The effect of gender stereotypes on young girls' intuitive number sense

Perceptions of sexual assault perpetrators, victims, and event depend on system justification beliefs and perpetrator atonement

When accused of wrongdoing, a sexual assault perpetrator may express atonement, i.e., he may acknowledge harm done, take responsibility, and make amends. Anecdotal observations suggest that mainstream U.S. audiences respond favorably when high-status perpetrators express less atonement, such as telling stories that minimize harm, or place responsibility on the victim. However, empirically, little is known about how perpetrator status and atonement influence audience responses. Informed by system justification theory, this vignette-based experiment tested the hypothesis that the more audiences are psychologically invested in an unequal status quo (i.e., the greater their system justification beliefs), the more they will favor perpetrators (vs. victims), especially when high-status perpetrators atone less, and low-status perpetrators atone more. In a pre-registered 2(perpetrator status: low, high) x 3(perpetrator narrative atonement: low, medium, high) x continuous(participant system justification) between-subjects design, U.S. adults (N = 895) were randomly assigned to read 1 of 6 first-person stories by a white male who has been accused of sexual assault by a female acquaintance. Dependent measures included perceived severity of and relative responsibility for the assault, empathy toward perpetrator and victim, and ratings of their likeability and positive personality traits. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that, instead of the hypothesized interactive effects, there were consistent main effects of system justification and atonement across perpetrator status levels. The greater their system justification beliefs, the more participants favored perpetrators, the less severe they rated the assault, and the less they favored victims. Greater perpetrator atonement boosted favorability ratings for him and the victim. Conversely, less perpetrator atonement diminished his favorability ratings, but also made the assault appear less severe and less his (vs. the victim's) responsibility. Findings underscore the strong influences that perpetrator stories and psychological investment in an unequal status quo have on perceptions of sexual violence.

Understanding the social-emotional components of our "number sense": insights from a novel non-symbolic numerical comparison task

Introduction

A large body of work has identified a core sense of number supported by the Approximate Number System (ANS) that is present in infancy and across species. Although it is commonly assumed that the ANS directly processes perceptual input and is relatively independent from affective factors, some evidence points at a correlation between ANS performance and math anxiety. However, the evidence is mixed. We tested whether giving participants active control in completing a numerical task would change the relationship between math anxiety on performance.

Methods

Adult participants (N = 103) completed a novel four-alternative-forced-choice non-symbolic numerical comparison task. In a repeated-measures design, participants either passively viewed different dot arrays or actively chose to view each array (i.e., active information-seeking) before deciding on the largest quantity. Participants also provided confidence judgments during the passive version of the task.

Results

We replicated the ratio-dependent signature in participants' accuracy in both the passive and active versions of the task using this novel paradigm, as well as in trial-level confidence judgments and information-seeking behavior. Participants' self-reported math anxiety significantly correlated with their accuracy on the passive version of the task. Critically, the correlation disappeared in the active version of the task. Gender also emerged as a predictor of confidence judgments and a moderator of the effect of task on overall accuracy and the effect of active information seeking on accuracy in the active version of the task. Exploratory analysis of estimated Weber Fraction suggests that these results may be driven by auxiliary factors instead of changes in ANS acuity.

Conclusion

These findings have implications for understanding the relationship between math anxiety and performance on numerical tasks.

Gender Inclusion and Fit in STEM

Despite progress made toward increasing women's interest and involvement in science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM), women continue to be underrepresented and experience less equity and inclusion in some STEM fields. In this article, I review the psychological literature relevant to understanding and mitigating women's lower fit and inclusion in STEM. Person-level explanations concerning women's abilities, interests, and self-efficacy are insufficient for explaining these persistent gaps. Rather, women's relatively lower interest in male-dominated STEM careers such as computer science and engineering is likely to be constrained by gender stereotypes. These gender stereotypes erode women's ability to experience self-concept fit, goal fit, and/or social fit. Such effects occur independently of intentional interpersonal biases and discrimination, and yet they create systemic barriers to women's attraction to, integration in, and advancement in STEM. Dismantling these systemic barriers requires a multifaceted approach to changing organizational and educational cultures at the institutional, interpersonal, and individual level.