An interesting bit of psychology on male & female bosses

[Loren Pechtel]

https://digest.bps.org.uk/2018/03/0...ame-classically-masculine-personality-traits/

Female bosses are personality-wise basically men.

Is it any wonder more men than women are qualified???

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

Peterson would actually say that its not a matter of the men being more qualified, but of them being more assertive. Solution seems to be to encourage assertiveness in women (and meek men), or to have more stringent promotion and pay raise structures that are based less of the squeeky wheels and more on the production levels.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Women are too agreeable?

Hmmm...

Or men are too disagreeable?

 

[thebeave]

Peterson would actually say that its not a matter of the men being more qualified, but of them being more assertive. Solution seems to be to encourage assertiveness in women (and meek men), or to have more stringent promotion and pay raise structures that are based less of the squeeky wheels and more on the production levels.

Not everybody will get this...

Show

 

[Jolly_Penguin]

HAHAHAHA Beave. That interview is a classic and everybody needs to see it.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Peterson would actually say that its not a matter of the men being more qualified, but of them being more assertive. Solution seems to be to encourage assertiveness in women (and meek men), or to have more stringent promotion and pay raise structures that are based less of the squeeky wheels and more on the production levels.

I am not a meek man at all. I am also very assertive.

I have only learned recently that assertiveness can be applied to one's own position when talking to male upper management. And I mean often and outside of performance evaluations. It's apparently a thing I can do but didn't know. Before this I was a very nose-to-the-grindstone person where my assertiveness was usually about quality issues.

When most upper management are males it's easier to have this rapport and discovery of what you can negotiate if you are one of the guys.

Or at least that's how it seems to me now as an established, successful person.

 

[untermensche]

There is no such thing as a male personality trait or male behavior.

There is only human behavior and human traits.

And all humans have so many behavior traits it is only by being very ignorant we can reduce them all to one thing.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Peterson would actually say that its not a matter of the men being more qualified, but of them being more assertive. Solution seems to be to encourage assertiveness in women (and meek men), or to have more stringent promotion and pay raise structures that are based less of the squeeky wheels and more on the production levels.

You're assuming the assertiveness isn't a benefit on the job.

 

[untermensche]

Peterson would actually say that its not a matter of the men being more qualified, but of them being more assertive. Solution seems to be to encourage assertiveness in women (and meek men), or to have more stringent promotion and pay raise structures that are based less of the squeeky wheels and more on the production levels.

You're assuming the assertiveness isn't a benefit on the job.

Dictators are very assertive.

It is a dictatorial system.

Of course assertiveness is rewarded.

But that is not a good thing for the rest of us.

 

[Emily Lake]

https://digest.bps.org.uk/2018/03/0...ame-classically-masculine-personality-traits/

Female bosses are personality-wise basically men.

Is it any wonder more men than women are qualified???

Seriously? You've got a bit of cart before your horse here.

"Traditional" personality traits are largely learned behaviors. There are a small handful that seem to be sex-linked genetic traits, but not very many. Instead, we have had many societies that have treated women as secondary to men in all aspects, and have built socially-defined gender roles around that divide. Men are strong and confident... a woman with the same behaviors will be viewed as domineering and arrogant. A man who is emotionally reserved is logical and thoughtful... a woman who is emotionally reserved is a heartless ice queen. A man who exercises for an hour every day and spends 30 minutes grooming each morning is disciplined and professional... a woman who does the same is vain and self-absorbed.

Here's the crux of the problem: leadership roles in business and politics require a person to be confident, assertive, and in control of their emotions. These are traits that we, as a society, have decided are male traits. And when a woman displays those exact same traits, they are viewed as negative behaviors from a woman. In a man they are positives, in a woman they are negatives. So if a man is seeking a leadership position, his behaviors are in accordance with the social expectation of both the role and his gender. If a woman is seeking a leadership position, her behaviors (which are needed for that leadership role) are in contradiction to the social expectation of her gender - and they act against her. Men don't like women who "act like men" and they get passed over for leadership positions as being uncooperative and unlikeable... but women who "act like women" aren't portraying the characteristics needed for leadership and get passed over as well. The small percentage of women who can manage to be both assertive and collaborative, confident and demure, emotionally controlled and ebullient - those are the few who have managed to attain leadership roles.

Just look at this last election. Irrespective of how much I personally disliked Clinton... how many comments were there on her pant-suits? How many disparaging swipes were taken at her for being unfeminine, for being masculine? And let's not even get into the whole calling her by her first name thing - women are consistently treated in an overly casual fashion in business and political encounters, where men are treated with a distanced respect. Women are more likely to be addressed by their first name only, where men are more likely to be referred to by their title, or at least their surname.

 

[Elixir]

https://digest.bps.org.uk/2018/03/0...ame-classically-masculine-personality-traits/

Female bosses are personality-wise basically men.

Is it any wonder more men than women are qualified???

Seriously? You've got a bit of cart before your horse here.

"Traditional" personality traits are largely learned behaviors. There are a small handful that seem to be sex-linked genetic traits, but not very many. Instead, we have had many societies that have treated women as secondary to men in all aspects, and have built socially-defined gender roles around that divide. Men are strong and confident... a woman with the same behaviors will be viewed as domineering and arrogant. A man who is emotionally reserved is logical and thoughtful... a woman who is emotionally reserved is a heartless ice queen. A man who exercises for an hour every day and spends 30 minutes grooming each morning is disciplined and professional... a woman who does the same is vain and self-absorbed.

Here's the crux of the problem: leadership roles in business and politics require a person to be confident, assertive, and in control of their emotions. These are traits that we, as a society, have decided are male traits. And when a woman displays those exact same traits, they are viewed as negative behaviors from a woman. In a man they are positives, in a woman they are negatives. So if a man is seeking a leadership position, his behaviors are in accordance with the social expectation of both the role and his gender. If a woman is seeking a leadership position, her behaviors (which are needed for that leadership role) are in contradiction to the social expectation of her gender - and they act against her. Men don't like women who "act like men" and they get passed over for leadership positions as being uncooperative and unlikeable... but women who "act like women" aren't portraying the characteristics needed for leadership and get passed over as well. The small percentage of women who can manage to be both assertive and collaborative, confident and demure, emotionally controlled and ebullient - those are the few who have managed to attain leadership roles.

Just look at this last election. Irrespective of how much I personally disliked Clinton... how many comments were there on her pant-suits? How many disparaging swipes were taken at her for being unfeminine, for being masculine? And let's not even get into the whole calling her by her first name thing - women are consistently treated in an overly casual fashion in business and political encounters, where men are treated with a distanced respect. Women are more likely to be addressed by their first name only, where men are more likely to be referred to by their title, or at least their surname.

Good post (but you have to admit that those pants suits were really bad).
All the factors you cite seem real to me, with the possible exception of the first name/last name thing (unless The Donald's last name really is Fuckface).
While the traits themselves may or may not be learned behavior, our visceral reactions to their display certainly are. But there is a reciprocal side that should favor women... I have encountered women in positions of power whose confident demeanor was not so ice-queenly as to spark revulsion or fear, but rather come across as logical and thoughtful. Such individuals cause me to irrationally accept them as authoritative - at least more than I would accept a male who demonstrated similar actual authority.
So to some extent, I lay it at the feet of actual logical and thoughtful females, to take it upon themselves to do the same work that a male has to do to create and maintain an aura of authority. It's another set of learned behaviors that can parlay what is often a disadvantage into a substantial advantage.
Ms Clinton, by any name, was terrible at that, though from all reports she was very good at it in one-on-one situations.

 

[barbos]

Studies on identical twins and adopted children have shown that personality traits are much more genetic than people think. As for sex differences then pretty much everything there is well, sex differences and nothing else.

 

[Trausti]

Humans are a sexually dimorphic species. That there are male and female behaviors should be of no surprise at all.

Sex differences in rhesus monkey toy preferences parallel those of children

We compared the interactions of 34 rhesus monkeys, living within a 135 monkey troop, with human wheeled toys and plush toys. Male monkeys, like boys, showed consistent and strong preferences for wheeled toys, while female monkeys, like girls, showed greater variability in preferences. Thus, the magnitude of preference for wheeled over plush toys differed significantly between males and females. The similarities to human findings demonstrate that such preferences can develop without explicit gendered socialization. We offer the hypothesis that toy preferences reflect hormonally influenced behavioral and cognitive biases which are sculpted by social processes into the sex differences seen in monkeys and humans.

 

[untermensche]

So the male monkeys that liked to play with plush toys are not somehow exhibiting male behavior?

And the female monkeys pushing carts are not displaying female behaviors?

A male behavior is any behavior a male may exhibit.

A female behavior is any behavior a female may exhibit.

In other words there is no difference between a male or female behavior.

Looking at the frequency these behaviors show up doesn't change this.

 

[RavenSky]

All the factors you cite seem real to me, with the possible exception of the first name/last name thing (unless The Donald's last name really is Fuckface).

I think the exception rather illustrates the rule Emily talks about. Most people currently calling Cadet Bone Spurs by his first name are doing so as a diminishment of him... not according him the social respect of using honorifics, surnames or acknowledging the office he took.

 

[Jon Osterman]

I think people are missing the issue here.

Firstly, we need to acknowledge that men and women tend to display different personality types. This is inevitable because they are biologically different with different hormones coursing through them. Testosterone, for example, tends to make one more aggressive and assertive. It is therefore natural that men excel in careers that require them to be assertive and/or aggressive, without much need for empathy or sociability, such as management of big companies. Similarly women tend to do better in careers that require empathy and sociability, while not needing assertiveness or aggression, such as a doctor, nurse or teacher.

I don't think there is anything wrong with this per se, other than we need to have non-discriminatory structures in place to allow assertive women and empathetic men to participate in the appropriate careers for their skills.

However, the real issue is that our society values the careers associated with masculinity (CEOs etc) over the careers associated with femininity (nursing, teaching, parenting etc). This is the real problem we should be trying to address. In my opinion, there is no more important job in our society than teaching the next generation, and it is appalling that our teachers are so poorly valued by our society as a whole. If we could somehow socially engineer our society to equally value important careers that are benefited by the more feminine traits, the gender pay gap would disappear and we would have a far more equitable society.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

To play devil's advocate a moment...

The sample size in this study was extremely small. 34 monkeys--so 17 male and 17 female?

The number of characteristics a toy may have numbers in the gazillions. Whether a toy has wheels or not is 1 of about a gazillion such characteristics. So if this characteristic is somehow related to sex differentiation (on average--because it's not a pure either/or thing), it doesn't say much about the majority of characteristics of toys. A large study of huge sample size and for different characteristics would be needed.

I will add that the study sort of implants the idea that wheeled toys are masculine. Are they really? I mean we live in different times than in the 80's when some of the groundwork was created for such notions. Most toys for boys are video games and card games (Yugio, Magic) and action figures these days while wheeled toys are a bit lagging and some toys for girls certainly include wheels like a mini shopping cart or some kind of cart for dolls.

However, I am in general agreement that testosterone or the lack thereof does have an impact on personality on average. I just think that is a completely different claim than one about toys or the magnitude of differentiation. Certainly testosterone is associated with aggression. Wheels is a bit of a different beast and not really sure that that discussion is needed in the thread.

 

[Toni]

Sounds to me as though the study shows more flexibility and a broader range of interests among females compared with males.

Affinity for an activity is not the same thing as a personality trait.

Assigning a behavior a gender is odd and perhaps a bit outdated. A long standing truism has been that what is called assertiveness in men is called being a bitch in women. To the extent that this is changing, it's all to the good.

That said, among my own children, I did notice a noticeable difference in preference of toys, although no clear hard lines. Boys enjoyed cuddly animals as well as girls.
Girls were as adept at playing with blocks, legos, etc. as were boys. Everyone rode bikes, daughter was most adventurous re: roller blading, everyone played the same number of sports except the one boy who refused to play sports because he didn't enjoy team activities. It would be hard to argue that my daughter was not the most assertive of her siblings. All enjoyed reading, creative arts, music, etc. Some are more introverted and others are more extroverted.

Among my female siblings, only one of us cared much about playing with dolls. This was the girl who was considered by everyone to be the least girl like and the most assertive and outgoing and certainly the one most interested in sports, fishing, mechanics, home repair, yard work, outdoor activities, etc. and at the same time was the most voracious reader. The one most stereotypically 'female' (minus doll playing) chose the most sterotypically male career. All chose careers in science during a time when this was not very typical for females.

Very small sample sizes and everyone shares close genetic makeup so perhaps not at all significant.

I am loathe to assign personality traits to a gender. I do think our perception of personality traits and behaviors is very sterotypically assigned and note that this is changing. For example, girls can now be interested in and good at sports without being considered to be dykes or even tom boys. Boys can enjoy cooking without being considered to be too 'girly.' None of my kids report hearing or believing that boys are better at math and science than girls are. They thought that was ridiculous to assume and not born out by their observations.

 

[Toni]

I think people are missing the issue here.

Firstly, we need to acknowledge that men and women tend to display different personality types.

No, we don't because it's not true.

This is inevitable because they are biologically different with different hormones coursing through them. Testosterone, for example, tends to make one more aggressive and assertive.

Aggression is behavior, not personality trait. Assertiveness is a skill that can be learned and developed.

Males also have estrogen; females have testosterone.

It is therefore natural that men excel in careers that require them to be assertive and/or aggressive, without much need for empathy or sociability, such as management of big companies. Similarly women tend to do better in careers that require empathy and sociability, while not needing assertiveness or aggression, such as a doctor, nurse or teacher.

Lol. This is just embracing stereotypes. I know you think you avoided that by including doctor as a female career but you didn't.

I don't think there is anything wrong with this per se, other than we need to have non-discriminatory structures in place to allow assertive women and empathetic men to participate in the appropriate careers for their skills.

Again, you are confusing skills with personality traits with behaviors, all through a lens of stereotypes.

However, you are (almost) correct. We need to have non-discriminatory structures in place to allow all people to make career choices that reflect their interests, talents and abilities.

However, the real issue is that our society values the careers associated with masculinity (CEOs etc) over the careers associated with femininity (nursing, teaching, parenting etc). This is the real problem we should be trying to address. In my opinion, there is no more important job in our society than teaching the next generation, and it is appalling that our teachers are so poorly valued by our society as a whole. If we could somehow socially engineer our society to equally value important careers that are benefited by the more feminine traits, the gender pay gap would disappear and we would have a far more equitable society.

I think that you are correct: it is a real problem that we tend to value careers associated with masculinity and maleness over those associated with femininity and femaleness. It's a two fold issue: one is that as a society we tend to value male over female. The other is that we tend to associate jobs and careers with male or female. Both need to be addressed.

 

[fast]

A male behavior is any behavior a male may exhibit.

Don't confuse a male's behavior with male behavior. If you do, you'll make deductive mistakes.