1. Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Companies
Social Psychology
David Myers
10e
Copyright 2010 McGraw-Hill Companies

2. Chapter Five
Genes, Culture, and Gender

3. How Are We Influenced by Human Nature and Cultural Diversity?
Genes, Evolution, and Behavior
Natural selection
Process by which heritable traits that best enable organisms to survive and reproduce in particular environments are passed to ensuing generations
Evolutionary psychology
Study of the evolution of cognition and behavior using principles of natural selection

4. How Are We Influenced by Human Nature and Cultural Diversity?
Culture and Behavior
Culture
Enduring behaviors, ideas, attitudes, and traditions shared by a large group of people and transmitted from one generation to the next
Cultural diversity
Our behavior is socially programmed
One in ten Americans is an immigrant

5. How Are We Influenced by Human Nature and Cultural Diversity?
Culture and Behavior
Norms: Expected Behavior
Norms
Standards for accepted and expected behavior
Personal space
Buffer zone we like to maintain around our bodies

6. How Are We Influenced by Human Nature and Cultural Diversity?
Culture and Behavior
Cultural Similarity
Universal friendship norms
Universal trait dimensions
Universal social belief dimensions
Universal status norms
Incest taboo
Norms of war

7. How Are Gender Similarities and Differences Explained?
Characteristics, whether biological or socially influenced, by which people define male and female

8. How Are Gender Similarities and Differences Explained?
Women
Men
Describe themselves in more relational terms
Experience more relationship-linked emotions
More empathetic
Gravitate toward jobs that reduce inequalities
Focus on tasks and on connections with large groups
Respond to stress with “fight or flight” response
Gravitate toward jobs that enhance inequalities

9. How Are Gender Similarities and Differences Explained?
Social Dominance
Men are socially dominant
Women’s wages in industrial countries average 77 percent of men’s
Men tend to be more autocratic; women more democratic
Men take more risks

10. How Are Gender Similarities and Differences Explained?
Aggression
Physical or verbal behavior intended to hurt someone
In the U.S., the arrest ratio of male to female is 10 to 1
When provocation occurs the gender gap shrinks
Women are slightly more likely to commit indirect aggressive acts
Spreading malicious gossip

11. How Are Gender Similarities and Differences Explained?
Sexuality
Men:
More often think about and initiate sex
Women:
Are more inspired by emotional passion

12. Evolution and Gender: Doing What Comes Naturally?
Gender and Mating Preferences
Men seek out quantity
Spreading genes widely
Women seek out quality
Protecting and nurturing of offspring

13. Evolution and Gender: Doing What Comes Naturally?
Reflections on Evolutionary Psychology
Evolutionary psychologists sometimes start with an effect and work backward to construct an explanation
Way to overcome the “hindsight bias” is to image things turning our otherwise
Evolutionary psychologists disagree with this theory

14. Sample Predictions Derived from Evolutionary Psychology
Figure 5.6

15. Evolution and Gender: Doing What Comes Naturally?
Gender and Hormones
Gender gap in aggression seems influenced by testosterone
As humans age they become more androgynous
Mixing both masculine and feminine characteristics

16. Culture and Gender: Doing as the Culture Says?
Gender Role
Set of behavior expectations (norms) for males and females
Gender roles vary over culture
Gender roles vary over time
Figure 5.7

17. Culture and Gender: Doing as the Culture Says?
Peer-Transmitted Culture
50 percent of individual variations in personality traits is by parental nurturing
The other 50 percent is peer influence

18. What Can We Conclude about Genes, Culture, and Gender?
Biology and Culture
Biology and experience interact when biological traits influence how the environment reacts
Figure 5.8