SEX-ROLE ORIENTATION: PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPLICATIONS OF THE INTERACTION OF GENDER AND SEX-TYPING

The purpose of the study was to demonstrate the effects of sex-typing on psychological functioning by relating sex-role orientation to selected measures of instrumental and expressive behavior and by exposing subjects to a training experience designed to elicit sex-typed responses. One hundred and eleven college sophomores (male = 60, female = 51) were administered a measure of sex-role orientation, the Bem Sex Role Inventory, and by this measure classified into eight sex-role groups according to gender and sex-role orientation. They were also administered measures of instrumental and expressive behavior, the Fundamental Interpersonal Relations Orientation-Form Behavior (FIRO-B) and the College Self-Expression Scale (CSES), and a measure of personality functioning, the Eysenck Personality Inventory (EPI). Subjects were then divided into control and treatment groups, and the treatment group was exposed to three and one half hours of assertiveness training. Following training, treatment and control subjects were readministered the self-report measure of positive and negative assertiveness. It was hypothesized that sex-typing would predict patterns of response on the FIRO-B, CSES and EPI, and would predict differential response to the assertiveness training. More specifically, masculine sex-typing should be positively related to measures of instrumental behavior and negatively related to measures of expressive behavior, with the reverse pattern holding true for feminine sex-typed subjects. Androgynous and undifferentiated should not show this pattern of relationships between expressive and instrumental behavior. It was also hypothesized that sex-typed subjects would respond to brief assertiveness training by significantly increasing gender appropriate assertive responses and showing no such increase in gender inappropriate assertive responses. The results provided some limited support for these hypothesized effects of sex-typing. Data were consistent with the hypothesized directional relationships between sex-typing and expressive and instrumental measures. The assertiveness training did effect masculine sex-role groups in the predicted direction, but the expected effects on other sex-role groups were not demonstrated. Deficiencies in the experimental design required that these positive findings be viewed with caution