Gender bias from my last 29 years and how we can solve it together
Living in a biased world since 1992 *)
*) Oops, women shouldn’t talk about their age, I forgot. ;)
Born in 1992 and being raised by open-minded parents in a family with
80% women’s quota (yes, this is true), didn’t prevent me from hearing and being influenced by stereotype belief statements in the last 29 years.
Especially when it comes to school, social networks and interactions with older generations, we are all confronted with bias that can undermine our self-esteem (as a perceiver) and influence our thinking (as a judger) more than we believe.
Deciding what’s wrong or right, isn’t a conclusion made up by an individual human being. Deciding who you are or who you want to be isn’t either a decision by yourself. It’s made by society; or at least it’s subject of discussion and judgement.
And as we all know “if men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences” [1] — the Thomas theorem, also known in context of the “self-fulfilling prophecy” by Robert K. Merton that “a belief or expectation, correct or incorrect, could bring about a desired or expected outcome” [2].
This theory makes it even more clear that it’s so important to be aware of and challenge existing stereotypes and bias.
Stereotypes and bias in my last 29 years
Twenty-nine years sound pretty long. The internet got invented (early 90’s), cloning got possible (1996), the dot-com bubble happened (late 90’s), the iphone got on market (2007) and later on self-driving cars were presented (2012) [3]. Technology and society seem to develop fast. But social inventions don’t seem to develop at all. I’d like to share some memorable events of stereotype thinking with you from my personal experience (as a female perceiver).
1996:
When I was in kindergarten, I got asked:
What do you want to be when you are grown up?
An Astronaut, I said.
But that isn’t a job for girls.
I didn’t get upset by that comment, but motivated to show that girls can do it. Starting my first day in elementary school one year later, proudly wearing my “Scout universe backpack” (really nice one with colorful rockets, stars and a black background), but being eyed on by my schoolmates because this was the boy’s edition apparently.
Two years later I cut my hair short to 3cm wanting to set a statement — being allowed to have short hair, wear wide t-shirts with shorts and play with Lego.
Haha, you look like a boy with your short hair!
But I’m a girl, I said.
Then why do you wear it short and don’t dress like a girl?
Also this comment wasn’t and isn’t unusual. Especially young girls get used to hearing and seeing what they have to be, wear and like [4].
Research has shown that beliefs about ourselves and groups in society are developed early on in life based on received information from parents, peers, personal experience and social media
[5] and also the consumer industry [6][7]. The beliefs are getting more established over the years [8]. So this has a tremendous effect on the later development of a child. Setting the baseline for many girls believing that they can’t do specific things in their future.
2011:
Life and high school went by and my hair got longer again — trying to fit in, especially during puberty. But what didn’t fit was my passion for Mathematics because that’s really uncommon for girls, I had learned back in elementary school (basic thing you learn in your first Math class before the 1x1). But going to college parties or being introduced to new people I wasn’t struggling with self-doubts about skills. Instead I got bored by the question about profession and the common reaction to it:
And what do you study?
I study Mathematics — what about you?, I asked.
You must be kidding me — I thought you would rather study fashion.
Apparently, these people just had efficiently working brains, using their “System 1” [9] to find a matching category for me.
As our unconscious System 1 can solve equations like 1+1 = 2 [9], my appearance gave them the solution for the equation: female + college student + nice clothes + communicative = something with fashion (nice try, but the world isn’t that simple).
Being aware of the two ways the brain forms thoughts (fast working, unconscious System 1 and slow working, conscious System 2), our System 1 can cause bias by not considering unique aspects of people, situations and cases — judging and categorizing people in a second.
In addition, the above example is just a representative of a thousand ones, me and other women got judged by their outer appearance. Research by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) has shown that “90% of people around the world are biased against women” [10] especially in context of business and qualifications.
2018:
Finally entering the business world after my graduation, I decided to start my career in an early stage start-up — innovating an old-fashioned industry with a new software solution. After a few months, I realized that women’s quota had been pretty good so far in my last stations in life compared to the construction industry (perceived women’s quota (on C-level): 1%).
Sexual offensive jokes or comments are not rare here, especially at trade fairs or other events.
But that seemed to be normal for that generation and industry (attention: also a bias from my side). What wasn’t normal to me were friends from my generation asking:
You work in Sales in a start-up?
Yes, why do you ask?, I asked.
I mean, Sales is really tough — especially for women …
Underestimating the abilities of women and questioning if I’m tough or skilled enough for a specific job just because of my sex showed me that some things haven’t changed over generations.
Such thinking leads to the fact that women are still underrepresented in managing roles [11] even performance reviews show that women have a great impact on the overall performance of a company [12].
But because 29 years ago we have learned as individuals and as a whole society that girl’s can’t do it.
Choose to Challenge in 2021
Seeing the above examples hopefully gives you and (my reflecting) me an impression about how stereotypes and bias are omnipresent in our daily lives. Realizing that stereotypes haven’t changed drastically over the years, other girls and women will have struggles on their way becoming unique human beings if we don’t #choosetochallenge together.
Here are some practical tips for you:
1. Challenge yourself first
- Educate yourself
- Monitor your own biases (and write it down because written word cant be ignored ;))
- Identify common patterns and triggers — you can work with
- Seek advice and feedback from others
2. Challenge your social network and workplace
- Be aware of biases of your friends and colleagues
- Start conversations and discussions #speakup
- Define (measurable) action items for improvement at work
(women’s quota; number of gender-biased comments — you name it) - Monitor your progress regularly
- Support each other by providing feedback
3. Challenge your kids (as they are the future)
- Teach your kids about gender bias early on [13]
- Be aware of it in daily life and re-teach your kids
- Share your knowledge with other parents
To sum it up, the key essence for challenging and changing our behavior effectively is to reflect and share open feedback with each other. Even if it’s unpleasant.
Hence, please leave a comment or feedback, so that we can learn from each other.
- Carina -
References:
[1] Thomas, W.I.; Thomas, D.S., 1928, “The child in America: Behavior problems and programs.”. New York: Knopf, pp. 571–572
[2] Biggs, Michael, 2013, “Prophecy, Self-Fulfilling/Self-Defeating”, Encyclopedia of Philosophy and the Social Sciences, SAGE Publications, Inc., doi:10.4135/9781452276052.n292, ISBN 9781412986892
[3] Webb, Kevin, May 2018, 2019, “From the internet to the iPhone, here are the 20 most important inventions of the last 30 years “, Retrieved March 4th, 2021 (https://www.businessinsider.com/most-important-inventions-of-last-30-years-internet-iphone-netflix-facebook-google-2019-5?r=DE&IR=T)
[4] Marcus, Rachel, November 2018, The norms factor : recent research on gender, social norms, and women’s economic empowerment, URI: http://hdl.handle.net/10625/57285
[5] Lumen Learning Institute, Introduction to Sociology, “Agents of Socialization”, Retrieved March 6th (https://courses.lumenlearning.com/sociology/chapter/agents-of-socialization/)
[6] Schnerring, Almut; Verlan, Sascha, 2014, “Die Rosa-Hellblau-Falle — Für eine Kindheit ohne Rollenklischees”, ISBN-10 : 3888979382
[7] Dittrich, Monika, January 1st, 2018, “Gender Studies — getrennte Spielwelten”, Retrievied March 5th (https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/gender-studies-getrennte-spielwelten.724.de.html?dram:article_id=409544)
[8] Kienbaum, Schuhrke, Ebersbach, 2019, “Entwicklungspsychologie der Kindheit: Von der Geburt bis zum 12. Lebensjahr — von der Geburt bis zum 12. Lebensjahr”, Grundriss der Psychologie Band 13, ISBN: 978–3–17–032930–0
[9] Kahneman, Daniel, 2011, “Thinking, fast and slow.”, New York, NY: Farrar, Stratus and Giroux., ISBN-10: 0374533555
[10] UN News, March 5th, 2020, “Report reveals nearly 90 per cent of all people have ‘a deeply ingrained bias’ against women”, Retrieved March 5th, 2021 (https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/03/1058731)
[11] McKinsey, 2020, “Women in the Workplace”, Retrieved March 4th, 2021 (https://www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/diversity-and-inclusion/women-in-the-workplace)
[12] Salloum et. al, January 2016,”The rise of women and their impact on firms’ Performance”, Int. J. Entrepreneurship and Small Business, Vol. 27, Nos. 2/3, DOI: 10.1504/IJESB.2016.073976
[13] Shafer, Leah, 2018, “Preventing Gender Bias — How parents and caregivers can work to counter stereotyping and discrimination — starting in early childhood”, Retrievied March 6th, 2021 (https://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/uk/18/11/preventing-gender-bias)
