Abstract
Ambivalent sexism theory (Glick and Fiske 1996, 1997) suggests that sexism takes two forms: an overt hostility as well as a subtle benevolence. We examined benevolent sexist behaviors and developed a 25-item Experiences with Benevolent Sexism Scale. Exploratory factor analysis (Study 1, U.S. college sample of 489 women) and confirmatory factor analysis (Study 2, online sample of 216 women) revealed three subscales of benevolently sexist experiences: Heterosexual Intimacy, Protective Paternalism, and Complementary Gender Differences. Women reported experiencing benevolently sexist events more frequently than overtly hostile sexist events; however, they perceived the hostile events to be more distressing and sexist (Studies 1 and 2). Experiencing Protective Paternalism was positively associated with self-doubt and negatively associated with self-esteem (Studies 1 and 2), and psychological well-being (Study 2). However, experiencing Complementary Gender Differentiation was negatively associated with self-doubt and positively associated with self-esteem (Studies 1 and 2), psychological well-being, flourishing, and submission to authority (Study 2). Finally, women in romantic relationships reported more benevolently sexist experiences than did those not in romantic relationships and the frequency of those experiences was positively associated with perceptions of the partner’s benevolently sexist attitudes (Study 2). The results highlight that women frequently experience sexism, ranging from overtly hostile to a subtle benevolence, and the different types of benevolent sexism each have unique associations with women’s well-being.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Abrams, D., Viki, G. T., Masser, B., & Bohner, G. (2003). Perceptions of stranger and acquaintance rape: The role of benevolent and hostile sexism in victim blame and rape proclivity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 84(1), 111–125. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.84.1.111.
Arbuckle, J. L., & Wothke, W. (1999). AMOS 4.0 User’s guide. Chicago IL: Small Waters Corporation.
Baalbaki, M., & Oswald, D. L. (2017, March). College women write about sexism: What does it look like? Where does it happen? How do they respond? Poster presented at the 2017 Association for Women in Psychology Meetings, Milwaukee, WI.
Barreto, M., & Ellemers, N. (2005). The burden of benevolent sexism: How it contributes to the maintenance of gender inequalities. European Journal of Social Psychology, 35, 633–642. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.270.
Barreto, M., Ellemers, B., Piebinga, L., & Moya, M. (2010). How nice of us and how dumb of me: The effect of exposure to benevolent sexism on women’s task and relational self-descriptions. Sex Roles, 62, 532–544. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-009-9699-0.
Becker, J. C., & Swim, J. K. (2011). Seeing the unseen: Attention to daily encounters with sexism as way to reduce sexist beliefs. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 35, 227–242. https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684310397509.
Becker, J. C., & Wright, S. C. (2011). Yet another dark side of chivalry: Benevolent sexism undermines and hostile sexism motivates collective action for social change. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 101, 62–77. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0022615.
Becker, J. C., Glick, P., Ilic, M., & Bohner, G. (2011). Damned if she does, damned if she doesn’t: Consequences of accepting versus confronting patronizing help for the female target and male actor. European Journal of Social Psychology, 41, 761–773. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.823.
Begany, J. J., & Milburn, M. A. (2002). Psychological predictors of sexual harassment: Authoritarianism, hostile sexism, and rape myths. Psychology of Men & Masculinity, 3, 119–126. https://doi.org/10.1037/1524-9220.3.2.119.
Bosson, J. K., Pinel, E. C., & Vandello, J. A. (2010). The emotional impact of ambivalent sexism: Forecasts versus real experiences. Sex Roles, 62, 520–531. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-009-9664-y.
Bryant, A. N. (2003). Changes in attitudes toward women's roles: Predicting gender-role traditionalism among college students. Sex Roles, 48, 131–142. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1022451205292.
Buhrmester, M., Kwang, T., & Gosling, S. D. (2011). Amazon's Mechanical Turk a new source of inexpensive, yet high-quality, data? Perspectives on Psychological Science, 6(1), 3–5. https://doi.org/10.1177/1745691610393980.
Chapleau, K. M., Oswald, D. L., & Russell, B. L. (2007). How ambivalent sexism toward women and men support rape myth acceptance. Sex Roles, 57, 131–136. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-007-9196-2.
Chisango, T., & Javangwe, G. (2012). Are people better at recognizing ambivalent sexism on the basis of non-standard profiles than the standard ASI ones? Sex Roles, 67, 69–82. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-012-0146-2.
Connelly, K., & Heesacker, M. (2012). Why is benevolent sexism appealing? Associations with system justification and life satisfaction. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 36, 432–443. https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684312456369.
Cummins, R. A., Eckersley, R., Pallant, J., van Vugt, J., & Misajon, R. (2003). Developing a national index of subjective well-being: The Australian Unity Well-being Index. Social Indicators Research, 64, 159–190. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1024704320683.
Diener, E., Wirtz, D., Tov, W., Kim-Prieto, C., Choi, D., Oishi, S., & Biswas-Diener, R. (2010). New well-being measures: Short scales to assess flourishing and positive and negative feelings. Social Indicators Research, 97, 143–156. https://doi.org/10.1007/sll205-009-9493-y.
Donnellan, M. B., Trzesniewski, K. H., & Robins, R. W. (2015). Measures of self-esteem. In G. J. Boyle, D. H. Saklofske, & G. Matthews (Eds.), Personality and social psychological constructs (pp. 131–157). London, UK: Academic Press.
Dumont, M., Sarlet, M., & Dardenne, B. (2010). Be too kind to a woman, she’ll feel incompetent: Benevolent sexism shifts self-construal and autobiographical memories toward incompetence. Sex Roles, 62, 545–553. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-008-9582-4.
Farkas, T., & Leaper, C. (2016). Chivalry’s double-edged sword: How girls’ and boys’ paternalistic attitudes relate to their possible family and work selves. Sex Roles, 74, 220–230. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-015-0556-z.
Ford, T. E., Boxer, C. F., Armstrong, J., & Edel, J. R. (2008). More than “just a joke”: The prejudice-releasing function of sexist humor. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 34, 159–170. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167207310022.
Gervais, S. J., & Vescio, T. K. (2012). The effect of patronizing behaviour and control on men and women’s performance in stereotypically masculine domains. Sex Roles, 66, 479–491. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-011-0115-1.
Glick, P., & Fiske, S. T. (1996). The ambivalent sexism inventory: Differentiating hostile and benevolent sexism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70, 491–512. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.70.3.491.
Glick, P., & Fiske, S. (1997). Hostile and benevolent sexism: Measuring ambivalent sexist attitudes toward women. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 21, 119–136. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.1997.tb00104.x.
Glick, P., & Fiske, S. T. (2001a). Ambivalent sexism. In M. P. Zanna (Ed.), Advances in experimental social psychology (pp. 115–188). San Francisco: Academic Press.
Glick, P., & Fiske, S. T. (2001b). An ambivalent alliance. Hostile and benevolent sexism as complementary justifications for gender inequality. American Psychologist, 56, 109–118. https://doi.org/10.1037//0003-66X.56.2.109.
Hammond, M. D., & Overall, N. C. (2015). Benevolent sexism and support of romantic partner’s goals: Undermining women’s competence while fulfilling men’s intimacy needs. Personality and Social Psychology, 41, 1180–1194. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167215593492.
Hammond, M. D., & Sibley, C. G. (2011). Why are benevolent sexists happier? Sex Roles, 65, 332–343. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-011-0017-2.
Hammond, M. D., Sibley, C. G., & Overall, N. C. (2014). The allure of sexism: Psychological entitlement fosters women’s endorsement of sexism over time. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 5, 422–429. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550613506124.
Hammond, M. D., Overall, N. C., & Cross, E. J. (2016). Internalizing sexism within close relationships: Perceptions of intimate partner’s benevolent sexism promote women’s endorsement of benevolent sexism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 110, 214–238. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000043.
Hideg, I., & Ferris, D. L. (2016). The compassionate sexist? How benevolent sexism promotes and undermines gender equality in the workplace. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 111, 706–727. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000072.
Hu, L., & Bentler, P. M. (1999). Cutoff criteria for fit indexes in covariance structure analysis: Conventional criteria versus new alternatives. Structural Equation Modeling, 6, 1–55. https://doi.org/10.1080/10705519909540118.
Jones, K., Stewart, K., King, E., Morgan, W. B., Gilrane, V., & Hylton, K. (2014). Negative consequence of benevolent sexism on efficacy and performance. Gender in Management, 29, 171–189. https://doi.org/10.1108/GM-07-2013-0086.
Jost, J. T., & Kay, A. C. (2005). Exposure to benevolent sexism and complementary gender stereotypes: Consequences for specific and diffuse forms of system justification. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 498–509. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.88.3.498.
Killianski, S. E., & Rudman, L. A. (1998). Wanting it both ways: Do women approve of benevolent sexism? Sex Roles, 39, 333–352. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1018814924402.
King, E. B., Botsford, W., Hebl, M. R., Kazama, S., Dawson, J. F., & Perkins, A. (2012). Benevolent sexism at work: Gender differences in the distribution of challenging developmental experiences. Journal of Management, 38, 1835–1866. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206310365902.
Klonoff, E. A., & Landrine, H. (1995). The Schedule of Sexist Events: A measure of lifetime and recent sexist discrimination in women’s lives. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 19, 439–472. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.1995.tb00086.x.
Klonoff, E. A., Landrine, H., & Campbell, R. (2000). Sexist discrimination may account for well-known gender differences in psychiatric symptoms. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 24, 93–99. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.2000.tb01025.x.
Landrine, H., & Klonoff, E. A. (1997). Discrimination against women: Prevalence, consequences, remedies. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
Landrine, H., Klonoff, E. A., Gibbs, J., Manning, V., & Lund, M. (1995). Physical and psychiatric correlates of gender discrimination: An application of the Schedule of Sexist Events. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 19, 473–492. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.1995.tb00087.x.
Lee, T. L., Fiske, S. T., & Glick, P. (2010). Next gen ambivalent sexism: Converging correlates, causality in context, and converse causality, an introduction to the special issue. Sex Roles, 62, 395–404. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-010-9747-9.
LeMaire, K. L., Oswald, D. L., & Russell, B. L. (2016). Labeling sexual victimization experiences; The role of sexism, rape myth acceptance, and tolerance for sexual harassment. Violence and Victims, 31, 332–346. https://doi.org/10.1891/0886-6708.VV-D-13-00148.
Masser, B., & Abrams, D. (1999). Contemporary sexism: The relationships among hostility, benevolence and neosexism. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 23, 503–571. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.1999.tb00378.x.
Masser, B. M., & Abrams, D. (2004). Reinforcing the glass ceiling: The consequences of hostile sexism for female managerial candidates. Sex Roles, 51, 609–615. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-004-5470-8.
Matteson, A. V., & Moradi, B. (2005). Examining the structure of the Schedule of Sexist Events: Replication and extension. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 29, 47–57. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.0361-6843.2005.00167.x.
McDonald, R., & Ho, M. R. (2002). Principles and practices in reporting structural equation analyses. Psychological Methods, 7, 64–82. https://doi.org/10.1037//1082-989X.7.1.64.
Mirels, H. L., Greblo, P., & Dean, J. B. (2002). Judgmental self-doubt: Beliefs about one’s judgmental prowess. Personality and Individual Differences, 33, 741–758. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0191-8869(01)00189-1.
Moradi, B., & Subich, L. M. (2002). Perceived sexist events and feminist identity development attitudes: Links to women’s psychological distress. The Counseling Psychologist, 30, 44–65. https://doi.org/10.1177/0011000002301003.
Moya, M., Glick, P., Exposito, F., de Lemus, S., & Hart, J. (2007). It’s for your own good: Benevolent sexism and women’s reactions to protectively justified restrictions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 33, 1421–1434. https://doi.org/10.1177/0146167207304790.
Napier, J. L., Thorsisdottir, H., & Jost, J. T. (2010). The joy of sexism? A multinational investigation of hostile and benevolent justifications for gender inequality and their relations to subjective well-being. Sex Roles, 62, 405–419. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-009-9712-7.
Oleson, K. C., Poehlmann, K. M., Yost, J. H., Lynch, M. E., & Arkin, R. M. (2000). Subjective overachievement: Individual differences in self-doubt and concern with performance. Journal of Personality, 68, 491–542. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-6494.00104.
Oswald, D. L., Franzoi, S., & Frost, K. (2012). Experiencing sexism and young women's body esteem. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 31, 1112–1137. https://doi.org/10.1037/t00700-000.
Pettijohn, T. F., & Walzer, A. S. (2008). Reducing racism, sexism, and homophobia in college students by completing a psychology of prejudice course. College Student Journal, 42, 459–468.
Rigby, K. (1987). An authority behavior inventory. Journal of Personality Assessment, 51, 615–625. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15327752jpa5104_14.
Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the adolescent self-image. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Rudman, L. A., & Glick, P. (2008). The social psychology of gender. New York: The Guilford Press.
Russell, B. L., & Trigg, K. Y. (2004). Tolerance of sexual harassment: An examination of gender differences, ambivalent sexism, social dominance, and gender roles. Sex Roles, 50, 565–573. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:SERS.0000023075.32252.fd.
Sakalli-Ugurlu, N., & Beydogan, B. (2002). Turkish college students’ attitudes toward women managers: The effects of patriarchy, sexism, and gender differences. The Journal of Psychology, 136, 647–656. https://doi.org/10.1080/00223980209604825.
Shepherd, M., Erchull, M. J., Rosner, A., Taubenberger, L., Queen, E. F., & McKee, J. (2011). “I’ll get that for you”: The relationship between benevolent sexism and body self-perceptions. Sex Roles, 64, 1–8. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-010-9859-2.
Shnabel, N., Bar-Anan, Y., Kende, A., Bareket, O., & Lazar, Y. (2016). Help to perpetuate traditional gender roles: Benevolent sexism increases engagement in dependency-oriented cross-gender helping. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 11, 55–75. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000037.
Silvan-Ferrero, M. P., & Bustillos Lopez, A. (2007). Benevolent sexism toward men and women: Justifications of the traditional system and conventional gender roles in Spain. Sex Roles, 57, 607–614. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-007-9271-8.
Swim, J. K., Hyers, L. L., Cohen, L. L., & Ferguson, M. J. (2001). Everyday sexism: Evidence of its incidence, nature and psychological impact from three daily diary studies. Journal of Social Issues, 57, 31–53. https://doi.org/10.1111/0022-4537.00200.
Swim, J. K., Mallett, R., Russo-Devosa, Y., & Stangor, C. (2005). Judgments of sexism: A comparison of the subtlety of sexism measures and sources of variability in judgments of sexism. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 29, 406–411. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1471-6402.2005.00240.x.
Ullman, J. B. (1996). Structural equation modeling. In B. Tabachnick & L Fidell (Eds.), Using multivariate statistics (3rd ed., pp. 709–812). New York: Harper Collins.
Viki, G. T., & Abrams, D. (2002). But she was unfaithful: Benevolent sexism and reactions to rape victims who violate traditional gender role expectations. Sex Roles, 47, 289–293. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1021342912248.
Viki, G. T., Abrams, D., & Hutchinson, P. (2003). The “true” romantic: Benevolent sexism and paternalistic chivalry. Sex Roles, 49, 533–537. https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1025888824749.
Viki, G. T., Abrams, D., & Masser, B. (2004). Evaluating stranger and acquaintance rape: The role of benevolent sexism in perpetrator blame and recommended sentence length. Law and Human Behavior, 28, 295–303. https://doi.org/10.1023/B:LAHU.0000029140.72880.69.
Wang, K., & Dovidio, J. F. (2017). Perceiving and confronting sexism: The causal role of gender identity salience. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 41, 65–76. https://doi.org/10.1177/0361684316670628.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Steve Franzoi and Kristine Chapleau for their helpful comments on this manuscript and feedback on item development. Thank you to Brooke Magnus for her assistance with the confirmatory factor analysis.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
This study was approved by the institutional review board at Marquette University and conforms to the APA research ethics. All authors have read and approve of submitting the manuscript to Sex Roles. This manuscript has not been published, in any part, elsewhere. This manuscript has not received any grant funding.
Electronic supplementary material
ESM 1
(DOCX 15.8 kb)
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Oswald, D.L., Baalbaki, M. & Kirkman, M. Experiences with Benevolent Sexism: Scale Development and Associations with Women’s Well-Being. Sex Roles 80, 362–380 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-018-0933-5
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11199-018-0933-5