Examination of residency program websites for the use of gendered language and imagery

BACKGROUND

Significant disparity in gender distribution exists among medical specialties. Residency program websites are a main source of preliminary program information for candidates, and website content may influence a prospective applicant's sense of belongingness within a particular program. Given the importance of the residency program website as a recruiting tool, this study sought to examine and compare the presence of gendered language and imagery on residency program websites across various specialties.

METHODS

A list of words considered masculine or feminine was used to evaluate residency program websites of the two most male-dominated specialties (orthopedic and thoracic surgery), female-dominated specialties (pediatrics and obstetrics and gynecology), and gender-balanced specialties (dermatology and family medicine) in the United States in 2022. Forty-five residency programs were randomly selected from each specialty across different regions of the US, with the exception of thoracic surgery of which there are only 33 programs. Masculine and feminine words were evaluated using a parsing and scraping program. Representation of female and male-presenting team members in photos on program websites was also evaluated.

RESULTS

Masculine wording occurred more frequently in male-dominated specialties compared to gender-balanced (p = 0.0030), but not female-dominated specialties (p = 0.2199). Feminine language was used more frequently in female-dominated compared to male dominated fields (p = 0.0022), but not gender balanced (p = 0.0909). The ratio of masculine-to-feminine words used was significantly higher in male-dominated specialties compared to both gender-balanced (p < 0.0001) and female-dominated specialties. (p < 0.0001). There was an average of 1, 7, and 10 female-presenting residency team members pictured on each male-dominated, gender balanced, and female-dominated specialty RPW respectively, with significantly more female-presenting team members pictured in the photographs on female-dominated specialty websites when compared to male-dominated and gender-balanced specialty websites (p < 0.0001, p = 0.014).

CONCLUSIONS

The use of gendered language and female representation in photographs varies significantly across specialties and is directly correlated with gender representation within the specialty. Given that students' perceptions of specialty programs may be affected by the use of language and photos on residency program websites, programs should carefully consider the language and pictures depicted on their program websites.

Do Men Apply Differently Than Women? An Analysis of Language in Standardized Application Documents

Based on previous research about gender differences we investigated whether varying language utilization across gender can be found in standardized text documents such as job applications. To this end, 581 cover letters, CVs and complete application documents were analyzed using linguistic inquiry and word count. Some language differences between men and women could be shown, even if as expected, there were smaller effects than in comparative studies in less formalized contexts. These differences were specific for cover letters and CVs. A differentiated examination showed that gender differences in the cover letters were largely determined by function words. In contrast, differences in the CVs were mainly due to differences in content words. The findings add the context of recruiting to lend support to the framework of gender differences in language across different contexts. Implications for candidates, recruiters and companies are discussed.

The Psychology of Communication: The Interplay Between Language and Culture Through Time

Human behavior is often guided by the development and use of language as a means of communication and as a way to represent thoughts and knowledge. Notions of linguistic relativity and the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis indicate that language plays a role in structuring the worldview and perceptions of individuals. The current work will explore how those perceptions are not only guided by language but are also moderated by culture and the beliefs, mores, and ideas that are sanctioned and regulated by a given cultural group. Papers, chapters, and books that have demonstrated the ways in which culture moderates behavior by way of the language that is used to express that culture will be of primary focus. Moreover, a developmental view of language learning will frame this approach in learning how language, culture, and thought have been examined and assessed as a way of describing how, together, they moderate human behavior. Is there truly evidence of linguistic relativity? Does language serve as the primary moderator of thought, or do cultural influences play a more pressing role in cognitive thought processes for a given group? Developments in theory, methods, and data that help explore these concepts through their publication in the Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology as well as other outlets will be presented and discussed as a framework that can be developed to generate future research questions, testing paradigms, and experimental approaches—both basic and applied.

Social Perception of Non-Binary Individuals

People can express their identity in different ways, one of which is through language. Non-binary individuals often speak in a gender-neutral way and use specific language forms. Language use not only reveals their identity but also can shape how others perceive them. The present study's purpose was to analyze how non-binary people are perceived through the language they use. The research was conducted in Polish, a language that is especially challenging for non-binary individuals because it has many gender markers. To avoid using gendered forms, they often use a specific form of passive voice. In an experiment, participants (N = 130, 102 women, 28 men) read a gendered (feminine or masculine) text and a gender-neutral text with passive voice. Most gave a masculine name to the person in the neutral text, but addressed them in a gender-neutral way when asked to react to them in presented scenarios. The gender-neutral text was evaluated as being less comprehensible than the gendered texts, and the non-binary person was rated less competent and colder than a man or a woman and was less socially accepted. Furthermore, the negative evaluation of non-binary people seemed to be attributable to unfamiliarity with gender-neutral language and its lower comprehensibility. More research is needed to understand these perceptions better and to be able to prevent their potential negative consequences.

Four Dimensions of Criticism Against Gender-Fair Language

The gender-neutral third-person pronoun singular hen was recently introduced in Swedish as a complement to she (hon) and he (han). The initiative to add hen initially received strong criticism. In the present study, we analyzed 208 arguments from 168 participants with critical attitudes toward hen. We used Blaubergs’ (1980) and Parks and Roberton’s (1998) taxonomies of critical arguments against past gender-fair language reforms in English in the 1970s and 1990s as a basis for coding the arguments. A majority of arguments (80.7%) could be coded into existing categories, indicating that criticisms of gender-fair language initiatives are similar across different times and cultural contexts. Two categories of arguments did not fit existing categories (19.3%): gender-neutral pronouns are distracting in communication and gender information is important in communication. Furthermore, we established four overarching dimensions that capture assumptions and beliefs underlying gender-fair language criticism: (a) Defending the Linguistic Status Quo (39.4%), (b) Sexism and Cisgenderism (27.4%), (c) Diminishing the Issue and Its Proponents (26.9%), and (d) Distractor In Communication (6.3%). These dimensions of criticisms should be considered and addressed in different ways when implementing gender-fair language.

Kick-Starting Female Careers

Abstract. Entrepreneurship programs often aim at increasing women’s lower entrepreneurial activities. We investigate how advertisements for entrepreneurship programs can be designed to increase women’s application intentions. Results of an experiment with 156 women showed that women indicate (1) lower self-ascribed fit to and interest in the program after viewing a male-typed image (compared to a gender-neutral or female-typed image) in the advertisement; and (2) lower self-ascribed fit to and interest in the program as well as lower application intentions if the German masculine linguistic form of the term “entrepreneur” (compared to the gender-fair word pair “female and male entrepreneur”) is used in the recruitment advertisement. Women’s reactions are most negative when both a male-typed image and the masculine linguistic form appear in the advertisement. Self-ascribed fit and program interest mediate the relationship of advertisement characteristics on application intentions.

Is Man the Measure of All Things? A Social Cognitive Account of Androcentrism

Androcentrism refers to the propensity to center society around men and men's needs, priorities, and values and to relegate women to the periphery. Androcentrism also positions men as the gender-neutral standard while marking women as gender-specific. Examples of androcentrism include the use of male terms (e.g., he), images, and research participants to represent everyone. Androcentrism has been shown to have serious consequences. For example, women's health has been adversely affected by over-generalized medical research based solely on male participants. Nonetheless, relatively little is known about androcentrism's proximate psychological causes. In the present review, we propose a social cognitive perspective arguing that both social power and categorization processes are integral to understanding androcentrism. We present and evaluate three possible pathways to androcentrism deriving from (a) men being more frequently instantiated than women, (b) masculinity being more "ideal" than femininity, and/or (c) masculinity being more common than femininity.