Binary Gender Beliefs: Effects at Individual, Group, and Country Levels

Binary Gender Beliefs: Effects at Individual, Group, and Country Levels
Jennifer K. Bosson, Ph.D.
The University of South Florida, Tampa, USA

Although men as a group universally hold more power and status than women, this higher social status comes with a cost: Across cultures, membership in the male gender group is more heavily policed and more easily revoked than is membership in the female gender group, a phenomenon referred to as precarious manhood. The precarity of their gender role exerts pressure on men to continually prove and re-prove their masculine competence, often in ways involving risk-taking, externalizing behavior, and other maladaptive tendencies. I have spent the past 25 years documenting and examining precarious manhood and its consequences for men, women, and gender diverse people at the individual, group, and country levels. At the individual and group levels, men respond to threats to their own masculine competence (individual level) and to men’s high status (group level) with negative affect and compensatory reactions meant to restore masculine standing. At the country level, in countries higher in precarious manhood beliefs, we find evidence of more negative health consequences for men, more violence against women, and more harms toward members of the LGBTQIA+ community. This talk provides a broad overview of my collaborative research on binary gender beliefs and precarious manhood over the past quarter century. I first provide some context that frames my life-long interest in gender, and I then summarize empirical findings linking precarious manhood beliefs to social and physical outcomes including aggression, risk-taking, sexism and gender bias, sexual prejudice, competitive mindsets, workplace dynamics, violence, physical health, and longevity.