that the position is "a low level unskilled task which a male could be expected to hold, and when a female performs equally well on the task, she is seen as being a better performer than the male" (p. 709). This is consistent with Bose's (1973) findings that women are accorded greater status in low paid blue-collar jobs, while the reverse is true in highly male-typed prestigious positions.

Assessment of Prospective Employees 813

Level of perceived competence may also represent an important factor in differential evaluations of males and females. Deaux and Taynor (1973) propose a "bias works two ways" phenomenon and substantiate this with evidence that men are preferred at high levels of expertise, while women are more positively evaluated at low levels of competence; i.e., women are stereotypically excused for failure, while men are rewarded for success. This gains further support from Ward (1979), who found that art students prefer high quality compositions attributed to male artists, but more positively appraise inferior artistic works ascribed to females.

Finally, it may be suggested that status of the assessor represents a cru- cial component in differential evaluation of males and females. Different factors may affect choice or appraisal of candidates for employment positions among managers, professionals, students, and housewives. Managers, for example, may be subject more to company policies, while students could be more reliant on candidates' academic achievements. While in both cases differential assessments are assumed to be partially dependent on stereotypes, other factors obviously come into play. The examination of the relationship between sex-role stereotyping and evaluation of males and females as prospective employees, then, could be better accomplished with a sample of unemployed married women. This is because housewives generally have less experience evaluating employees or predicting professional success, and their appraisals are more likely to be reliant on ubiquitous criteria, i.e., stereotypes. If sex-role stereotyping does play a vital role in the devaluation of females, it should be particularly blatant in a sample of nonworking women who are frequently assumed to accept a traditional life style and harbor conservative prejudices. An experiment was designed, therefore, to examine the attitudes of housewives toward occupational suitability and feminine expertise, including the influence of sex appropriateness of endeavor, prestige, and level of competence on the evaluation of prospective employees. It was hypothesized that sex appropriateness of occupation would be the most salient predictor of differential appraisals, but women would be most frequently devalued in high status, masculine careers. It was also hypothesized that differential devaluation would be affected by level of qualifications over occupations, with males being less favorably appraised at low levels of ex- oertise.

METHOD

Subjects

Sixty questionnaires were distributed and 38 women, members of a local mothers' and toddlers' group, participated in the study, returning the questionnaires at their convenience.

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Materials and Procedure

The questionnaire contained a brief description (scope and required train- ing) of 12 occupations and a total of 36 short resum6s describing prospective employees. The occupations were defined a priori as masculine or feminine by the composition in the work force: geologist (m), interior designer (m), teacher of the handicapped (f), economist (m), telephonist (f), dental hygienist (f), architect (m), lecturer (m), baker (m), hairdresser (f), social worker (f), and mathematician (m) (adapted from Priestley, 1973). In connection with each occupational description were three resum6s of prospective employees in that field, totaling 36 resum6s for 12 occupations. Ss were instructed to rate each candidate on a 1 (low) to 7 (high) scale on three characteristics - employability, status, and likability. Employability was defined as "the suitability of a candidate for employment in a specific field," and status was described as "the occupational prestige the candidate is likely to achieve in the field." It was suggested that both are dependent upon the applicant's educational and occupational history. Likability was taken to refer to the subject's attraction or affective in- clinations toward the candidate.

The resum6s were purposely constructed to present a low, medium, and highly qualified applicant in each profession; and the design of the study neces- sitated three separate questionnaire formats. In each format, for the seven male occupations (geologist, economist, interior designer, architect, lecturer, baker, and mathematician) one female applicant was presented appearing as either the low, medium, or highly qualified applicant; for the five female occupations (teacher, telephonist, dental hygienist, hairdresser, and social worker) one male applicant appeared at one of the three levels of qualification. This resulted in three questionnaire formats to allow both the male (in female occupations) and the female (in male occupations) to "rotate" over each level of qualification.

Resum6s were identical except for the sex of the applicant. The order of presentation of low, medium, and highly qualified applicants was varied among occupations. Personal attributes such as age, marital status, and number of children were also varied.

Ss were told that the purpose of the study was to obtain opinions concerning qualifications for different occupations and were instructed to rate each candidate on the three previously mentioned characteristics. To obtain an independent index of prestige, Ss were also requested to rank the 12 occupations in terms of prestige from most to least prestigious.

RESULTS

The data were analyzed by a two-factor mixed design analysis of variance, method of unweighted means, for each occupation. The 3 × 3 analysis consisted

Assessment of Prospective Employees

Table I. Significant Main Effects by Sex: Mean Ratings

Sex

Occupation Trait Male Female p

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Geologist Employability 4 .9333 3.7297 .025 Economist Status 5.3026 4.9729 .06

Likability 4.6756 4.270 .05

Dental hygienist Likability 4.2432 4.6901 .05

of levels (low, medium, and high qualifications) by sex allocation (the position of the minority sex over level of qualification), resulting in a nested analysis.

Sex of subject produced two main effects. Male geologists were preferred to females in employability, while male economists were rated marginally higher in status than their female counterparts (see Table I).

Although low, medium, and highly qualified candidates were deafly dis- tinguished, level of competence did not interact with sex of applicant to produce differential evaluation of males and females. There was, however, one exception. Female lecturers were more positively appraised in both status and employability at high levels of competence, while males were preferred at intermediate levels (see Table II).

In general, Ss reported the greatest liking for the most qualified applicants. This was apparent for the evaluations of telephonist (p < .001), baker (p < .002), architect (p < .001), hairdresser (p < .001), dental hygienist (p < .05), teacher (p < .001), and interior designer (p < .001). In addition, female dental hygienists (.~ = 4.6901) were preferred to males (X= 4.2432, F = 3.092, p < .05), but male economists were liked more than females (Xm = 4.6756, ~ f = 4.270, F = 2.674, p < .05).

The mean rank order of occupational prestige emerged as follows: architect (2.5), lecturer (3.3), economist (3.7), geologist (4.3), mathematician (4.6), social worker (6.1), teacher (6.3), interior designer (6.9), dental hygienist (8.7), baker (10.4), hairdresser (10.8), and telephonist (10.9).

Table II. Significant Interaction Effects of Sex and Level of Competence: Mean Ratings

Level of Qualification

Occupation Trait Sex Low Medium High p

Lecturer Employability Male 4.666 5.4285 5.6842 .01 Female 4.6153 4.250 6.200

Status Male 4.4583 5.2142 5.6363 .05 Female 5.0000 4.444 6.130

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DISCUSSION

The results of this study with nonworking women do not suggest a pervasive devaluation of females in occupational suitability. In 12 occupations- geologist, interior designer, teacher, economist, telephonist, dental hygienist, architect, lecturer, baker, hairdresser, social worker, and mathematician - males were rated as more suitable employees than females in geology and as possessing more status as economists. For the most part, introduction of level of qualification as a main factor to investigate Deaux and Taynor's "bias works two ways" supposition did not influence evaluations of male and female applicants. Al- though evaluative ratings did distinctly delimit a low, medium, and highly qualified applicant, the prediction that males would be preferred at high levels of expertise and females at tow levels of competence was not supported; nor were females more positively appraised in low status positions. In fact, contrary to this hypothesis, highly qualified female lecturers were preferred to equally qualified males in both employability and status; the reverse was true at intermediate levels of qualification.

Examination of occupations which did produce more favorable evaluations of males reveals a concentration in fields which appear both male dominated and prestigious, in accordance with composition in the labor force and prestige rank- ings of subjects. Although the preference for male geologists as employees and male economists in status attainment does not constitute overall statistical significance as defined by Sakoda, Cohen, and Beall (1954), the nature of the professions warrants special comment. Both appear to be male dominated and, more importantly, highly prestigious. It is not surprising that women should be devalued in these fields. What is unusual is that the devaluation is not consistent in professions with similar characteristics, such as architecture or mathematics. In- terestingly, candidates in the feminine professions are not differentially assessed.

The influence of level of competence on differential appraisals of males and females ran counter to the hypothesis with an unexpected preference for female lecturers at a high level of expertise resulting. Two potential explanations are probable, but neither can be delimited as the sole cause. The first explanation focuses not on a theory of sex-role stereotypes, but on experimenter demand and social desirability factors. Both Orne (1962) and Riecken (1962) have demonstrated that subjects make special efforts to please the experimenter and to confirm the perceived hypothesis. In these studies the experimenter was known to the subjects as a research psychologist at a local university. Sex of the experimenter might, therefore, influence subjects' evaluations of female lecturers. More specifically, in a conscious or unconscious effort to please the experimenter, these relatively naive subjects may have more positively appraised female academics.

The alternative explanation centers on sex-role stereotypes and concerns Taynor and Deaux's (1973) equity theory. Mackie (1976)has reported that


female professors are perceived as more competent than male instructors by university students. Although she does not provide a detailed explanation, she suggests the findings may be interpreted in light of Epstein's (1970) supposition that routine accomplishments of a highly visible minority may be positively exaggerated. Similarly, these results may be explained in terms of Taynor and Deaux's equity theory, in which individuals performing tasks under nonvolun- tary restraints are viewed as more deserving of reward. For example, Taynor and Deaux empirically demonstrate that women performing successfully in an emer- gency situation are rated more positively, judged to expend more effort and to merit greater reward. The implication is that women who achieve in spite of their sex are more highly rewarded than men. Still, Taynor and Deaux's explanation does not clarify why this trend is only apparent in lecturing. It can only be postulated that (in comparison to other professions ranked as prestigious) subjects are more willing to acknowledge competence in lecturing, which may have more women than perhaps architecture, geology or mathematics.

In light of previous results and a realistic look at the contemporary labor force, the promale bias in occupational suitability is very slight. Low status occupations and female professions fail to induce differential appraisals, where only partial support for a promale bias is demonstrated in prestigious male-dominated professions. This may be due both to the nature of role-playing studies and the self-perception of nonworking women. The two prime studies which demonstrated discrimination against women were undertaken as field studies. FideU (1970) verified discriminatory practices in hiring for academic positions by sam- piing departmental chairpersons. Likewise, Rosen and Jerdee (1974) concluded that males are favored in selection, promotion, and career development decisions by questioning executive managers. Alternatively, Soto and Cole (1975) found no bias in personnel selection when students were requested to role-play departmental managers; nor did Brief and Wallace (1976), who instructed students to exercise supervisory abilities in the evaluation of library administrators. Likewise, Arvey, Passino, and Lounsbury (1977) reported no differential evaluation in the assessment of male and female white-collar workers by university students. It seems that role-playing studies may not be as relevant to applied situations as previously assumed. This is highlighted by the more pervasive discrimination against women in field studies. As would be expected, role players are not subject to company policies or pressures; nor do their choices have any realistic consequences. It is more than likely, then, that this type of investigation may reflect more general attitudes toward working women.

On the other hand, there is strong evidence to suggest that familiarity, competence, or experience in an area is required before a selective devaluation may occur. Pheterson (1969) could not demonstrate a promale bias in the evaluation of psychological essays by a sample of housewives and suggests that they may feel unqualified to make critical judgements. Perhaps subjects who participated in the experiment reported here, being older and relatively less

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educated, may be unwilling to devalue occupational candidates in general and, consequently, do not assume a promale bias.

While sex appropriateness, prestige, and competence play a small but in- consistent part in the differential evaluation of males and females, it may be suggested that the denigration of women is most reliant on exploitative advantage to the assessor, and prejudice is not uniformly present in the general population. Touhey's (1974) evidence that the hypothetical addition of women into high status careers diminishes occupational prestige and desirability accounts for the greatest denigration of women in field investigations as opposed to role-playing studies. (It is interesting to note in this study that feminine professions are accorded less status than .masculine careers.) In short, devaluation of women appears most likely to occur when the assessor feels threatened by feminine competence. This has been empirically demonstrated by Ward (19 ), who found that students from an international college of art more critically appraised works attributed to female artists, although this trend was not apparent in university students. Staines, Jayratne, and Tavris (1974) also present evidence of a "Queen Bee Syndrome" - excessive criticism of aspiring females by professional women.

Finally, a mention of interpersonal attraction should be made. Previous research by Spence et al. (1975), who allowed students to view videotaped ver- sions of male and female stimulus persons, demonstrated that the opposite sex was found more attractive overall, but for females, the competent stimulus person with masculine interests was preferred to the feminine counterpart. Spence et al.'s (1975) results suggest that although males may be liked more by female subjects, a masculine sex-role orientation or a high level of competence should not decrease the liking of a female professional. Alternatively, it may be hypothesized that males and females in atypical occupations may be defined as deviant and liked less than their traditional colleagues. Spence et al.'s findings are supported in that generally subjects did prefer the most qualified applicants. How- ever, sex appropriateness of the occupation did appear to affect attraction to- wards hypothetical candidates. Male economists were preferred to females, but female dental hygienists were liked more than males. Although females are not censured for competence, as postulated by Homer (1972), individuals of both sexes may be socially penalized for choosing sexually atypical occupations.

CONCLUSION

Empirical investigation of differential evaluation of males and females in terms of occupational suitability did not yield a pervasive promale bias. Females were somewhat devalued in highly prestigious masculine endeavors, but this trend was not consistent. Feminine professions and low status occupations did not induce differential appraisal of the sexes. The "bias works two ways" hy-


pothesis (males are preferred at high levels of expertise and females are more positively evaluated at low levels of competence) was not supported, but there was some evidence that atypical choice of vocation may reduce individuals'

attractiveness. Interpreted in light o f previous research, this study suggests that role-play-

ing investigations may not be particularly relevant to applied settings and are more useful for reflecting general att i tudes toward women in the labor force. Results imply that a uniform promale bias is not generally prevalent, but may be most apparent when an exploitative advantage is available to the assessor. Further research should be directed toward the differentiation of latent prejudice and potential discrimination in applied areas and the heterogeneous factors which influence these processes.

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Dorros, K., & Follett, J. Prejudice against women as revealed by male college students. Unpublished m anuseript, Connecticut College, 1969.

Epstein, C. F. Encountering the male establishment: Sex status limits on women's careers in the professions. American Journal o f Sociology, 1970, 75, 965-982.

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Pheterson, G., Kiesler, S., & Goldberg, P. Evaluation of the performance of women as a function of their sex, achievement and personal history. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1971, 19, 114-118.

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The differential assessment of males and females as prospective employees by a sample of nonworking women