Gender stereotypes reflect the division of labor between women and men across nations

EVANSTON, Ill. --- Researchers at Northwestern University and the University of Bern in Switzerland have conducted the first cross-temporal, multinational study to compare views of gender using data collected 30 years apart.

An international study reveals that people’s beliefs about the attributes of women and men follow from the differing social roles that they typically occupy in homes and workplaces in their respective societies.

The goal driving the research was to understand the sources of stereotypes of men as assertive and ambitious and of women as the kinder and more caring gender. The study showed that these stereotypes reflect the differing social roles that are typical of women and men in homes and workplaces in nations across the world.

The researchers based their study on a Gallup public opinion poll of 22 nations from 1995, which they replicated and expanded to 40 nations in their 2023 survey. The results showed that across all nations and both time points, poll respondents reported that men are the more agentic gender, displaying qualities such ambition and competitiveness, and that women are the more communal gender, displaying qualities such as warm and caring.

The findings may seem surprising, given global trends showing the growing number of women in the paid workforce around the world. Yet, according to the researchers, a simple explanation exists.

“The persistence of the agentic male stereotype across the world reflects men’s continuous overrepresentation in the most prominent and high-status roles, such as CEOs of large corporations. In fact, although women have increasingly attained such leadership roles, these tend to be in organizations that have a more communal mission, such as executives in nonprofit and educational organizations,” said Christa Nater, the lead author of the study and a researcher at the Institute of Psychology at the University of Bern, Switzerland. Also promoting the male agency stereotype is the male dominance of a wide range of occupations demanding courage and physical strength such as firefighter, police officer and soldier.

A similar explanation accounts for how the communal stereotype of women as the kinder and more caring gender differs across nations. The researchers found that the “women are communal” stereotype was stronger in nations with greater occupational segregation of women into jobs in communal domains, such as teaching professions. In other words, stereotypes across the world reflect the roles people see women and men occupy in their societies.

“Even now, there is an easily recognized gender division of labor in the workplace and the home that accounts for the communal theme in stereotypes of women and the agentic theme in stereotypes of men,” said Alice Eagly, professor emerita of psychology at Northwestern University and coauthor of the study. “Gender stereotypes are not fiction. They represent what we observe in our daily life.”

Perhaps unsurprisingly, gender stereotypes about competence, such as intelligence and creativity, reflect the extent to which women and men obtain college degrees in their respective societies. As the proportion of women earning degrees has increased overall, people have come to believe that women and men are equally competent.

Taken together, this study suggests that gender stereotypes are a result of people’s observations of the roles that women and men typically occupy in their societies. “This means that efforts to end gender stereotypes can be effective only if women and men gain more similar positions and roles,” Nater said.

Another key finding

In nations where women had greater political power and were better represented as heads of government agencies, people ascribed more communion — but not more agency — to women than men. The likely explanation is that women tend to occupy the more communal version of roles, for example, heads of agencies pertaining to family and children, rather than financial affairs and defense.  

Implications
The researchers maintained that widely shared beliefs about the traits of men and women have far-reaching consequences. Although these gender stereotypes can be helpful as shortcuts that guide thinking in everyday life, they also can foster unfair judgments of individuals who are not typical of their gender.

“Stereotypes can make people who do not fit expectations appear not just surprising, but unacceptable, leading to disapproval, for example, of a woman who excels as an aerospace engineer or a man who is a caring teacher of young children,” Nater said.

Stereotypes can harm society as well as individuals. “Gender stereotypes tend to discourage equal opportunity and disregard talent that challenges what has been typical of men and women,” Eagly said.

Policies that would support a more flexible division of labor and thereby weaken gender stereotypes include allowing parental leave for fathers and improving childcare options to enable mothers to maintain demanding careers outside the home.

The researchers pointed out the automation of many jobs that once required heavy physical labor has opened up new opportunities for women in such areas. Stereotypes are also undermined by welcoming qualified men into female-dominated roles in childcare and other caring professions. “Also helpful is government policy that challenges gender discrimination and promotes equal opportunity,” Eagly said.

The study, “Gender stereotypes across nations relate to the social positions of women and men: Evidence from cross-cultural opinion polls,” will be published by the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). The study is under embargo until  Monday, Jan. 5 at 3 p.m. ET., after which it can be viewed online here.