1. Gender and Sexuality Chapter 11
Paula England

2. Where do the differences between men and women come from?
THE BIG QUESTIONS
Where do the differences between men and women come from?
How have the lives of women and men changed in the past 50 years?
How are our sex lives shaped by biology and society?
How has sexual behavior changed in the last 50 years?

3. Where do the differences between men and women come from?
QUESTION 1
Where do the differences between men and women come from?

4. What Do Differences Actually Mean?
Do males score higher than females on standardized math tests?
Male and female means and distribution on Math SAT test
More people score in the middle distribution than at either extreme
Males have higher average, but many members will have higher average who are below average of sex with lower average

5. What shapes gender differences in behavior and preferences?
Gender Socialization
What shapes gender differences in behavior and preferences?
Biological differences, including hormones, anatomy, or brain structure
Social construction of gender including parenting and mass media
Definitions:
Gender: Way in which social forces structure how being male or female affect what is expected of you, what opportunities you have, and the results for individual men and women.
Social construction of gender: Entire system of social processes that create and sustain gender differences and gender inequality.
Patriarchy: Gender system in which men have more power than wormen in politics, the economy, and the family.

6. Sex versus Gender
Sex
Biological grouping based on anatomy, chromosomes, and levels of hormones
Gender
Result of how society shapes differences and inequalities between men and women
Transgendered Individuals
Challenge assumptions about how sex and gender and how these go together
How do we distinguish the concepts of sex and gender?

7. Gender Differences by Setting and Time
Rationale for Social Construction of Gender
Gender differences vary between social settings
Gender arrangements have changed over time
Lightdale and colleagues concluded that gender-stereotypical behavior is more likely when people believe they are being watched
How do social expectations affect the interactions between men and women when they know they are being watched by others?

8. Do you know? Check your text!
What does the fact that gender differences vary across situations and over time tell us about the concept of gender?
Gender-stereotypical behavior is more likely to happen when people believe that they are being watched.
Some of how women and men act results from trying to live up to what they think others expect from someone of their sex.
Social pressure, even with no rewards or punishment, has an effect.
Do you know? Check your text!

9. The Impact of Stereotypes
Stereotypes: Beliefs about group that are often untrue or exaggerated as a description of the group
Research findings reveal that what people hear from others about whether their sex is better at something affects their confidence and even their actual performance
Social context determine how “macho” men act
Correll: Women’s assessment of their math skills were influenced by disclosures of male superiority on tests
Spencer and colleagues: Differences in math test performance influenced by disclosure of male higher performance or male equal performance on tests.
These studies do not prove that biological influence have no influence on gender differences. Gender difference fluctuations indicate influence of social situations.

10. How have the lives of women and men changed in the last 50 years?
QUESTION 2
How have the lives of women and men changed in the last 50 years?

11. Rising Women’s Employment and Education
Of all the changes in the lives of women over the last several decades, the biggest is the increase of women in the paid workforce
Increased wages
Higher share of jobs in service work
Feminist movement and laws against sex discrimination
Steady increase in women’s educational level
What are some of the reasons that women’s employment increased dramatically between 1960 and 1990?
Increased wages offered incentive to work for pay
Economy changed to include higher share of jobs in service work
Feminist movement and the laws against sex discrimination were influential
Women steadily increased their share of degrees over time
More women than men now receive degrees
Financial support for college has changed

12. Occupational sex segregation measures
Change in Women’s Jobs
Occupational sex segregation measures
Sex segregation declined substantially in 1970s and 1980
Declined more slowly since then
Jobs still sex segregated partly due to socialization and hiring discrimination
In the last 40 years, occupational sex segregation has declined significantly
In the last 40 years, occupational sex segregation has declined significantly
One example of this is that more women have entered into engineering, still a largely male-dominated field.

13. Why do women earn less than men? What does your textbook say?
Women earned about 60 to 65 percent of what men earned from the 1950s to the 1980s. After 1980, this began to equalize so that by about 2000, women earned 76 percent of what men did. Since 2000 there hasn’t been much more progress toward equality.

14. What Do You Think?
Why haven't the changes in men's roles been as dramatic as the changes in women's roles?
Let’s find out!

15. The Impact on Men
Women have entered traditionally male employment more than men have taken on traditionally female activities
Greater stigma for men to engage in female-identified activities
Men’s housework increased slightly
Employed fathers spend more time caring for their children than they did 50 years ago, but so do employed mothers.
Women have entered traditionally male employment more than men have taken on traditionally female activities
Greater stigma for men to engage in female-identified activities
Attitudes towards female employment improved
Men’s housework increased slightly
Employed fathers spend more time caring for their children than they did 50 years ago, but so do employed mothers.
Women’s hours of paid work have increased much more than men’s hours in household work.
Norms of masculinity seem relatively unchanged in insisting that married men are supposed to have a job—so much so that when men aren’t employed, couples more often divorce

16. How are our sex lives shaped by biology and society?
QUESTION 3
How are our sex lives shaped by biology and society?

17. Do American women take any drastic measures to alter their bodies?
In the “Long Neck” tribe in Northern Thailand, women are seen as more beautiful if they have long necks, and some take drastic measures to achieve this beauty
Do American women take any drastic measures to alter their bodies?
If so, what are these?
What Drastic Measures Do American Women Take to Alter Their Bodies?

18. Terms and labels Sexual Orientation Sexual orientation Heterosexual
Homosexual
Bisexual
Definitions:
Sexual orientation: Refers to whether individuals are attracted to members of the other sex, the same sex, or both
Diamond
Showed that behavior (which sex one has sex with), attraction (which sex one is attracted to), and identity (whether one refers to oneself as lesbian, bisexual, or heterosexual) are not always consistent

19. Does Biology Influence Sexual Orientation?
What the research tells us
Higher percentage of identical twins of gay men were also gay, compared to lower percentage of fraternal twins of gay brothers and even lower percentage of adoptive brothers of gay men
Similar pattern found for women
What conclusion can you develop from these findings?

20. Our culture supports double standard of sexuality
Sexual Behavior
Evolutionary theories
Specific sex-genes help men and women to produce offspring
For women: Number of surviving children will not be enhanced by frequent sex with multiple partners
For men: Genes that encourage frequent, casual sex would increase men’s number of offspring-evolution led to more preference for causal sex among men
Our culture supports double standard of sexuality
Nightclubs and college parties often feature women showing more skin than men. Why is this?

21. Sexual Minorities
Sexual minority
Anyone who is not heterosexual, or who is transgendered
Heteronormativity
Situation where culture and institutions send message that everyone who is normal is heterosexual
Heterosexism or homophobia
Bias directed at person because of sexual orientation

22. What do you think is the future of same-sex marriage in America?
Let’s Talk About It!
Same sex marriage
What do you think is the future of same-sex marriage in America?
On what do you base your opinion?
Gay rights movement Queer Nation: group highlighted the concerns of nonheterosexual persons of color, lesbians, bisexuals, transgendered persons, and those who didn’t like pigeonholing people into any of these categories and preferred the umbrella term queer.
Strong backlash: Religious institutions, local and state government groups opposed gay marriage; DOMA at federal level

23. How has sexual behavior changed in the last 50 years?
QUESTION 4
How has sexual behavior changed in the last 50 years?

24. Overview Increase in proportion of Americans have sex before marriage
Premarital Sex
Overview
Increase in proportion of Americans have sex before marriage
American parents against teen children having sex
Cohabitation
Increasing numbers of young couples in relationship living together as unmarried couple
How have relationships in which premarital sex occurs changed in recent decades in the U .S.?

25. Hooking Up
In recent decades sexual activity in causal liaisons with no expectation that a relationship with ensue
Do you think that hookups often lead to relationships?

26. Gender Scripts
How much change has occurred in the sexual and romantic behavior that are scripted by gender?
Sex before marriage has become more acceptable
Little change in gender differences in what is expected in the romantic and sexual realm
In hookups, women feel obligation to try to give pleasure; men more selfish

27. Births Outside of Marriage
Birth outside of marriage more common with increase in all education, income, and racial groups
Highest rates occur among most disadvantaged African Americans
Reduction of stigma of pregnancy outside of marriage related to acceptance of sex before marriage

28. Generational Differences
Younger generation more likely to have sex before marriage, to have cohabited before marriage, and to have more sexual partners
Oral sex more accepted and appealing to younger generation
Married or cohabiting people reported more frequent sex in the last year