Reviewer for Psy125 Midterms PDF

REVIEWER FOR PSY125 MIDTERMS prepared by YDN YDN CHAPTER 4 Belle (1985) suggests that we tend to focus on differences when we are confronted with two...

REVIEWER FOR PSY125 MIDTERMS prepared by YDN YDN CHAPTER 4 Belle (1985) suggests that we tend to focus on differences when we are confronted with two of anything. Why does it seem that women and men are so different? 1. differences are more salient and more provocative than similarities. 2. we have stereotypes about men’s and women’s behavior that are quite strong and quite distinct a. confirmatory hypothesis testing - We often recall information that confirms our stereotypes and disregard information that disconfirms our stereotypes. Remember that a sex difference does not imply all women differ from all men, which may explain why you will have some personal experiences that do not fit with the research literature. Maccoby and Jacklin, who published the first comprehensive review—PSYCHOLOGY OF SEX DIFFERENCES—of sex differences in 1974. entailed a comprehensive review of the ways men and women differ psychologically. They examined intellectual or cognitive domains as well as social abilities. They identified sex differences in only four domains: a. verbal ability (advantage girls), b. visual-spatial ability (advantage boys), c. mathematical ability (advantage boys), and. d. aggression (greater in boys). Adolescence is sometimes referred to as a time of gender intensification, a time when girls and boys are concerned with adhering to gender roles. Thus, sex differences that arise as a result of socialization pressures might not appear until adolescence. Meta-analysis is a statistical tool that quantifies the results of a group of studies. Size of the difference, or the effect size. The effect size, often calculated in terms of the “d statistic,” is calculated by taking the difference between the means [M] of the two groups (in this case, women and men) and dividing this difference by the variability in the scores of the members of these two groups (i.e., the standard deviation [SD]). As the size of the sample increases, the estimate of the mean becomes more reliable because the variability around the mean (the standard deviation) becomes smaller. A small difference between the means of two large groups will result in a larger effect size than a small difference between the means of two small groups. The rule of thumb used to interpret the d statistic is that.2 is a small effect,.5 is a medium effect, and.8 is a large effect Bringing the issue closer to home, Martell, Lane, and Emrich (1996) used computer simulations YDN to examine the implications of a small amount of sex discrimination on promotions within an organization. Using meta-analysis rather than narrative reviews to understand an area of research has several advantages: 1. meta-analysis takes into consideration the size of the effects; 2. researchers can examine how other variables influence, or moderate, the size of the effect. a. A moderating variable is one that alters the relation between the independent variable and the dependent variable. b. Age, author sex, and year of publication are frequently tested as moderator variables in the following meta-analyses. File- drawer problem - studies failing to detect a difference is less likely to be published. In her “Gender Similarities Hypothesis” paper, Janet Hyde showed across 46 meta-analyses that most differences are small to zero. Sex Comparisons in Cognitive Abilities 1. Spatial Ability - involve the ability to think about and reason using mental pictures rather than words. a. Of the three spatial abilities discussed, the sex difference in mental rotation is the largest and most stable over time, causing it to receive a great deal of attention from researchers. b. One spatial domain in which women appear to have greater aptitude than men is object location memory c. One conclusion is that men are better at manipulating objects in space, and women are better at locating objects. One conclusion is that men are better at manipulating objects in space, and women are better at locating objects. 2. Mathematical Ability a. This study identified a country-level moderator variable—gender equality. Countries in which women had fewer educational and economic opportunities compared to men were associated with larger sex differences in math in favor of males. b. Thus, there is some evidence that experience might alter attitudes toward math. c. Sex differences in math ability appear among highly select samples, in favor of males. d. Despite equal performance, girls have more negative attitudes toward math than boys, and both boys and girls label math as a masculine field 3. Verbal Ability a. On average, girls talk earlier than boys and develop larger vocabularies and better grammar than boys. There is some evidence that girls more easily adopt a second  language compared to boys, and this difference is apparent among children and YDN adults b. Thus, the majority of girls and boys have similar reading ability, but there is a preponderance of girls who have very high reading ability and a preponderance of boys with reading difficulties c. There is a small sex difference in verbal ability, favoring females, but the difference is decreasing with time. d. The size of the sex difference depends on the specific verbal ability; the sex difference is large in the case of writing and moderate in the case of reading. e. One reason for the sex difference in verbal ability has to do with the fact that a larger proportion of males than females have verbal difficulties Sex Comparisons in Social Domains Cognitive abilities are assessed by standardized tests and measures 1. Empathy - involves feeling the same emotion as another person or feeling sympathy or compassion for another person a. Cognitive Empathy - perspective-taking b. Emotional Empathy - shared feeling empathic accuracy - ability to infer another person’s thoughts or feelings 2. Helping Behavior a. Males were more likely than females to help in situations of danger b. social dilemma is a conflict in which one’s self-interest is pitted against the interest of others c. Thus, women and men are more likely to help in situations congruent with their gender roles. d. Women’s help is communal (caring for an individual). e. men’s help is agentic (heroic helping and helping in situations of danger). 3. Aggression a. Sex of Perpetrator Crime statistics clearly show that males are more likely than females to be perpetrators of violence. Nearly nine times as many homicides are committed by men compared to women b. Provocation - may release women from the constraints the female gender role places on aggressive behavior c. emotional arousal generated by the situation. Because males may be more easily aroused than females and less able to regulate their emotions d. men are more impulsive than women and less able to delay gratification than women Sex of Victim ✓ Men are more likely than women to report being victims of physical aggression ✓ The sex of the perpetrator and the sex of the victim are interrelated. The most frequent physical aggression occurs in the context of male dyads and male group  ✓ men who subscribe to male gender-role norms are more aggressive to women who violate YDN the female gender role than women who do not Sexuality ✓ studies say sexual behavior being greater in men than women ✓ The one exception was the frequency of same-sex sexual behavior, which was small but in the direction of females more than males ✓ sex difference in extramarital sex experiences was larger, in the direction of men ✓ The meta-analysis showed that women report more favorable attitudes than men toward gay men ✓ erotic plasticity, the extent to which one’s sex drive is influenced by social and cultural factors. General Personality Attributes ✓ sex differences in personality were small but consistent in the direction of men being more assertive, women being more submissive, women being more nurturant, and women having more negative affect ✓ suggested that traditional cultures may link sex differences in behavior to “roles” rather than “traits.” That is, in traditional cultures, men and women are viewed as behaving differently due to their distinct social roles; no personality traits are inferred from behavior. Indeed, other research has shown that Western cultures are more likely than other cultures to link behavior to traits, a bias referred to as the fundamental attribution error Take Home Points Kohlberg’s (1981) theory of moral development was criticized for excluding women during its creation; the concern was that women emerged as morally inferior to men. The controversy sparked the concept of two different views of morality, one emphasizing individual rights (justice) and the other emphasizing responsibility to others (care). The former was said to characterize men, and the latter was said to characterize women. However, research has shown that it is not so much that men and women view morality differently as that men and women face different kinds of moral dilemmas. Men seem to face moral dilemmas that focus on justice, and women seem to face moral dilemmas that focus on relationships. A more recent distinction between a deontological and utilitarian view of morality has shown that women are more deontologic than men, suggesting women have stronger affective responses to moral dilemmas compared to men. Women are more religious than men, which may explain why women have more conservative attitudes toward some social issues (e.g., extramarital affairs) and are more concerned with social issues involving compassion and social justice (e.g., racial discrimination, death penalty). Take Home Points YDN According to Erikson’s theory of social development, identity achievement precedes intimacy achievement. The theory was criticized as applying to men more than women because women may achieve their identity in part by establishing intimacy. More recent research suggests that identity and intimacy are more intertwined for females than males. meta-synthesis - averaged across an even larger number of effect sizes CHAPTER 5 The answer is not either nature (e.g., genes) or nurture (e.g., socialization) but a combination of the two. BIOLOGY biological theories of sex differences identify genes and hormones as the causes of observed differences GENES Modern genetics research focuses on the interaction between genes and the environment Gene expression is said to be developmental because it often depends on the environment and unfolds over time Epigenetics is the study of how the environment influences when genes are expressed, and it is critical to the study of gender because a key environmental factor is hormonal fluctuation monozygotic twins (also known as identical twins) to dizygotic twins (fraternal twins) The theory behind these twin studies is that genes explain the greater similarity in behavior between identical twins compared to fraternal twins because the environment for both sets of twins is the same, but the genes differ. Aggression is one social behavior for which there are clear-cut sex differences, and some of this difference has been attributed to biology Turner syndrome is a genetic condition in which girls are missing all or part of the second X chromosome Genes also have been implicated in sex differences in cognitive abilities—in particular spatial ability HORMONES two classes of sex-related hormones: estrogens and androgens female sex hormones are estrogens male sex hormones are androgens  women and men have both kinds of hormones but in varying amounts YDN One avenue of research that has enabled us to study the influence of hormones on behavior is the study of intersex conditions Intersex conditions are ones in which there is some inconsistency between the individual’s chromosomal sex and phenotypical sex congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH), a genetic disorder resulting from a malfunction in the adrenal gland that results in prenatal exposure to high levels of male hormones and a lack of cortisol lateralization CAIS - people who are genetically male (XY chromosome) but have an insensitivity to androgens. These individuals have what is known as complete androgen insensitivity syndrome (CAIS) and are born with testes instead of a uterus but have female genitalia synthetic estrogen, diethylstilbestrol (DES), prescribed for pregnant women in the 1960s to prevent miscarriage BRAIN Spatial abilities are located in the right hemisphere, and verbal abilities are located in the left hemisphere. 1990s being labeled the “decade of the brain” PSYCHOBIOSOCIAL MODELS Halpern and colleagues propose an alternative theory to the traditional nature versus nurture model of sex differences—the psychobiosocial model. They argue that nature and nurture are not two mutually exclusive categories but rather categories that interact with one another TAKE HOME POINTS: Twin and adoption studies conclude that genes play a role in sex differences in cognition and social behavior as well as gender-related behavior and identity The major problem with most studies of the relations of hormones to behavior is that they are correlational; thus, cause and effect cannot be established. Psychobiosocial models provide a richer framework within which to consider biological and social contributions to gender. EVOLUTIONARY THEORY AND SOCIOBIOLOGY EVOLUTIONARY THEORY applies the principles of evolution to the study of cognition and behavior extension of Darwin’s theory of evolution: o which states that we behave in ways to ensure the survival of our genes ET states that different behaviors may have evolved in women and men because the differences were adaptive for survival  ET states that women and men will differ in domains for which they have historically YDN faced different adaptive challenges and will be similar in domains for which they have historically faced similar adaptive challenges SEXUAL BEHAVIOR Cultural factors can override the influence of evolutionary theory on sexual behavior. The evolutionary view of sex differences in sexual behavior assumes that sexual intercourse will lead—or is intended to lead—to reproduction. With the introduction of effective contraceptives, sexual behavior does not always lead to reproduction, nor is it intended to. AGGRESSION Women, but not men, are at greatest risk for being murdered when they try to end the relationship the primary motive men have for killing their spouses is sexual jealous FINAL NOTE The concern was that evolutionary theory would be used to justify the unequal treatment of women and men researchers are recognizing that evolutionary theory is not deterministic but interactionistic Evolutionary theory does not view behavior as fixed but as flexible and changeable depending on environmental circumstances One limitation of evolutionary theory is the inability to explain behaviors that do not maximize reproductive success second limitation is that evolutionary theory does not account for individual differences or cultural differences in behavior. PSYCHOANALYTIC THEORY SIGMUND FREUD - was a physician and a psychoanalyst who developed a theory of personality, most notable for its emphasis on the unconscious: o stage 3, the phallic stage, develops between 3 and 6 years of age. It is during this stage of development that boys and girls discover their genitals and become aware that only boys have a penis. o castration anxiety o Oedipal complex o Girls experience penis envy o a link between pain and pleasure in women, or masochism o Females handle their conflict, known as the Electra complex, by identifying with their mothers and focusing their energies on making themselves sexually attractive to men Karen Horney (1926, 1973), a feminist psychoanalyst and physician  more modern version of psychoanalytic theory, referred to as object-relations theory, was YDN applied to the acquisition of gender roles by Nancy Chodorow (1978) in her book The Reproduction of Mothering. o emphasizes the importance of early relationships in establishing gender identity SOCIAL LEARNING THEORY most basic social environment states that we learn behavior in two ways. First, we learn behavior that is modeled; second, we learn behavior that is reinforced. OBSERVATIONAL LEARNING OR MODELING Modeling, or observational learning, is “the tendency for a person to reproduce the actions, attitudes, and emotional responses exhibited by real-life or symbolic models” One sex-related behavior that has been examined extensively in terms of social learning theory is aggression The application of social learning theory to gender suggests that as the norms change and the role models of a culture (e.g., in the media) change, the way boys and girls behave also will change REINFORCEMENT Reinforcement theory no doubt sparks images of Pavlov’s dogs salivating at the bell, the cue that signifies a reward is coming TAKE HOME POINTS: Social learning theory states that we acquire gender-related behavior through modeling and reinforcement. We are more likely to imitate same-sex models, especially when they display gender- congruent behavior, models who are reinforced for their behavior, and models we like. Society is filled with models of male aggression—in movies, on television, and in video games—who are reinforced for their behavior. Boys are more likely to be rewarded by parents, teachers, and peers for aggression. Girls and boys are rewarded for gender-congruent behavior. Boys are more likely than girls to be punished for gender-incongruent behavior, further supporting the rigidity of the male compared to the female role. GENDER-ROLE SOCIALIZATION gender-role socialization, different people and objects in a child’s environment provide rewards and models that shape behavior to fit gender-role norms Agents in the environment encourage women to be communal and men to be agentic, to take on the female and male gender roles “boy code” when describing the pressure boys face to keep their emotions to themselves and maintain an emotional distance from others  The masculine mystique consists of toughness, dominance, emotional detachment, YDN callousness toward women, eagerness to seek out danger, and competition INFLUENCE OF PARENTS I. DIFFERENTIAL TREATMENT OF BOYS AND GIRLS o Parents are prime candidates for contributing to gender-role socialization o Today, there is evidence that parents continue to encourage sex-typed toys, although parents may deny it II. EMOTION o One area in which parents may influence their children is in how they communicate emotion o parents’ emotion language is gendered, meaning that the language is either linked to the parent sex or the child se o parents encourage boys to suppress their emotions o normative male alexithymia, which means that boys are unaware of their emotions o parents are teaching children that the expression and examination of emotion is more acceptable in females INFLUENCE OF OTHER PEOPLE Recall that we are more likely to stereotype people we do not know very well Judith Harris (1998), who concluded that parents have largely no effect on the development of a child’s personality o Harris argues that the source of influence on children comes from outside the home, in particular, from the peer group o Harris’s theory is called group socialization and emphasizes the child’s experience outside the home o According to her theory, children learn behavior inside the home but then test it on others outside the home to see if it is going to be accepted or rejected. homophily amplification hypothesis, or the idea that interactions with similar others make one more similar to those others. Boys may experience more pressure from peers than girls to conform to gender roles. OTHER FEATURES OF THE ENVIRONMENT 1. TOYS o Exposure to certain classes of toys may foster skills that could advantage one sex over the other 2. BOOKS o Books that children read also may model and encourage gender-role-appropriate behavior o Historically, one problem with children’s books is that females were not represented to the extent that males were  o I am Jazz, a book about a transgender girl authored by a transgender teen Jazz YDN Jennings, and Some Assembly Required, a book about the author’s, Arin Andrews, own experience with becoming a transgender person. o heterosexual script reflects three themes: ▪ (1) sexual double standards (i.e., it is okay for men but not women to have sex), ▪ (2) courtship behavior (men initiate, women respond), and ▪ (3) commitment (men avoid, women seek) o HS was depicted by boys objectifying girls, boys valuing girls for their appearance, and girls objectifying themselves 3. ADVERTISEMENTS o Advertisements continue to market products differentially to men and wom o One way in which women are portrayed in advertisements that has not changed is that women continue to be depicted as sex objects SOCIAL ROLE THEORY According to social role theory, differences in women’s and men’s behavior are a function of the different roles women and men hold in our society social role theory focuses on society and how societal role structures shape behavior across groups of people the way labor is divided between women and men in society accounts for why women become communal and men become agentic Communal and agentic roles are “diffuse” social roles, meaning that they refer to categories of social roles rather than specific one Eagly and Wood (2013) more recently expanded their social role theory to include evolutionary principles. In their “biosocial constructionist theory,” they argue that cultural processes interact with evolutionary forces COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT THEORY cognitive development theory states that the acquisition of gender roles takes place in the child’s head Learning occurs because the child cognitively organizes what she or he sees; learning does not occur from reinforcement or from conditioning Cognitive development theory suggests there are a series of stages of development that eventually lead to the acquisition of gender roles. First, children develop a gender identity o The evaluative consequence is a preference for the group to which one belongs o The motivational consequence is to learn about one’s own category and identify ways in which the two categories differ Children learn gender constancy by age 5. That is, they can categorize themselves as female or male and realize they cannot change their category “pink frilly dress phenomenon” in which some preschool and kindergarten girls became captivated by pink dresses and refuse to wear pants regardless of weather and occasion.  One limitation of Kohlberg’s theory is that he states gender constancy must be achieved YDN before children will value and seek out behavior that fits their gender role Bussey and Bandura (1999) have advanced the notion of social cognitive theory, which states that cognitive development is one factor in gender-role acquisition, but there are social influences as well, such as parents and peers According to social cognitive theory, external sources have the initial influence on behavior. “Gender Self-Socialization Model” was offered as a variant of cognitive development theory that emphasized the individual perspective of each child rather than a uniform societal perspective GENDER SCHEMA THEORY schema is a construct that contains information about the features of a category as well as its associations with other categories gender schema includes your knowledge of what being female and male means and what behaviors, cognitions, and emotions are associated with these categories. gender schematic? Someone who is gender schematic uses the gender category to make decisions about what to wear, how to behave, what career to pursue, what leisure interests to pursue, and what emotions to present to others Someone who is gender aschematic does not consider gender when making these decisions Gender schema theory is a theory about the process by which we acquire gender roles; it is not a theory that describes the content of those roles. o simply states that we divide the world into masculine and feminine categories. Androgyny - that the androgynous individual has both feminine and masculine attributes DEAUX AND MAJOR’S MODEL Deaux and Major (1987) focused on the conditions that create the display of gender- related behavior o they emphasized the proximal, or more immediate, causes of whether a sex difference is observed rather than the distal, or more distant, factors such as biology and socialization Deaux and Major’s (1987) model emphasizes three determinants of whether a sex difference in behavior is displayed: o (1) the perceiver’s expectancies, ▪ The perceiver is the person observing the behavior ▪ Cognitive confirmation is the idea that we see what we want to see; it explains how two people can see the same behavior and interpret it differentl ▪ Behavioral confirmation is the process by which a perceiver’s expectation actually alters the target’s behavior  o (2) the target’s (i.e., person who may or may not display the sex difference) self- YDN concept, and ▪ The target in an interaction is the person whose behavior is of interest ▪ Self- verification is our concern with behaving in ways consistent with our self-concept ▪ Self-presentation is our concern with how our behavior appears to others ▪ Self-monitoring is an individual difference variable that describes the extent to which one is more concerned with self-presentation or self- verification ▪ A high self-monitor is someone who changes his or her behavior to fit the situation ▪ A low self-monitor typically behaves the same from one situation to the next. o (3) the situation. I review how each of these contributes to the display of sex differences ▪ In some situations, you may be more concerned with adhering to your principles and values and want to behave in a way that is consistent with them ▪ In some situations, you will be very much concerned with how you appear to others. ▪ Other aspects of the situation influence behavior Key Terms Androgens—Male sex hormones (e.g., testosterone). Androgyny—Incorporation of both traditionally masculine and traditionally feminine qualities into one’s self-concept. Behavioral confirmation—Process by which a perceiver’s expectation actually alters the target’s behavior so the target comes to confirm the perceiver’s expectancy. Cognitive confirmation—Idea that individuals see what they want to see. Epigenetics—the study of how the environment influences gene expression. Estrogens—Female sex hormones. Gender aschematic—Someone who does not use the gender category as a guiding principle in behavior or as a way of processing information about the world. Gender constancy—Categorization of the self as male or female and the realization that this category cannot be changed. Gender identity—Label determined by biological sex that is applied either to the self or other people. Gender schematic—Someone who uses the gender category as a guiding principle in behavior and as a way of processing information about the world. Heterosexual script—Stereotypical enactment of male and female roles in romantic relationships.  YDN Homophily amplification hypothesis—States that interacting with similar others increases one’s similarity to those others. Intersex conditions—Conditions in which chromosomal sex does not correspond to phenotypic sex or there is an inconsistency within phenotypic sex. Lateralization—Localization of an ability (e.g., language) in one hemisphere of the brain. Masculine mystique—Image of masculinity upheld by society that consists of toughness, dominance, emotional detachment, callousness toward women, eagerness to seek out danger, and competition. Normative male alexithymia—Socialization of males to become unaware of their emotions. Schema—Category that contains information about the features of the category as well as its associations with other categories. Self-monitoring—Variable that describes the extent to which one is more concerned with self- presentation or self-verification. Self-presentation—Concern individuals have with how their behavior appears to others. Self-verification—Concern individuals have with behaving in ways consistent with their self- concepts. Social cognitive theory—States that cognitive development is one factor in gender-role acquisition, but there are social influences as well. CHAPTER 13 antidepressants, making it one of the most commonly prescribed medications in the United States SEX DIFFERENCES IN DEPRESSION depressive symptoms, which all of us experience to some extent at one time or another major depressive disorder or clinical depression, which is a diagnosable mental health problem used self-report measure of depression, the Center for Epidemiological Studies in Depression scale (CES-D) Major depressive disorder (MDD) is often referred to as clinical depression. Depressive symptoms are typically evaluated with community surveys Information on clinical depression is typically obtained from treatment facilities. o These two methodologies have provided a wealth of evidence that women experience more depressive symptoms than men in the general population, and women are more likely than men to be diagnosed with clinical depression  it appears that women are not only more likely to be depressed than men but women’s YDN episodes of depression are more likely to recur and to last longer There is a higher prevalence of some mental health problems, including depression, among gay and lesbian people compared to heterosexuals several reasons why sexual minorities have elevated mental health problems compared to heterosexuals o One is the impact of discrimination o second, and related, reason is lack of social support o Finally, sexual minorities may internalize society’s negative attitudes toward them METHODOLOGICAL ARTIFACTS Three sets of methodological problems or artifacts could explain why women “appear” to be more depressed: 1. there may be a bias on the part of clinicians, such that depression is overdiagnosed among women and underdiagnosed among men. 2. there may be a response bias on the part of depressed persons; men may be less likely than women to admit depression or to seek help for depression. 3. women and men may manifest depression in different ways, and instruments are biased in the direction of tapping female depression. CLINICIAN BIAS o One source of bias is the clinician’s judgment RESPONSE BIAS o A common concern is that men are less likely than women to report depression because depression is inconsistent with the male gender role. DIFFERENT MANIFESTATION OF DEPRESSION o One difficulty with examining sex differences in depression, or any other disorder, is that symptoms of depression may differ for women and men o However, as Winstead and Sanchez (2005) point out, in this case, the underlying disease—heart disease—is the same among men and women o The idea that some items are more likely to be associated with a trait, such as depression, among men versus women is referred to as differential item functioning THEORIES OF DEPRESSION Sex differences in depression can be understood by distinguishing between two sets of factors: o Susceptibility factors are innate, usually biological, factors that place women at greater risk for depression than men o Precipitating factors are environmental events that trigger depression  YDN The same cause theory suggests that the same factor causes depression in both females and males but that factor must increase during adolescence for females only The different cause theory says there are different causes of girls’ and boys’ depression, and only the cause of girls’ depression increases during adolescence The interactive theory suggests being female always poses a risk for depression, but the events of adolescence activate that risk factor I. BIOLOGOY GENES o There is undoubtedly a genetic influence on depression o the authors concluded that there might be a genetic basis for females to be more reactive than males to stress HORMONES o hormones change over the life span, and there is a great deal of hormonal fluctuation during adolescence when sex differences in depression emerge o sex hormones influence the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in girls to make them more sensitive to stress OXYTOCIN o hormones change over the life span, and there is a great deal of hormonal fluctuation during adolescence when sex differences in depression emerge o sex hormones influence the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis in girls to make them more sensitive to stress o Oxytocin is a neuropeptide that is regulated by female sex hormones ▪ promotes affiliative behavior BRAIN o There is some evidence that women and men use different regions of the brain to process emotional stimuli II. LEARNED HELPLESSNES Learned helplessness is the sense of giving up because we perceive that nothing can be done to alter a situation Learned helplessness is the product of three events: o First, we learn an outcome is beyond our control; o second, we respond by giving up or ceasing to respond; o third, we generalize this response to new situations—perceive that future responses cannot influence future outcomes  A construct related to learned helplessness is the pessimistic attributional YDN style. This is the tendency to attribute negative effects to internal, stable, and global causes. internal cause is located in the person a stable cause is one that is unchangeable global cause means the cause generalizes from one attribute to the entire person III. COPING Coping refers to the different strategies that we use to manage stressful events and the accompanying distress associated with them Problem-focused coping refers to attempts to alter the stressor itself. Emotion-focused coping refers to ways in which we accommodate ourselves to the stressor SPECIFIC COPING STARTEGIES: o The largest differences appeared for positive self-talk (i.e., encouraging oneself), seeking support, and rumination o Another approach to understanding how men and women cope with stress is to examine relative coping, which refers to how likely men or women are to use one strategy compared to another. TEND AND BEFRIEND o the general response to stress has been described as “fight or flight.” o women’s response to stress may be better understood as “tend and befriend.” RUMINATION o In her “Response Styles Theory,” Susan Nolen-Hoeksema (1987, 1994) has argued that women are more depressed than men because women respond to environmental stressors or to negative affect by talking about and trying to figure out their feelings— that is, rumination, whereas men respond by playing sports and by avoiding thoughts about the reasons for their feelings, that is, distraction IV. STRESSFUL LIVE EVENTS One reason that women may be more depressed than men is that women experience more traumatic or stressful life events Investigators have asked whether sex differences in depression are due to differential exposure to stressful events or differential vulnerability to stressful events Differential exposure suggests that women are more depressed than men because they experience more of a certain kind of stressful event Differential vulnerability implies that certain stressful events are more strongly associated with distress among women than men Cortisol is a hormone that is expected to increase with stress to better prepare the body to cope with it  One explanation as to why women report more interpersonal stressors and are YDN more reactive to interpersonal stressors is stress generation. stress generation hypothesis is the idea that one contributes to the stressors that occur. V. FEMALE GENDER ROLE COMMUNION AND AGENCY o Trait measures of the female gender role are typically measured with communion scales o of the BSRI (Bem Sex Role Inventory) or PAQ (Personal Attributes Questionnaire), which reflect a positive focus on others o Communion, however, is either unrelated to depression or related to less depression o agency, which includes traits such as independent, self-confident, and persistent, is related to lower levels of depression o Agency reflects a positive focus on and regard for the self. UNMITIGATED COMMUNION o unmitigated communion is defined as a focus on others to the exclusion of the self o other research has shown that women are more likely to have “interpersonal contingent self-esteem,” which means that they base their self-esteem on the quality of their relationships VI. CAREGIVING the caregiving aspect of the female gender role may be linked to depression CHALLENGES OF ADOLESCENCE 1. GENDER INTENSIFICATION - means that gender roles and their associated norms become salient to females and males. a. Depression might be heightened among women during adolescence as they attend to the female gender role and realize its limited value in society. 2. PUBERTY a. researchers have investigated whether the physical changes that accompany puberty are associated with depression in women 3. BODY IMAGE - Adolescent and adult females have a more negative body image than males a. A phenomenon related to body image that takes place among adolescent girls is “fat talk.” It was first discovered by Nichter and Vuckovic (1994) who described it as a middle school girl phenomenon. b. It is not only body image but body objectification that is related to depression c. Objectification theory states that there are social and cultural forces that sexually objectify women, which lead women to continually monitor their bodies and evaluate themselves based on their appearance 4. PEERS - there is also evidence for “depression socialization” among girls Women have higher rates of what are referred to as internalizing problems (e.g., depression, YDN anxiety), men have higher rates of what are referred to as externalizing problems (e.g., substance abuse, antisocial disorders; Schizophrenia is a form of psychopathology. It is a form of psychosis that includes delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, and flattened affect Antisocial personality disorder is characterized by a disregard for others, failure to conform to social norms, impulsivity, aggression, deceit, and lack of empathy Conduct disorder includes aggression toward people or animals, destruction of property, and serious violation of rules Borderline personality disorder is characterized by unstable interpersonal relationships and maladaptive interpersonal functioning Histrionic personality disorder includes excessive emotionality and attention seeking Dependent personality disorder is a disorder related to interpersonal functioning Narcissistic personality disorder is characterized by feelings of self-importance and superiority, desire for admiration, entitlement, exploitation of others, and a lack of empathy Panic disorder is characterized by recurrent panic attacks panic attack is the presence of an intense fear without a basis in reality and is characterized by palpitations, sweating, shaking, and shortness of breath ***note: all except narcisstic PD, are prevalent in women. Males have higher rates of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) than females two components to ADHD: inattentiveness and impulsivity. ADJUSTMENT TO CHRONIC ILLNESS 1. MALE GENDER ROLE - People with a traditional masculine orientation may find it difficult to depend on others for assistance or to ask others for help a. Psychological reactance occurs when you perceive that someone has taken away your freedom or sense of control by telling you what to do; more familiar term for this idea is “reverse psychology.” 2. FEMALE GENDER ROLE - can facilitate adjustment to chronic illness by providing support resources but can impede adjustment when physical attractiveness and caregiving issues interfere with taking proper care of oneself. EATING DISORDERS Ana Carolina Reston, a Brazilian model, died in 2006 from an eating disorder.  Kirsten Haglund received the help that she needed and went on to become Miss America YDN in 2008. three major eating disorders are anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder DEFINITONS AND PREVALENCE A. Anorexia nervosa is the most life-threatening eating disorder. The primary features of this disorder include energy intake restriction, fear of gaining weight, and a disturbed self-image in regard to weight B. Bulimia Nervosa is characterized by recurrent binge eating followed by inappropriate methods to prevent weight gain, such as vomiting; intense exercising; or the use of laxatives, diuretics, and enemas the most common method of purging is vomiting. binge is characterized by eating an unusually large amount of food and feelings of a loss of control. C. Binge Eating Disorder is characterized by recurrent binge eating without purging or fasting D. Because the prevalence rate of eating disorders in the general population is so small, investigators often study symptoms of bulimia or anorexia. These symptoms are referred to as disturbed eating behavior. most frequently used instruments to assess disturbed eating is the Eating Disorder Inventory CONSEQUENCES ETIOLOGY BIOLOGY o It is clear that there is a genetic component to eating disorders from studies of twins and from studies of genotypes o Hormones also may play a role in eating behavior DEMOGRAPHICS - Females are more likely than males to have eating disorders and disturbed eating behavior, FEMALE GENDER ROLE o Eating disorders have been linked to features of the female gender role. o First, the female gender role places a high value on physical attractiveness. Second, women are interpersonally oriented, so others’ opinions are important to them. SOCIETAL FACTORS o One perspective on eating disorders places the blame on society’s obsession with dieting and the pressure for thinness among women o The media normalizes dieting and excessive thinness and also encourages people to evaluate their bodies and to use extreme measures to improve them PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS  o A general psychological theory of eating disorders is that they stem from feelings YDN of a lack of autonomy, a lack of control, and a lack of a sense of self in combination with a striving for perfection and achievement. SUICIDE Men commit suicide more frequently than women, but women attempt suicide more frequently than men. >>> INCIDENCE Overall, the suicide rate is four times higher among males than females. There is a higher rate of suicide and suicide attempts in LGBT communities than heterosexuals >>> ATTEMPTS Although men commit suicide more frequently than women, women are more likely than men to attempt suicide and to express more suicidal thoughts than men. >>> GENDER PARADOX Suicide is not viewed as acceptable, but it is viewed as less unacceptable among men than women Suicide is considered masculine behavior suicide attempts are considered feminine behavior >>> Factors Associated With Suicide Among Adults suicide and suicide attempts have been linked to substance abuse and depression. alcohol use and abuse has been more strongly implicated in suicide in men than women One antecedent to suicide is the breakup of a relationship. Divorce is related to suicide, One reason that relationship loss and intimate relationship difficulties may be more strongly related to suicide in men than women is that intimate relationships are men’s primary source of social support, whereas women have alternative sources of support >>> Factors Associated With Suicide Among Adolescents suicide and suicide attempts in adolescents are associated with other mental disorders, in particular, depression Key Terms Anorexia nervosa—Eating disorder characterized by the continual pursuit of thinness, a distorted body image, and refusal to maintain a weight that is more than 85% of what is considered normal for the person’s age and height. Binge eating disorder—Eating disorder characterized by recurrent binge eating without purging or fasting. Body objectification—The experience of one’s body being treated as an object to be evaluated YDN and used by others. Bulimia nervosa—Eating disorder characterized by recurrent binge eating followed by purging via vomiting, laxatives, diuretics, enemas, and/or exercising. Clinical depression—Another name for major depressive disorder, the critical feature of which is that the person must have experienced a set of depressive symptoms for a period no shorter than 2 weeks. Different cause theory—Suggestion that there are different causes of girls’ and boys’ depression and the cause of girls’ depression increases during adolescence. Differential exposure—Idea that men and women are exposed to a different number of or different kinds of stressors. Differential item functioning—Idea that some items are more likely to be associated with a trait, such as depression, among men versus women. Differential vulnerability—Idea that certain stressors are more strongly linked to distress in one sex than the other. Emotion-focused coping—Approach to stressful situations in which individuals attempt to accommodate themselves to the stressor. Gender intensification—Gender roles becoming salient during adolescence, causing boys and girls to adhere more strongly to these roles. Interactive theory—Suggestion that being female always poses a risk for depression and the events of adolescence activate that risk. Learned helplessness—Learning that our actions are independent of outcomes, which then leads us to stop responding (give up) in other situations. Pessimistic attributional style—Tendency to attribute negative events to internal, stable, and global causes. Precipitating factors—Environmental events that trigger the emergence of a disorder (e.g., depression). Problem-focused coping—Approach to stressful situations in which we attempt to alter the stressor itself. Psychological reactance—Reaction to a perceived threat to control that involves doing the opposite of what is demanded. Relative coping—Likelihood that men or women use one coping strategy compared to another strategy. Same cause theory—Suggestion that the same factor could cause depression in both men and YDN women, but the factor increases during adolescence only for girls. Stress generation—The idea that one’s own behavior can contribute to the stressors that occur. Susceptibility factors—Innate, usually biological, factors that place one group (e.g., women) at greater risk for a disorder (e.g., depression) than another group.