On Your Own, Jot Down… 1. Describe the earliest memory you have of an experience with a person or people of a cultural or ethnic group different from your own. 2. Who or what has had the most influence in the formation of your attitudes and opinions about people of different cultural groups? in what way? 3. What influences in your experience have led to the development of positive feelings about your own cultural heritage and background? 4. What influences in your experience have led to the development of negative feelings, if any, about your own cultural heritage or background? 5. What changes, if any, would you like to make in your own attitudes or experiences in relation to people of other ethnic or cultural groups? 6. Describe an experience in your own life when you feel you were discriminated against for any reason, not necessarily because of your culture. 7. How do you feel you should deal with (or not deal with) issues of cultural diversity in American Society?

For the Next Slide… There is a series of statements concerning men and women and their relationships in contemporary society. Please indicate the degree to which you agree or disagree with each statement using the following scale: 0 = disagree strongly; 1 = disagree somewhat; 2 = disagree slightly; 3 = agree slightly; 4 = agree somewhat; 5 = agree strongly

guise of asking for "equality." 1. No matter how accomplished he is, a man is not truly complete as a person unless he has the love of a woman. 2. Many women are actually seeking special favors, such as hiring policies that favor them over men, under the guise of asking for "equality." 3. In a disaster, women ought not necessarily be rescued before men. 4. Most women interpret innocent remarks or acts as being sexist. 5. Women are too easily offended. 6. People are often truly happy in life without being romantically involved with a member of the other sex. 7. Feminists are not seeking for women to have more power than men. 8. Many women have a quality of purity that few men possess. 9. Women should be cherished and protected by men. 10. Most women fail to appreciate fully all that men do for them. 11. Women seek to gain power by getting control over men. 12. Every man ought to have a woman whom he adores. 13. Men are complete without women. 14. Women exaggerate problems they have at work. 15. Once a woman gets a man to commit to her, she usually tries to put him on a tight leash. 16. When women lose to men in a fair competition, they typically complain about being discriminated against. 17. A good woman should be set on a pedestal by her man. 18. There are actually very few women who get a kick out of teasing men by seeming available and then refusing male advances. 19. Women, compared to men, tend to have a superior moral sensibility. 20. Men should be willing to sacrifice their own well being in order to provide financially for the women in their lives. 21. Feminists are making entirely reasonable demands of men. 22. Women, as compared to men, tend to have a more refined sense of culture and good taste

The authors make the important point that positive feelings toward women can go hand in hand with sexist antipathy. Thus, they have presented a theory of sexism formulated as ambivalence toward women. Both hostile and benevolent sexism are presumed to be “legitimizing ideologies,” that is, beliefs that serve to justify and maintain inequality between groups. To score the inventory, students should reverse the numbers (0 = 5, 1 = 4, 2 = 3, 3 = 2, 4 = 1, 5 = 0) placed in front of items 3, 6, 7, 13, 18, and 21. An overall measure of sexism is found by adding, then taking an average of the numbers placed in front of all 22 items. The hostile sexism score is found by averaging the numbers in response to items 2, 4, 5, 7, 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, 18, and 21. The benevolent sexism score is found by averaging the numbers in response to items 1, 3, 6, 8, 9, 12, 13, 17, 19, 20, and 22. In each case, scores can range from 0 to 5, with higher scores reflecting greater sexism.

Glick and Fiske report that hostile and benevolent sexism consistently emerge as separate but positively correlated factors. In addition, there are three separate benevolent sexism subfactors. These include protective paternalism (e.g., women ought to be rescued first in emergencies), complementary gender differentiation (e.g., women are purer than men), and heterosexual intimacy (e.g., every man ought to have a woman whom he adores). More generally, benevolent sexism is defined as a set of interrelated attitudes in which women are stereotypically placed into restricted roles. It is typically based on the idea that man is the provider, and woman is his dependent.

Research indicates that, relative to nonsexists, ambivalent sexist men spontaneously categorize women into good sexy versus unattractive or “deviant” sexuality. Some women are put on a “pedestal” and others are placed in the “gutter.” Findings also indicate that hostile sexism as measured by the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory predicts less favorable attitudes toward women in a nontraditional role (career women), where benevolent sexism predicted favorable attitudes toward women in a traditional role (homemakers). By habitually typing women, sexists can maintain both their positive and negative beliefs about women without experiencing conflict. Glick and Fiske conclude that while benevolent sexism is a kinder and gentler form of prejudice, it is pernicious because women, as well as men, are more likely to accept it, especially in cultures in which women are highly threatened by men. Both hostile and benevolent prejudice appear to be cross-culturally prevalent; this finding suggests that these ideologies arise from structural aspects of male–female relations that are common across human groups. More recently, Glick and his colleagues report that stereotypes about men also come in contrasting pairs— for example, ambivalent sexism toward men includes benevolent attitudes of men as powerful and hostile attitudes toward men as immoral. Those who endorse benevolent sexism toward women also endorse benevolent sexism toward men. These complementary and supporting views may provide an important justification for the status quo in gender relations.