Tag Archives | Gender

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Many argue that hegemonic gender norms depress boys’ performance and account for the gender gap in achievement. I describe differences in the emergence of the gender gap in academic achievement between white and Asian American youth and explore how the immigrant experience and cultural differences in gender expectations might account for observed differences. For white students, boys are already underperforming girls in kindergarten, with the male disadvantage growing into high school. For Asian Americans, boys perform as well as girls throughout elementary school but begin underperforming relative to girls at the transition to adolescence. Additionally, I show that the Asian American gender gap is larger in schools with stronger male-centric sports cultures and where boys’ underachievement is normalized. I speculate that model-minority stereotypes, the immigrant experience, and standards of masculinity that promote pro-school behaviors in boys act as protective factors in early childhood but wane at the transition to adolescence during a period when the dominant peer culture plays a larger role in shaping gender identities. The study offers evidence that the gender gap in achievement is not an inevitable fact of biology but is shaped by social environment.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Amy Hsin: Department of Sociology, Queens College, City University of New York
E-mail: amy.hsin@qc.cuny.edu

Acknowledgements: The author would like to thank Yu Xie, Kate Choi, Sophia Catsambis, and Lizandra Friedland for commenting on earlier versions of this work. All remaining errors are strictly the responsibility of the author.

Citation: Hsin, Amy. 2018. “Hegemonic Gender Norms and the Gender Gap in Achievement: The Case of Asian Americans.” Sociological Science 5: 752-774.
Received: July 22, 2018
Accepted: October 23, 2018
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Sarah Soule
DOI: 10.15195/v5.a32

Benefit Inequality among American Workers by Gender, Race, and Ethnicity, 1982–2015

By Parker Webservices on July 19, 2018 in Articles

Tali Kristal, Yinon Cohen, Edo Navot

Sociological Science, July 19, 2018
10.15195/v5.a20

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Gender, racial, and ethnic gaps in wages are well known, but group disparities in employer-provided benefits, which account for one-quarter of total compensation, are not. We use benefit costs data to study levels and trends in gender, racial, and ethnic gaps in voluntary employer-provided benefits. Analyzing Employer Costs for Employee Compensation microdata on wages and benefit costs for the years 1982 to 2015, matched to Current Population Survey files by wage decile in the industrial sector, we find that (1) benefit gaps were wider than wage gaps for minorities but were narrower for gender, (2) racial and ethnic gaps in benefits increased faster than wage gaps, and (3) the gender gap in benefits decreased faster than the wage gap. We show that these findings reflect the types of jobs women, blacks, and Hispanics have held for the past three decades.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Tali Kristal: Department of Sociology, University of Haifa
E-mail: kristal@soc.haifa.ac.il

Yinon Cohen: Department of Sociology, Columbia University
E-mail: yc2444@columbia.edu

Edo Navot:United States Department of Labor
E-mail: navot.edo@dol.gov

Acknowledgements: We thank the United States–Israel Binational Science Foundation for its partial support of this project. Earlier versions of this article were presented at the summer meeting of the International Sociological Association Research Committee on Social Stratification and Mobility (in 2017) and the Intergenerational Mobility and Income Inequality Workshop held at the University of Haifa (in March 2018). We thank Yitchak Haberfeld and the participants in these meetings for their comments. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) and its staff, who facilitated this research with generosity and patience. The research was conducted with restricted access to Bureau of Labor Statistics data. The views expressed in any publication resulting from an analysis of these data do not necessarily reflect the views of the BLS. Additionally, the views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the United States Department of Labor or any agency within it.

Citation: Kristal, Tali, Yinon Cohen, and Edo Navot. 2018. “Benefit Inequality among American Workers by Gender, Race and Ethnicity, 1982–2015.” Sociological Science 5: 461-488.
Received: April 17, 2018
Accepted: June 5, 2018
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Kim Weeden
DOI: 10.15195/v5.a20

"I Didn't Want To Be 'That Girl'": The Social Risks of Labeling, Telling, and Reporting Sexual Assault

By Parker Webservices on July 12, 2018 in Articles

Shamus R. Khan, Jennifer S. Hirsch, Alexander Wamboldt, Claude A. Mellins

Sociological Science, July 12, 2018
10.15195/v5.a19

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This article deploys ethnographic data to explain why some students do not label experiences as sexual assault or report those experiences. Using ideas of social risks and productive ambiguities, it argues that not labeling or reporting assault can help students (1) sustain their current identities and allow for several future ones, (2) retain their social relationships and group affiliations while maintaining the possibility of developing a wider range of future ones, or (3) avoid derailing their current or future goals within the higher educational setting, or what we call “college projects.” Conceptually, this work advances two areas of sociological research. First, it expands the framework of social risks, or culturally specific rationales for seemingly illogical behavior, by highlighting the interpersonal and institutional dimensions of such risks. Second, it urges researchers to be more attentive to contexts in which categorical ambiguity or denial is socially productive and to take categorical avoidance seriously as a subject of inquiry. Substantively, this work advances knowledge of why underreporting of campus sexual assault occurs, with implications for institutional policies to support students who have experienced unwanted nonconsensual sex regardless of how those students may label what happened.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Shamus R. Khan: Department of Sociology, Columbia University
E-mail: sk2905@columbia.edu

Jennifer S. Hirsch: Department of Sociomedical Sciences, Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University
E-mail: jsh2124@columbia.edu

Alexander Wamboldt:Department of Sociology, Columbia University
E-mail: asw2176@columbia.edu

Claude A. Mellins: Division of Gender, Sexuality and Health, Departments of Psychiatry and Sociomedical Sciences, New York State Psychiatric Institute and Columbia University Medical Center
E-mail: cam14@cumc.columbia.edu

Acknowledgements: The authors thank the research participants, the Undergraduate Advisory Board, Columbia University, and the entire Sexual Health Initiative to Foster Transformation team who contributed to the development and implementation of this ambitious effort, particularly Matthew Chin, Gloria Diaz, Abby DiCarlo, and Megan Kordenbrock. Leigh Reardon, Gloria Diaz, Matthew Chin, and Megan Kordenbrock assisted in the data collection and analysis of this project. Several scholars commented on previous drafts; we owe particular thanks to Maria Abascal, Christopher Muller, and Adam Reich for their suggestions.

This research was funded by Columbia University through generous support from multiple donors. The research benefited from infrastructural support from the Columbia Population Research Center, which is funded by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health under award number P2CHD058486. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

Citation: Khan, Shamus R., Jennifer S. Hirsch, Alexander Wamboldt, and Claude A. Mellins. 2018. “”I Didn’t Want To Be ‘That Girl'”: The Social Risks of Labeling, Telling, and Reporting Sexual Assault.” Sociological Science 5: 432-460.
Received: February 24, 2018
Accepted: May 26, 2018
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Mario Small
DOI: 10.15195/v5.a19

Obesity Is in the Eye of the Beholder: BMI and Socioeconomic Outcomes across Cohorts

By Parker Webservices on April 19, 2017 in Articles

Vida Maralani, Douglas McKee

Sociological Science, April 19, 2017
DOI 10.15195/v4.a13

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The biological and social costs of body mass cannot be conceptualized in the same way. Using semiparametric methods, we show that the association between body mass index (BMI) and socioeconomic outcomes such as wages, being married, and family income is distinctly shaped by gender, race, and cohort rather than being above a specific threshold of BMI. For white men, the correlation between BMI and outcomes is positive across the “normal” range of BMI and turns negative near the cusp of the overweight range, a pattern that persists across cohorts. For white women, thinner is nearly always better, a pattern that also persists across cohorts. For black men in the 1979 cohort, the association between BMI and wages is positive across the normal and overweight ranges for wages and family income and inverted U–shaped for marriage. For black women in the 1979 cohort, thinner is better for wages and marriage. By the 1997 cohort, however, the negative association between body mass and outcomes dissipates for black Americans but not for white Americans. In the social world, “too fat” is a subjective, contingent, and fluid judgment that differs depending on who is being judged, who does the judging, and the social domain.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Vida Maralani: Department of Sociology, Cornell University
Email: vida.maralani@cornell.edu

Douglas McKee: Department of Economics, Cornell University
Email: douglas.mckee@cornell.edu

Acknowledgements: We thank Maurice Gesthuizen, Richard Breen, and Jason Fletcher for their comments and suggestions and Sam Stabler, Luke Wagner, Kate Bradley, and Isadora Milanez for providing superb research assistance.

This research uses data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 and 1997, and also data from Add Health, a program project directed by Kathleen Mullan Harris and designed by J. Richard Udry, Peter S. Bearman, and Kathleen Mullan Harris at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and funded by grant P01-HD31921 from the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, with cooperative funding from 23 other federal agencies and foundations. Special acknowledgment is due Ronald R. Rindfuss and Barbara Entwisle for assistance in the original design. Information on how to obtain the Add Health data files is available on the Add Health website (http://www.cpc.unc.edu/addhealth). No direct support was received from grant P01-HD31921 for this analysis.

Citation: Maralani, Vida, and Douglas McKee. 2017. “Obesity Is in the Eye of the Beholder: BMI and Socioeconomic Outcomes across Cohorts.” Sociological Science 4: 288-317.
Received: January 30, 2017
Accepted: February 27, 2017
Editors: Jesper B. Sørensen, Stephen Morgan
DOI: 10.15195/v4.a13

Increases in Sex with Same-Sex Partners and Bisexual Identity Across Cohorts of Women (but Not Men)

By Parker Webservices on November 7, 2016 in Articles

Paula England, Emma Mishel, Mónica L. Caudillo

Sociological Science, November 7, 2016
DOI 10.15195/v3.a42

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We use data from the 2002–2013 National Surveys of Family Growth to examine change across U.S. cohorts born between 1966 and 1995 in whether individuals have had sex with same-sex partners only, or with both men and women, and in whether they have a bisexual or gay identity. Adjusted for age, race/ethnicity, immigrant status, and mother’s education, we find increases across cohorts in the proportion of women who report a bisexual identity, who report ever having had sex with both sexes, or who report having had sex with women only. By contrast, we find no cohort trend for men; roughly 5 percent of men in every cohort have ever had sex with a man, and the proportion claiming a gay or bisexual attraction changed little. We speculate that this gender difference is rooted in a broader pattern of asymmetry in gender change in which departures from traditional gender norms are more acceptable for women than men.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Paula England: Department of Sociology, New York University
Email: Pengland@nyu.edu

Emma Mishel: Department of Sociology, New York University
Email: Emmamishel@nyu.edu

Mónica L. Caudillo: Department of Sociology, New York University
Email: Monica.Caudillo@nyu.edu

Acknowledgements: We are grateful to Gary Gates for helpful comments.

Citation: England, Paula, Emma Mishel, and Mónica L. Caudillo. 2016. “Increases in Sex with Same-Sex Partners and Bisexual Identity Across Cohorts of Women (but Not Men).” Sociological Science 3: 951-970.
Received: August 2, 2016
Accepted: September 25, 2016
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Sarah Soule
DOI: 10.15195/v3.a42

Unequal Hard Times: The Influence of the Great Recession on Gender Bias in Entrepreneurial Financing

By Jesper Sorensen on January 6, 2016 in Articles

Sarah Thébaud, Amanda J. Sharkey

Sociological Science, January 6, 2016
DOI 10.15195/v3.a1

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Prior work finds mixed evidence of gender bias in lenders’ willingness to approve loans to entrepreneurs during normal macroeconomic conditions. However, various theories predict that gender bias is more likely to manifest when there is greater uncertainty or when decision-makers’ choices are under greater scrutiny from others. Such conditions characterized the lending market in the recent economic downturn. This article draws on an analysis of panel data from the Kauffman Firm Survey to investigate how the Great Recession affected the gender gap in entrepreneurial access to financing, net of individual and firm-level characteristics. Consistent with predictions, we find that women-led firms were significantly more likely than men-led firms to encounter difficulty in acquiring funding when small-business lending contracted in 2009 and 2010. We assess the consistency of our results with two different theories of bias or discrimination. Our findings shed light on mechanisms that may contribute to disadvantages for women entrepreneurs and, more broadly, highlight how the effects of ascribed status characteristics (e.g., gender) on economic decision-making may vary systematically with macroeconomic conditions.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Sarah Thébaud: Department of Sociology, University of California, Santa Barbara. Email: sthebaud@soc.ucsb.edu.

Amanda J. Sharkey: Booth School of Business, University of Chicago. Email: sharkey@chicagobooth.edu.

Acknowledgments: This research was supported by a National Science Foundation Fellowship and the Center for the Study of Social Organization at Princeton University. We thank Paul DiMaggio, Heather Haveman, Michael Jensen, Johan Chu, Elizabeth Pontikes, Chris Yenkey, seminar participants at Cornell, the Kauffman Foundation, Princeton, and the University of Michigan, and Deputy Editor Olav Sorenson for helpful comments and feedback.

Citation: Thébaud, Sarah and Amanda J. Sharkey. 2016. “Unequal Hard Times: The Influence of the Great Recession on Gender Bias in Entrepreneurial Financing.” Sociological Science 3: 1-31.
Received: June 12, 2015.
Accepted: August 21, 2015.
Editors: Olav Sorenson
DOI: 10.15195/v3.a1

Gender Differences in the Formation of a Field of Study Choice Set

By Jesper Sorensen on February 18, 2015 in Articles

Sigal Alon, Thomas A. DiPrete

Sociological Science, February 18, 2015
DOI 10.15195/v2.a5

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Women now surpass men in overall rates of college graduation in many industrialized countries, but sex segregation in fields of study persists. In a world where gender norms have changed but gender stereotypes remain strong, we argue that men’s and women’s attitudes and orientations toward fields of study in college are less constrained by gendered institutions than is the ranking of these fields. Accordingly, the sex segregation in the broader choice set of majors considered by college applicants may be lower than the sex segregation in their first preference field of study selection. With unique data on the broader set of fields considered by applicants to elite Israeli universities, we find support for this theory. The factors that drive the gender gap in the choice of field of study, in particular labor market earnings, risk aversion, and the sex composition of fields, are weaker in the broad set of choices than in the first choice. The result is less segregation in considered majors than in the first choice and, more broadly, different gender patterns in the decision process for the set of considered majors and for the first choice. We consider the theoretical implications of these results.

Sigal Alon: Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Tel Aviv University. Email: salon1@post.tau.ac.il

Thomas A. DiPrete: Department of Sociology, Columbia University. Email: tad61@columbia.edu

Citation: Alon, Sigal, and Thomas A. Diprete. 2015. “Gender Differences in the Formation of a Field Study Choice Set.” Sociological Science 2: 50-81.
Received: July 9, 2014
Accepted: September 16, 2014
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Kim Weeden
DOI: 10.15195/v2.a5

Job Mobility and the Great Recession: Wage Consequences by Gender and Parenthood

By Jesper Sorensen on May 2, 2014 in Articles

Youngjoo Cha

Sociological Science, May 2, 2014
DOI 10.15195/v1.a12

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This study examines how inter-organizational mobility affects earnings inequality based on gender and parenthood under different macroeconomic conditions. Fixed effects regression analysis of Survey of Income and Program Participation data from 2004 to 2012 shows that earnings growth after quitting jobs for work-related reasons (e.g., to improve one’s job situation) is greater for women than for men pre-recession, but the trend is driven by childless women, and mothers of children under six benefit the least among all groups of workers. However, this motherhood wage penalty disappears in the 2008 recession, as a result of the decline of wage returns to mobility for childless women. The analysis also shows that across economic conditions, the rate of layoffs or displacement is higher among men than women, but once laid off, women experience greater earnings losses than men. No motherhood penalty is found for this mobility type. These findings help us understand the longitudinal process by which the motherhood wage penalty is generated, and conditions under which a motherhood-based or gender-based wage gap becomes more pronounced.

Youngjoo Cha: Indiana University. E-mail: cha5@indiana.edu

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Citation: Cha, Youngjoo. 2014. “Job Mobility and the Great Recession: Wage Consequences by Gender and Parenthood.” Sociological Science 1: 159-177.
Received: October 31, 2013
Accepted: January 19, 2014
Editors: Jesper Sørensen, Olav Sorenson
DOI: 10.15195/v1.a12

Pathways to Science and Engineering Bachelor's Degrees for Men and Women

By Jesper Sorensen on February 14, 2014 in Articles

Joscha Legewie, Thomas A. DiPrete

Sociological Science, February 18, 2014
DOI 10.15195/v1.a4