Davies, Paul G.2006-07-282006-07-2820002000http://hdl.handle.net/10012/588Women in traditionally masculine domains must deal with the shadow of doubt hat accompanies stereotypes alleging a sex-based inability. The threat of being personally reduced to one of these negative gender stereotypes can evoke a disruptive apprehension among women - a situational predicament we call "stereotype threat." The risk of experiencing stereotype threat in traditionally masculine fields may lead women to avoid those stereotype-relevant domains in an attempt to cope with the self-evaluative threat they impose. Employing gender-stereotypic commercials to elicit the female stereotype, the represent research examined the insidious effects that stereotype threat can have on women's achievement-related choices. A series of five studies demonstrated that exposure to stereotype threat, and seek domains in which they are immune to stereotype threat. Study 1 revealed that only those women exposed to the gender-stereotypic commercials avoided math items in favor of verbal items on a subsequent aptitude test. Viewing those commercials also led women in Study 2 to indicate diminished educational and vocational aspirations in quantitative domains, while indicating increased aspirations in verbal domains. Study 3 demonstrated the stifling effect that stereotype threat has on women's leadership aspiration - only women who viewed the gender-stereotypic commercials avoided leadership positions on an impending task. By making the leadership-inability stereotype irrelevant to the impending task, which eliminated stereotype threat from the situation, Study 4 verified that women's interest in leadership could be restored even after they had viewed the stereotypic commercials. Finally, Study 5 established that varying the stereotype relevance of the leadership task moderated whether activation of the female stereotype mediated the noxious effects of those commercials on women's leadership aspirations.application/pdf2993623 bytesapplication/pdfenCopyright: 2000, Davies, Paul G.. All rights reserved.Harvested from Collections CanadaDoctoral Thesis