perspective, the confrontation came from the investigators responsible for the experts with authority and not individuals who were directly implicated by the purported gender bias. An evidence-based sexism confrontation may be less effective if performed by a lay person who was the actual target of the sexism. Also, although we led participants to believe that they exhibited gender bias so that they could be confronted, we actually found that male and female candidates with equivalent credentials were evaluated similarly (Experiment 1). The absence of actual gender bias may be explained in a variety of ways (e.g., the lab manager evaluation task had lower stakes and was less self-relevant among our lay participants than for the STEM faculty in Moss-Racusin et al.’s, 2015, research, so that gender bias may have been less likely to be activated and applied). Regardless, reactions to an evidence-based confrontation may differ when people have actually just exhibited sexism. One possibility is that confrontation becomes more impactful as the extent of actual gender bias increases and becomes more plainly evident to all. There may be a limit, however, as even an evidence-based confrontation may fall on indifferent ears when perpetrators engage in overt biases that they consciously sanction. Although we successfully identified an effective gender confrontation strategy, a variety of less encouraging caveats must be considered. opportunities for confronting people with concrete evidence that their treatment of women in particular situations (e.g., hiring) is more negative than their treatment of men are far from commonplace. In other words, the requisite conditions for instigating social change through evidenced-based confrontation will frequently be unmet. Perhaps greater applicability of evidence-based confrontation can be found in diversity training interventions. Researchers should direct efforts not only to documenting the existence of gender biases and disseminating their results, but also to designing effective experiential tasks
perspective, the confrontation came from the investigators responsible for the experts with authority and not individuals who were directly implicated by the purported gender bias. An evidence-based sexism confrontation may be less effective if performed by a lay person who was the actual target of the sexism. Also, although we led participants to believe that they exhibited gender bias so that they could be confronted, we actually found that male and female candidates with equivalent credentials were evaluated similarly (Experiment 1). The absence of actual gender bias may be explained in a variety of ways (e.g., the lab manager evaluation task had lower stakes and was less self-relevant among our lay participants than for the STEM faculty in Moss-Racusin et al.’s, 2015, research, so that gender bias may have been less likely to be activated and applied). Regardless, reactions to an evidence-based confrontation may differ when people have actually just exhibited sexism. One possibility is that confrontation becomes more impactful as the extent of actual gender bias increases and becomes more plainly evident to all. There may be a limit, however, as even an evidence-based confrontation may fall on indifferent ears when perpetrators engage in overt biases that they consciously sanction. Although we successfully identified an effective gender confrontation strategy, a variety of less encouraging caveats must be considered. opportunities for confronting people with concrete evidence that their treatment of women in particular situations (e.g., hiring) is more negative than their treatment of men are far from commonplace. In other words, the requisite conditions for instigating social change through evidenced-based confrontation will frequently be unmet. Perhaps greater applicability of evidence-based confrontation can be found in diversity training interventions. Researchers should direct efforts not only to documenting the existence of gender biases and disseminating their results, but also to designing effective experiential tasks
parker%2c-monteith%2c-moss-racusin%2c---van-camp-(in-press).docx