Gender and Leadership: Behavioral Differences Exhibited While Leading a Production Simulation

This research is an empirical examination of gender differences in leader behavior during a production simulation task. Four categories of leader behavior were investigated--overall leader activity; amount of input from leaders solicited by group members; behaviors used to motivate workers\u27 and demotivating behaviors exhibited by leaders. Participant data from a doctoral dissertation was reanalyzed to explore gender differences that had not been examined. Some limited evidence suggests that leader behavior is related to gender. However, no significant main effects were found for any behavioral measure. Limitations of the study may have contributed to the non-significant results and the argument is posed that more studies examaining actual leader behaviors should be undertaken