The hypotheses for the investigation are:
Null hypothesis (H0): there will be no significant differences in the amount of times each sex associates an adjective to a gender. This is a one tailed hypothesis.
Alternative Hypothesis (H1): there will be a significant difference in the amount of times a sex associates an adjective to a gender.
Method:
Design:
In this investigation, the independent variable which is used is the two different genders which act as participants. This is because an independent variable is what the experimenter changes, in this case it is the gender of the participant.
The dependant variable is what I, as the experimenter is measuring. In this case, the dependant variable is how the results were perceived (which sex the adjective is associated to). The results will be obtained using independent measures as each participant has to judge both conditions (male or female) to decide which sex the adjective is associated to. There are only the two variables of male or female.
Participants:
The target population of participants were sixth form students from Longslade Community College. This target population is aged sixteen to nineteen years of age and includes people of different ethnic backgrounds, religious beliefs and genders.
Materials:
The materials which have been used for this investigation are thirty A4 papers which have the instructions for the participants with the twelve adjectives printed on and a black ball point pen.
Procedure:
The following is a step by step procedure of how to carry out the investigation:
- Select a population of sixth form students. In this investigation, students were selected from Longslade Community College’s sixth form.
- Randomly select fifteen males and fifteen females to be the participants
- Place the participants one by one into laboratory conditions. This laboratory condition is used to reduce the chance of confounding variables affecting the results. The main confounding variable to be avoided is other people influencing the participants’ decisions. Demand characteristics can also be avoided by the experimenter not being present when the participants are judging the adjectives.
- The participant will read the instructions to the investigation
- The participant will then use the black ball point pen to tick the relevant box to their judgement of the adjective (they will have to decide weather the word is mainly associated to males or females in their opinion).
- The examiner will collect the results
- the participants will be de-briefed by the examiner
- this procedure will be repeated for each of the thirty participants
Results:
These results show that males associate the words resourceful, witty, forgiving, cautious, hard-headed and confident to their own sex. It also shows that females associate the words resourceful, forgiving, affectionate, fussy and warm to their own sex.
These results indicate to me that each sex generally tends to associate positive adjectives to themselves and derogatory words to the opposite sex. These results show that the “Battle of the sexes” is still continuing, particularly between teenagers asked to participate in the experiment. The words that both sexes agreed to being mainly associated to the same sex were emotional, affectionate, fussy and warm (associated to females) and witty, cautious, hard-headed and confident (mainly associated to males). These words are common stereotypes that are often associated to each sex.
Discussion:
Psychological Collusions:
The results of the investigation have found conclusive results which are backed by the work of Williams and Best in 1990. This is because their research discovered that the adjectives emotional, forgiving, cautious, warm and confident are generally associated to females. Their results are identical to the results of this investigation. My results also agree with the original hypothesis (H1) which stated their will be a significant difference in the number of times a sex associates an adjective to a specific gender.
From my results, I can conclude that gender stereotypes are still used by many people. The population, society, still expects people from different genders to act and behave in specific ways depending on their sex.
I think my research has added to our understanding of this area of study as it has specifically found which adjectives are associated to males or females. It also shows that these gender stereotypes are still believed by modern society. I don’t believe any confounding variables have affected the results.
Evaluation:
If this investigation was to be repeated, it could be improved in the following ways:
- More participants would be included to exclude any irregular results that may have occurred. This would also give a more accurate average result
- More adjectives would be included that describe human behaviours
- More people from different populations would be used as participants
- For further research, cross cultural research could be carried out. This would find any differences in gender stereotypes from different belief from around the world.
