Gender Differences in Norm Adherence
Sarah Van Meter
Undergraduate Researcher
Neuroscience Major (College of Arts & Sciences)
Ed Hirt
Faculty Mentor
Ed Hirt (College of Arts & Sciences)
Project Description
We have been doing research over the last year on gender differences in response to two types of social norms: injunctive norms (what is the correct thing to do?) and descriptive norms (what do most people do in that situation?). Our studies have shown that while men and women both pay attention to descriptive norms, women adhere significantly more to injunctive norms than do men. We are currently exploring the mechanisms responsible for these effects, which include gender or cultural stereotypes (e.g., that women are more conscientious and/or more submissive to authority), reactance on the part of men (i.e., they rebel against being told what to do), or differences in power in the situation (i.e., men can get away with deviating from the norm more, given greater interpersonal power). The current project will examine these different mechanisms, and students will have input into the context for the study as well as the final design and measures.
Technology or Computational Component
The project will be conducted online, so that students will learn to program the study in Qualtrics and will learn about the use of online platforms such as Amazon Mechanical Turk or Prolific. Students will also learn how to clean and analyze data using both Excel and SPSS. Finally, students will learn to use graphing software to display and present their data following analysis.