Gender Stereotypes: Impediments to Women’s Career Progress

Abstract

This chapter describes how both descriptive and prescriptive gender stereotypes can give rise to gender bias and discrimination in work settings, creating obstacles for upwardly aspiring women. It describes how descriptive gender stereotypes produce negative performance expectations that are a result of perceived lack of fit, and how these expectations lead to faulty information processing and biased evaluations. It also describes how prescriptive gender stereotypes promote gender bias by designating “shoulds” and “should nots” for women—normative standards that prompt disapproval and dislike both when directly violated and when violation is inferred because of a woman’s success. Some methods for deterring the negative effects of gender stereotypes are explored.