zimble Assignment.docx
- 1. Smiling Several meta-analyses indicate that females smile more than males (Hall et al., 2000; LaFrance & Hecht, 2000; LaFrance, Hecht, & Paluck, 2003). The effect size seems to be moderate, in the d = -.40 range. The sex difference appears to be largest among teenagers (LaFrance et al., 2003) and not consistent among children (Kolaric & Galambos, 1995). An interesting study of female and male yearbook pictures spanning kindergarten through college showed that the sex difference in smiling became significant by second grade, peaked in fourth grade, and persisted through college (Dodd, Russell, & Jenkins, 1999). These findings are cross-sectional, however, making it difficult to determine if the effect is due to age or to differences in smiling across the generations. When a portion of the students were followed over time, the same pattern of results appeared suggesting that the sex difference in smiling emerges over time. Not all smiles are alike, however. Researchers have distinguished between more genuine smiles (Duchenne smiles) and false smiles (non-Duchenne smiles), which can be observed by the movement of specific facial muscles. When college students role-played the position of job applicant, females engaged in more of both kinds of smiles than males (Woodzicka, 2008). Interestingly, females were aware of non-Duchenne smiles, but were not aware of Duchenne smiles. Women said that they engaged in non-Duchenne smiling to conceal negative emotions, to show enthusiasm, and to take up time so that they could come up with a verbal response to a question. There are several situational variables that influence the sex difference in smiling. First, the sex difference in smiling seems to be limited to social settings and is especially large when people know they are being observed (LaFrance et al., 2003). Second, there is crosscultural variation in the sex difference, with the largest sex difference appearing in Canada (d = -.59) and the smallest sex difference appearing in Britain (d = -.13; LaFrance et al., 2003). Finally, smiling seems to be more strongly correlated with personality variables associated with sex, such as sociability, nurturance, and femininity, rather than sex per se (Hall, 1998). Gazing
- 2. Gazing is a difficult nonverbal behavior to interpret. In general, gazing is thought to convey interest and attention; thus it is not surprising that sex differences in gazing have been found in the direction of women gazing M07_HELG0185_04_SE_C07.indd 236 6 more than men. Furthermore, sex differences in gazing (female more than male) are typically larger when the situation evaluated is a friendly one. Yet, in other situations, gazing can convey a different message, in particular, a message related to status. A high-status person, for example, may gaze intently at the person to whom she or he is speaking. To confuse matters even more, sex differences in gazing do not generalize to all other cultures. For example, in Japan, it appears women make less eye contact than men, especially during interactions with other women. Eye contact here may convey dominance. Interpersonal Sensitivity Interpersonal sensitivity (sometimes referred to as decoding) is defined as correctly interpreting and assessing others, including their nonverbal behavior and their emotions. Females seem to be more sensitive than males to nonverbal cues, meaning they can more accurately interpret the meaning of nonverbal behavior (Brody & Hall, 2008; Rosip & Hall, 2004). Females are better able to understand the meaning behind nonverbal cues such as facial expression, vocal intonation, and body position. This finding seems to generalize to people in other countries, such as Malaysia, Japan, Hungary, Mexico, New Zealand, Hong Kong, and Israel (Hall et al., 2000). A meta-analytic review of the literature showed that females are better than males at interpreting facial expressions at all age groups examined—infants, children, and adolescents (McClure, 2000). Furthermore, the sex of the target does not make a difference in decoding accuracy; that is, females are more accurate than males in decoding both women’s and men’s emotions. The female advantage is stronger for nonverbal facial behavior than for nonverbal body movements or auditory cues. Females are also more accurate in recalling information about other people, regardless of whether the information is female or male stereotypic (Hall & Mast, 2008). One exception to females’ ability to accurately interpret other’s feelings and behavior is
- 3. deception. Females are not more accurate than males at detecting deception unless language is involved, in which case women are better than men at detecting deception (Forrest & Feldman, 2000). If females’ decoding ability is related to their orientation toward relationships, it is not a surprise that females are not as good as males at detecting deception. Detecting deception would not necessarily foster relationship development, whereas accurately interpreting another’s emotions certainly would. Encoding The counterpart to understanding another’s emotions is the ability to convey one’s own emotions accurately. Encoding reflects the capacity to convey emotions without intentionally doing so. Because emotional expressiveness is central to the female gender role, it is not surprising that women are better at encoding than men (Hall et al., 2000). That is, others are better able to judge the emotions of a woman than of a man. Again, the difference is larger when judging facial expressions than vocal cues. It is not clear whether a sex difference in encoding occurs among children. Touching It is difficult to make a generalization about sex comparisons in touch because there are so many moderator variables, including the nature of the touch and the context in which it occurs. The sex composition of the dyad is a strong determinant of touch. In an observational study of touch across a variety of settings, women were significantly more likely than men to receive touching, and there was a trend for men to be more likely thanwomen to initiate touch (Major, Schmidlin, & Williams, 1990). Both of these findings are misleading, however, because touching was best understood by considering both the sex of the initiator and the sex of the recipient. As shown in Figure 7.5a, there was greater crosssex than same-sex touch. Within cross-sex dyads, males were more likely to touch females than females were to touch males. Males initiated more touch—but only toward females. Other contextual factors, such as age and relationship status, have been investigated in regard to touch. In contrast to interactions among adults, interactions among children show greater same-sex than cross-sex touch (see Figure 7.5b). Among children, it appeared that females were more likely to initiate touch, but this was due to the high proportion of touching in the female–female dyad
- 4. compared to the other three dyads. From preschool through high school, same-sex touch is more common than cross-sex touch— especially for females (Gallace & Spence, 2010). However, from college through adulthood, cross-sex touch is more common than same-sex touch. In cross-sex touch among adults, who initiates the touch may depend on age. In an observational study of touch among teenagers and adults, men initiated touch toward women among the younger group, but women initiated touch toward men among the older group (Hall & Veccia, 1990). In that study, age is confounded with relationship status, such that younger people have less developed relationships than older people. Thus, men may initiate touch among the younger people to indicate their control of a newly formed relationship. Women may initiate touch among the older people as an expression of the intimacy of the more developed relationship. An evolutionary explanation for this behavior is that men use touch to seduce a woman into a sexual relationship during the early stages, and women use touch to preserve the intimacy of the relationship during the later stages. One interesting arena in which to explore touch is sports. Here it is more acceptable for men to touch one another. When male baseball and female softball teams were observed over 20 games, there were no sex differences for the majority of the 32 kinds of same-sex touch coded (Kneidinger, Maple, & Tross, 2001). Among the sex differences that did appear, they were typically in the direction of females engaging in more touching. Specifically, females were more likely to engage in intimate forms of touch with one another, such as group embraces. The outcome of the event also influenced sex differences in touch. After a positive event, women and men were equally likely to touch. However, after a negative event, women were more likely than men to touch—probably reflective of women conveying greater sympathy for one another. Conduct your own observational study of touch in Do Gender 7.3 to see what variables influence touch. TAKE HOME POINTS ■ There are fairly robust sex differences in nonverbal behavior. ■ Women smile more, gaze more, are better able to express an emotion, and are better able to read another
- 5. person’s emotions. ■ The sex difference in touch depends on many factors, including the target of the touch, the age of the participant, and the relationship between the two people. One reason findings are so variable is that touch has many meanings; it can be used to indicate status or to express intimacy. LEADERSHIP AND INFLUENCEABILITY An important behavior that occurs in the context of social interactions is interpersonal influence. Recall that one reason children play with members of the same sex is that girls find it difficult to influence boys. Does this difficulty hold up among adults? Are men more influential than women, and thus more likely to become leaders? Who is susceptible to influence? First, I review who is influenced and then who is influential and likely to emerge as a leader in groups. I discuss the different leadership styles and how female and male leaders are perceived. Who Is Influenced? It turns out that dispositional characteristics do not predict who is easily influenced as well as situational characteristics. Women may be more easily influenced than men, but it is because they find themselves in different situations than those of men. People interact differently with women than with men, and the interaction style used with women leads to influence. This idea was shown in a now-classic dyadic interaction study conducted by Carli (1989). Men and women were placed in same-sex or mixed-sex dyads and asked to talk about an issue with which they disagreed. Participants’ opinions on lowering the drinking age and providing free day care for working parents were obtained prior to creating the dyads so that disagreement on the issue could be assured. The pair then discussed the topic for 10 minutes. One of the partners in each dyad was randomly assigned to try to persuade the partner to her or his point of view. The discussion was videotaped and later coded for number of task contributions (giving suggestions or opinions), agreements, disagreements, questions, negative social behaviors (showing negative affect), and positive social behaviors (showing positive affect; see Table 7.3 for examples of codes). After the discussion, each member of the dyad indicated privately what his or her opinion was on the topic. The change in opinion from before to after the discussion was the measure of influence. Neither task behavior nor positive social behavior was related to attitude change.
- 6. Disagreement was related to less attitude change, or less influence. The only interaction style associated with greater influence was agreement. People who interacted with a partner who expressed at least some agreement were more likely to change their attitudes in the direction of the partner than people who interacted with a partner who expressed complete disagreement. At first glance, this may seem counterintuitive—agreement leads to more influence and disagreement leads to less influence? We are more receptive to the ideas of someone who finds a way to agree with us; disagreement puts us on the defensive. Our intuition is to disagree with someone to try to change the person’s mind. When people were randomly assigned to the condition in which they had to persuade their partners, they used more disagreement, less agreement, and more task behavior—but only with males, not with females. Unfortunately, this is exactly opposite of the kind of behavior that is persuasive. Thus, it is not surprising that women and men were more successful in persuading females than males; women and men were more likely to agree with femalesThus women are not more easily influenced than men due to some fundamental female trait, but due to the fact that people feel more comfortable in interactions with women and thus display more agreeable behavior. Women are more easily influenced than men because of the way people behave toward women and men. People use ineffective influence strategies with men (e.g., disagreement) but express agreement with women, and agreement leads to influence. Figure 7.6 illustrates the process by which women come to be more easily influenced than men. Who Emerges as the Leader? Male and female students view leadership roles in organizations as equally desirable, but women perceive that they are less likely to attain these positions compared to men (Killeen, Lopez-Zafra, & Eagly, 2006). A meta-analysis of group interaction studies evaluated who emerged as the leader in the group (Eagly & Karau, 1991). Leadership was measured by both objective indicators of group participation as well as respondents’ reports of who appeared to be the group leader. Across laboratory and field studies and across both measures of leadership, men were more likely than women to emerge as leaders. Men contributed more to the group and were more likely to be perceived and chosen as leaders.
- 7. The nature of the leadership role influenced who emerged as a leader. Men were especially likely to emerge as leaders when task leadership was needed (d = +.41). When the nature of the task was not specified, men also were more likely to emerge as leaders, but the effect was smaller (d = +.29). When social leadership was necessary, there was a small effect for women to be more likely to emerge as leaders (d = -.18). The meta-analytic review also showed that the length of the interaction influenced who emerged as a leader (Eagly & Karau, 1991). Males were more likely to emerge as leaders when the group interaction lasted less than 20 minutes (d = +.58), but there was no sex difference if the group lasted longer than one session (d = +.09). One reason that men are presumed to be leaders is that being male is associated with dominance, a trait also characteristic of a leader. In an older study, in which the personality trait of dominance was measured, males were chosen to be the leader over females, regardless of who was the dominant personality (Nyquist & Spence, 1986). However, when the study was replicated several years later and people were given an opportunity to interact with one another so that the personality trait of dominance could be revealed, the high-dominant person was chosen to be leader regardless of sex (Davis & Gilbert, 1989). Again, these studies show we are more likely to rely ongender-role stereotypes or category-based expectancies in the absence of other information about people. But once we obtain more information, we are likely to use that information when deciding how to behave