Experimentally Manipulating Gender Inequality Affects Explicit and Implicit Gendered Attitudes and Self-Perceptions

Given the volume of related theory there is surprisingly little experimental evidence testing the prediction that gender in/equality affects psychological gender-differences and gendered attitudes. Here we experimentally manipulated economic gender inequality and income by assigning 749 heterosexual, cis-gendered participants to one of five fictional societies that differed in average earnings of men and women (women outearned men by a factor of 2:1 or 3:2, men outearned women by these same factors, or incomes were gender equal), and to one of five income percentiles (the 10th, 30th, 50th, 70th, or 90th percentile for their gender) within their assigned society, and measured participants’ degree of self-perceived femininity/masculinity, explicit endorsement of traditional gender roles and non-deterministic attitudes regarding gender, implicit endorsement of gender stereotypes and counter-stereotypes, and perceived acceptability of intimate partner coercion. Results revealed that, as women’s earnings increased (relative to men’s), self-perceived femininity increased, while traditional gender role attitudes decreased. The effects of gender inequality on implicit gender stereotypes were moderated by participant gender and assigned income. Specifically, men assigned low, but not high, income endorsed implicit gender stereotypes less and endorsed implicit gender-counterstereotypes more when women earned more than men. However, we did not observe effects of gender inequality nor income on explicit non-deterministic attitudes regarding gender nor on perceived acceptability of intimate partner coercion. Results broadly support current theories regarding the effects of gender inequality on attitudes and beliefs, but highlight the importance of gender and individual income in determining the magnitude and direction of these effects.