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• Published: 28 April 2020

The impact a-gender: gendered orientations towards research Impact and its evaluation

• J. Chubb   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-9716-820X 1 &
• G. E. Derrick   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-5386-8653 2  

Palgrave Communications volume  6 , Article number:  72 ( 2020 ) Cite this article

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A Correction to this article was published on 19 May 2020

This article has been updated

Using an analysis of two independent, qualitative interview data sets: the first containing semi-structured interviews with mid-senior academics from across a range of disciplines at two research-intensive universities in Australia and the UK, collected between 2011 and 2013 ( n  = 51); and the second including pre- ( n  = 62), and post-evaluation ( n  = 57) interviews with UK REF2014 Main Panel A evaluators, this paper provides some of the first empirical work and the grounded uncovering of implicit (and in some cases explicit) gendered associations around impact generation and, by extension, its evaluation. In this paper, we explore the nature of gendered associations towards non-academic impact (Impact) generation and evaluation. The results suggest an underlying yet emergent gendered perception of Impact and its activities that is worthy of further research and exploration as the importance of valuing the ways in which research has an influence ‘beyond academia’ increases globally. In particular, it identifies how researchers perceive that there are some personality traits that are better orientated towards achieving Impact; how these may in fact be gendered. It also identifies how gender may play a role in the prioritisation of ‘hard’ Impacts (and research) that can be counted, in contrast to ‘soft’ Impacts (and research) that are far less quantifiable, reminiscent of deeper entrenched views about the value of different ‘modes’ of research. These orientations also translate to the evaluation of Impact, where panellists exhibit these tendencies prior to its evaluation and describe the organisation of panel work with respect to gender diversity.

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Introduction

The management and measurement of the non-academic impact Footnote 1 (Impact) of research is a consistent theme within the higher education (HE) research environment in the UK, reflective of a drive from government for greater visibility of the benefits of research for the public, policy and commercial sectors (Chubb, 2017 ). This is this mirrored on a global scale, particularly in Australia, where, at the ‘vanguard’ (Upton et al., 2014 , p. 352) of these developments, methods were first devised (but were subsequently abandoned) to measure research impact (Chubb, 2017 ; Hazelkorn and Gibson, 2019 ). What is broadly known in both contexts as an ‘Impact Agenda’—the move to forecast and assess the ways in which investment in academic research delivers measurable socio-economic benefit—initially sparked broad debate and in some instances controversy, among the academic community (and beyond) upon its inception (Chubb, 2017 ). Since then, the debate has continued to evolve and the ways in which impact can be better conceptualised and implemented in the UK, including its role in evaluation (Stern, 2016 ), and more recently in grant applications (UKRI, 2020 ) is robustly debated. Notwithstanding attempts to better the culture of equality and diversity in research, (Stern, 2016 ; Nature, 2019 ) in the broader sense, and despite the implementation of the Impact agenda being studied extensively, there has been very little critical engagement with theories of gender and how this translates specifically to more downstream gendered inequities in HE such as through an impact agenda.

The emergence of Impact brought with it many connotations, many of which were largely negative; freedom was questioned, and autonomy was seen to be at threat because of an audit surveillance culture in HE (Lorenz, 2012 ). Resistance was largely characterised by problematising the agenda as symptomatic of the marketisation of knowledge threatening traditional academic norms and ideals (Merton, 1942 ; Williams, 2002 ) and has led to concern about how the Impact agenda is conceived, implemented and evaluated. This concern extends to perceptions of gendered assumptions about certain kinds of knowledge and related activities of which there is already a corpus of work, i.e., in the case of gender and forms of public engagement (Johnson et al., 2014 ; Crettaz Von Roten, 2011 ). This paper explores what it terms as ‘the Impact a-gender’ (Chubb, 2017 ) where gendered notions of non-academic, societal impact and how it is generated feed into its evaluation. It does not wed itself to any feminist tradition specifically, however, draws on Carey et al. ( 2018 ) to examine, acknowledge and therefore amend how the range of policies within HE and how implicit power dynamics in policymaking produce gender inequalities. Instead, an impact fluidity is encouraged and supported. For this paper, this means examining how the impact a-gender feeds into expectations and the reward of non-academic impact. If left unchecked, the propagation of the impact a-gender, it is argued, has the potential to guard against a greater proportion of women generating and influencing the use of research evidence in public policy decision-making.

Scholars continue to reflect on ‘science as a gendered endeavour’ (Amâncio, 2005 ). The extensive corpus of historical literature on gender in science and its originators (Merton, 1942 ; Keller et al., 1978 ; Kuhn, 1962 ), note the ‘pervasiveness’ of the ‘masculine’ and the ‘objective and the scientific’. Indeed, Amancio affirmed in more recent times that ‘modern science was born as an exclusively masculine activity’ ( 2005 ). The Impact agenda raises yet more obstacles indicative of this pervasiveness, which is documented by the ‘Matthew’/‘Matilda’ effect in Science (Merton, 1942 ; Rossiter, 1993 ). Perceptions of gender bias (which Kretschmer and Kretschmer, 2013 hypothesise as myths in evaluative cultures) persist with respect to how gender effects publishing, pay and reward and other evaluative issues in HE (Ward and Grant, 1996 ). Some have argued that scientists and institutions perpetuate such issues (Amâncio, 2005 ). Irrespective of their origin, perceptions of gendered Impact impede evaluative cultures within HE and, more broadly, the quest for equality in excellence in research impact beyond academia.

To borrow from Van Den Brink and Benschop ( 2012 ), gender is conceptualised as an integral part of organisational practices, situated within a social construction of feminism (Lorber, 2005 ; Poggio, 2006 ). This article uses the notion of gender differences and inequality to refer to the ‘ hierarchical distinction in which either women and femininity and men and masculinity are valued over the other ’ (p. 73), though this is not precluding of individual preferences. Indeed, there is an emerging body of work focused on gendered associations not only about ‘types’ of research and/or ‘areas and topics’ (Thelwall et al., 2019 ), but also about what is referred to as non-academic impact. This is with particular reference to audit cultures in HE such as the Research Excellence Framework (REF), which is the UK’s system of assessing the quality of research (Morley, 2003 ; Yarrow and Davies, 2018 ; Weinstein et al., 2019 ). While scholars have long attended to researching gender differences in relation to the marketisation of HE (Ahmed, 2006 ; Bank, 2011 ; Clegg, 2008 ; Gromkowska-Melosik, 2014 ; Leathwood et al., 2008 ), and the gendering of Impact activities such as outreach and public engagement (Ward and Grant, 1996 ), there is less understanding of how far academic perceptions of Impact are gendered. Further, how these gendered tensions influence panel culture in the evaluation of impact beyond academia is also not well understood. As a recent discussion in the Lancet read ‘ the causes of gender disparities are complex and include both distal and proximal factors ’. (Lundine et al., 2019 , p. 742).

This paper examines the ways in which researchers and research evaluators implicitly perceive gender as related to excellence in Impact both in its generation and in its evaluation. Using an analysis of two existing data sets; the pre-evaluation interviews of evaluators in the UK’s 2014 Research Excellence Framework and interviews with mid-senior career academics from across the range of disciplines with experience of building impact into funding applications and/ or its evaluation in two research-intensive universities in the UK and Australia between 2011 and 2013, this paper explores the implicitly gendered references expressed by our participants relating to the generation of non-academic, impact which emerged inductively through analysis. Both data sets comprise researcher perceptions of impact prior to being subjected to any formalised assessment of research Impact, thus allowing for the identification of unconscious gendered orientations that emerged from participant’s emotional and more abstract views about Impact. It notes how researchers use loaded terminology around ‘hard’, and ‘soft’ when conceptualising Impact that is reminiscent of long-standing associations between epistemological domains of research and notions of masculinity/femininity. It refers to ‘hard’ impact as those that are associated with meaning economic/ tangible and efficiently/ quantifiably evaluated, and ‘soft’ as denoting social, abstract, potentially qualitative or less easily and inefficiently evaluated. By extending this analysis to the gendered notions expressed by REF2014 panellists (expert reviewers whose responsibility it is to review the quality of the retrospective impact articulated in case studies for the purposes of research evaluation) towards the evaluation of Impact, this paper highlights how instead of challenging these tendencies, shared constructions of Impact and gendered productivity in academia act to amplify and embed these gendered notions within the evaluation outcomes and practice. It explores how vulnerable seemingly independent assessments of Impact are to these widespread gendered- associations between Impact, engagement and success. Specifically, perceptions of the excellence and judgements of feasibility relating to attribution, and causality within the narrative of the Impact case study become gendered.

The article is structured as follows. First, it reviews the gender-orientations towards notions of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ excellence in forms of scholarly distinction and explores how this relates to the REF Impact evaluation criteria, and the under-representation of women in the academic workforce. Specifically, it hypothesises the role of how gendered notions of excellence that construct academic identities contribute to a system that side-lines women in academia. This is despite associating the generation of Impact as a feminised skill. We label this as the ‘Impact a-gender’. The article then outlines the methodology and how the two, independent databases were combined and convergent themes developed. The results are then presented from academics in the UK and Australia and then from REF2014 panellists. This describes how the Impact a-gender currently operates through academic cultural orientations around Impact generation, and in its evaluation through peer-review panels by members of this same academic culture. The article concludes with a recommendation that the Impact a-gender be explored more thoroughly as a necessary step towards guiding against gender- bias in the academic evaluation, and reward system.

Literature review

Notions of impact excellence as ‘hard’ or ‘soft’.

Scholars have long attempted to consider the commonalities and differences across certain kinds of knowledge (Becher, 1989 , 1994 ; Biglan, 1973a ) and attempts to categorise, divide and harmonise the disciplines have been made (Biglan, 1973a , 1973b ; Becher, 1994 ; Caplan, 1979 ; Schommer–Aikins et al., 2003 ). Much of this was advanced with a typology of the disciplines from (Trowler, 2001 ), which categorised the disciplines as ‘hard’ or ‘soft’. Both anecdotally and in the literature, ‘soft’ science is associated with working more with people and less with ‘things’ (Cassell, 2002 ; Thelwall et al., 2019 ). These dichotomies often lead to a hierarchy of types of Impact and oppose valuation of activities based on their gendered connotations.

Biglan’s system of classifying disciplines into groups based on similarities and differences denotes particular behaviours or characteristics, which then form part of clusters or groups—‘pure’, ‘applied’, ‘soft’, ‘hard’ etc. Simpson ( 2017 ) argues that Biglan’s classification persists as one of the most commonly referred to models of the disciplines despite the prominence of some others (Pantin, 1968 ; Kuhn, 1962 ; Smart et al., 2000 ). Biglan ( 1973b ) classified the disciplines across three dimensions; hard and soft, pure and applied, life and non-life (whether the research is concerned with living things/organisms) . This ‘taxonomy of the disciplines’ states that ‘pure-hard’ domains tend toward the life and earth sciences,’pure-soft’ the social sciences and humanities, and ‘applied hard’ focus on engineering and physical science with ‘soft-applied’ tending toward professional practice such as nursing, medicine and education. Biglan’s classification looked at levels of social connectedness and specifically found that applied scholars Footnote 2 were more socially connected, more interested and involved in service activities, and more likely to publish in the form of technical reports than their counterparts in the pure (hard) areas of study. This resonates with how Impact brings renewed currency and academic prominence to applied researchers (Chubb, 2017 ). Historically, scholars inhabiting the ‘hard’ disciplines had a greater preference for research; whereas, scholars representing soft disciplines had a greater preference for teaching (Biglan, 1973b ). Further, Biglan ( 1973b ) also found that hard science scholars sought out greater collaborative efforts among colleagues when teaching as opposed to their soft science counterparts.

There are also long-standing gendered associations and connotations with notions of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ (Storer, 1967 ). Typically used to refer to skills, but also used heavily with respect to the disciplines and knowledge domains, gendered assumptions and the mere use of ‘hard’ or ‘soft’ to describe knowledge production carries with it assumptions, which are often noted in the literature; ‘ we think of physics as hard and of political science as soft ’, Storer explains, adding how ‘hard seems to imply tough, brittle, impenetrable and strong, while soft on the other hand calls to mind the qualities of weakness, gentleness and malleability’ (p. 76). As described, hard science is typically associated with the natural sciences and quantitative paradigms whereas normative perceptions of feminine ‘soft’ skills or ‘soft’ science are often equated with qualitative social science. Scholars continue to debate dichotomised paradigms or ‘types’ of research or knowledge (Gibbons, 1999 ), which is emblematic of an undercurrent of epistemological hierarchy of the value of different kinds of knowledge. Such debates date back to the heated back and forth between scholars Snow (Snow, 2012 ) and literary critic Leavis who argued for their own ‘cultures’ of knowledge. Notwithstanding, these binary distinctions do few favours when gender is then ascribed to either knowledge domain or related activity (Yarrow and Davies, 2018 ). This is particularly pertinent in light of the current drive for more interdisciplinary research in the science system where there is also a focus on fairness, equality and diversity in the science system.

Academic performance and the Impact a-gender

Audit culture in academia impacts unfairly on women (Morley, 2003 ), and is seen as contributory to the wide gender disparities in academia, including the under-representation of women as professors (Ellemers et al., 2004 ), in leadership positions (Carnes et al., 2015 ), in receiving research acknowledgements (Larivière et al., 2013 ; Sugimoto et al., 2015 ), or being disproportionately concentrated in non-research-intensive universities (Santos and Dang Van Phu, 2019 ). Whereas gender discrimination also manifests in other ways such as during peer review (Lee and Noh, 2013 ), promotion (Paulus et al., 2016 ), and teaching evaluations (Kogan et al., 2010 ), the proliferation of an audit culture links gender disparities in HE to processes that emphasise ‘quantitative’ analysis methods, statistics, measurement, the creation of ‘experts’, and the production of ‘hard evidence’. The assumption here is that academic performance and the metrics used to value, and evaluate it, are heavily gendered in a way that benefits men over women, reflecting current disparities within the HE workforce. Indeed, Morely (2003) suggests that the way in which teaching quality is female dominated and research quality is male dominated, leads to a morality of quality resulting in the larger proportion of women being responsible for student-focused services within HE. In addition, the notion of ‘excellence’ within these audit cultures implicitly reflect images of masculinity such as rationality, measurement, objectivity, control and competitiveness (Burkinshaw, 2015 ).

The association of feminine and masculine traits in academia (Holt and Ellis, 1998 ), and ‘gendering its forms of knowledge production’ (Clegg, 2008 ), is not new. In these typologies, women are largely expected to be soft-spoken, nurturing and understanding (Bellas, 1999 ) yet often invisible and supportive in their ‘institutional housekeeping’ roles (Bird et al., 2004 ). Men, on the other hand are often associated with being competitive, ambitious and independent (Baker, 2008 ). When an individual’s behaviour is perceived to transcend these gendered norms, then this has detrimental effects on how others evaluate their competence, although some traits displayed outside of these typologies go somewhat ‘under the radar’. Nonetheless, studies show that women who display leadership qualities (competitiveness, ambition and decisiveness) are characterised more negatively than men (Rausch, 1989 ; Heilman et al., 1995 ; Rossiter, 1993 ). Incongruity between perceptions of ‘likeability’ and ‘competence’ and its relationship to gender bias is present in evaluations in academia, where success is dependent on the perceptions of others and compounded within an audit culture (Yarrow and Davis, 2018). This has been seen in peer review, reports for men and women applicants, where women were disadvantaged by the same characteristics that were seen as a strength on proposals by men (Severin et al., 2019 ); as well as in teaching evaluations where women receive higher evaluations if they are perceived as ‘nurturing’ and ‘supportive’ (Kogan et al., 2010 ). This results in various potential forms of prejudice in academia: Where traits normally associated with masculinity are more highly valued than those associated with femininity (direct) or when behaviour that is generally perceived to be ‘masculine’ is enacted by a woman and then perceived less favourably (indirect/ unconscious). That is not to mention direct sexism, rather than ‘through’ traits; a direct prejudice.

Gendered associations of Impact are not only oversimplified but also incredibly problematic for an inclusive, meaningful Impact agenda and research culture. Currently, in the UK, the main funding body for research in the UK, UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) uses a broad Impact definition: ‘ the demonstrable contribution that excellent research makes to society and the economy ’ (UKRI website, 2019 ). The most recent REF, REF2014, Impact was defined as ‘ …an effect on, change or benefit to the economy, society, culture, public policy or services, health, the environment or quality of life, beyond academia ’. In Australia, the Australian Research Council (ARC) proposed that researchers should ‘embed’ Impact into the research process from the outset. Both Australia and the UK have been engaged in policy borrowing around the evaluation of societal impact and share many similarities in approaches to generating and evaluating it. Indeed, Impact has been deliberately conceptualised by decision-makers, funders and governments as broad in order to increase the appearance of being inclusivity, to represent a broad range of disciplines, as well as to reflect the ‘diverse ways’ that potential beneficiaries of academic research can be reached ‘beyond academia’. The adoption of societal impact as a formalised criterion in the evaluation of research excellence was initially perceived to be potentially beneficial for women, due to its emphasis on concepts such as ‘public engagement’; ‘duty’ and non-academic ‘cooperation/collaboration’ (Yarrow and Davies, 2018 ). In addition, the adoption of narrative case studies to demonstrate Impact, rather than adopting a complete metrics-focused exercise, can also be seen as an opportunity for women to demonstrate excellence in the areas where they are over-represented, such as teaching, cultural enrichment, public engagement (Andrews et al., 2005 ), informing public policy and improving public services (Schatteman, 2014 ; Wheatle and BrckaLorenz, 2015). However, despite this, studies highlight how for the REF2014, only 25% of Impact Case Studies for business and management studies were from women (Davies et al., 2020 ).

With respect to Impact evaluation, previous research shows that there is a direct link between notions of academic culture, and how research (as a product of that culture) is valued and evaluated (Leathwood and Reid, 2008 ; p. 120). Geertz ( 1983 ) argues that academic membership is a ‘cultural frame that defines a great part of one’s life’ influences belief systems around how academic work is orientated. This also includes gendered associations implicit in the academic reward system, which in turn influences how academics believe success is to be evaluated, and in what form that success emerges. This has implications in how academic associations of the organisation of research work and the ongoing constructions of professional identity relative to gender, feeds into how these same academics operate as evaluators within a peer review system evaluation. In this case, instead of operating to challenge these tendencies, shared constructions of gendered academic work are amplified to the extent that they unconsciously influence perceptions of excellence and the judgements of feasibility as pertaining to the attribution and causality of the narrative argument. As such, in an evaluation of Impact with its ambiguous definition (Derrick, 2018 ), and the lack of external indicators to signal success independent of cultural constructions inherent in the panel membership, effects are assumed to be more acute. In this way, this paper argues that the Impact a-gender can act to further disadvantage women.

The research combines two existing research data sets in order to explore implicit notions of gender associated with the generation and evaluation of research Impact beyond academia. Below the two data sets and the steps involved in analysing and integrating findings are described along with our theoretical positioning within the feminist literature Where verbatim quotation is used, we have labelled the participants according to each study highlighting their role and gender. Further, the evaluator interviews specify the disciplinary panel and subpanel to which they belonged, as well as their evaluation responsibilities such as: ‘Outputs only’; ‘Outputs and Impact’; and ‘Impacts only’.

Analysis of qualitative data sets

This research involved the analysis and combination of two independently collected, qualitative interview databases. The characteristics and specifics of both databases are outlined below.

Interviews with mid-senior academics in the UK and Australia

Fifty-one semi-structured interviews were conducted between 2011 and 2013 with mid-senior academics at two research-intensive universities in Australia and the UK. The interviews were 30–60 min long and participants were sourced via the research offices at both sites. Participants were contacted via email and invited to participate in a study concerning resistance towards the Impact agenda in the UK and Australia and were specifically asked for their perceptions of its relationship with freedom, value and epistemic responsibility and variations across discipline, career stage and national context. Mostly focused on ex ante impact, some interviewees also described their experiences of Impact in the UK and Australia, in relation to its formal assessment as part of the Excellence Innovation Australia (EIA) for Australia and the Research Excellence Framework (REF) in the UK.

Participants comprised mid to senior career academics with experience of winning funding from across the range of disciplines broadly representative of the arts and humanities, social sciences, physical science, maths and engineering and the life and earth sciences. For the purposes of this paper, although participant demographic information was collected, the relationship between the gender of the participants, their roles, disciplines/career stage was not explicitly explored instead, such conditions were emergent in the subsequent inductive coding during thematic analysis. A reflexive log was collected in order to challenge and draw attention to assumptions and underlying biases, which may affect the author, inclusive of their own gender identity. Further information on this is provided in Chubb ( 2017 ).

Pre- and post-evaluation interviews with REF2014 evaluators

REF2014 in the UK represented the world’s first formalised evaluation of ex-post impact, comprising of 20% of the overall evaluation. This framework served as a unique experimental environment with which to explore baseline tendencies towards impact as a concept and evaluative object (Derrick, 2018 ).

Two sets of semi-structured interviews were conducted with willing participants: sixty-two panellists were interviewed from the UK’s REF2014 Main Panel A prior to the evaluation taking place; and a fifty-seven of these were re-interviewed post-evaluation. Main Panel A covers six Sub-panels: (1) Clinical Medicine; (2) Public Health, Health Services and Primary Care; (3) Allied Health Professions, Dentistry, Nursing and Pharmacy; (4) Psychology, Psychiatry and Neuroscience; (5) Biological Sciences; and (6) Agriculture, Veterinary and Food Sciences. Again, the relationship between the gender of the participants and their discipline is not the focus for the purposes of this paper.

Database combination and identification of common emergent themes

The inclusion of data sets using both Australian and UK researchers was pertinent to this study as both sites were at the cusp of implementing the evaluation of Impact formally. These researcher interviews, as well as the evaluator interviews were conducted prior to any formalised Impact evaluation took place, but when both contexts required ex ante impact in terms of certain funding allocation, meaning an analysis of these baseline perceptions between databases was possible. Further, the inclusion of the post-evaluation interviews with panellists in the UK allowed an exploration of how these gendered perceptions identified in the interviews with researchers and panellists prior to the evaluation, influenced panel behaviour during the evaluation of Impact.

Initially, both data sets were analysed using similar, inductive, grounded-theory-informed approaches inclusive of a discourse and thematic analysis of the language used by participants when describing impact, which allowed for the drawing out of metaphor (Zinken et al., 2008 ). This allowed data combination and analysis of the two databases to be conducted in line with the recommendations for data-synthesis as outlined in Weed ( 2005 ) as a form of interpretation. This approach guarded against the quantification of qualitative findings for the purposes of synthesis, and instead focused on an initial dialogic approach between the two authors (Chubb and Derrick), followed by a re-analysis of qualitative data sets (Heaton, 1998 ) in line with the outcomes of the initial author-dialogue as a method of circumventing many of the drawbacks associated with qualitative data-synthesis. Convergent themes from each, independently analysed data set were discussed between authors, before the construction of new themes that were an iterative analysis of the combined data set. Drawing on the feminist tradition the authors did not apply feminist standpoint theory, instead a fully inductive approach was used to unearth rich empirical data. An interpretative and inductive approach to coding the data using NVIVO software in both instances was used and a reflexive log maintained. The availability of both full, coded, qualitative data sets, as well as the large sample size of each, allowed this data-synthesis to happen.

Researcher’s perceptions of Impact as either ‘hard’ or ‘soft’

Both UK and Australian academic researchers (researchers) perceive a guideline of gendered productivity (Davies et al., 2017 ; Sax et al., 2002 ; Astin, 1978 ; Ward and Grant, 1996 ). This is where men or women are being dissuaded (by their inner narratives, their institutions or by colleagues) from engaging in Impact either in preference to other (more masculine) notions of academic productivity, or towards softer (for women) because they consider themselves and are considered by others to be ‘good at it’. Participants often gendered the language of Impact and introduced notions of ‘hard’ and ‘soft’. On the one hand, this rehearses and resurfaces long-standing views about the ‘Matthew Effect’ because often softer Impacts were seen as being of less value by participants, but also indicates that the word impact itself carries its own connotations, which are then weighed down further by more entrenched gender associations.

Our research shows that when describing Impact, it was not necessarily the masculinity or femininity of the researcher that was emphasised by participants, rather researchers made gendered presumptions around the type of Impact, or the activity used to generate it as either masculine or feminine. Some participants referred to their own research or others’ research as either ‘hard’ or as ‘soft and woolly’. Those who self-professed that their research was ‘soft’ or woolly’ felt that their research was less likely to qualify as having ‘hard’ impact in REF terms Footnote 3 ; instead, they claimed their research would impact socially, as opposed to economically; ‘ stuff that’s on a flaky edge — it’s very much about social engagement ’ (Languages, Australia, Professor, Male) . One researcher described Impact as ‘a nasty Treasury idea,’ comparing it to: a tsunami, crashing over everything which will knock out stuff that is precious ’ . (Theatre, Film and TV, UK, Professor, Male) . This imagery associates the concept of impact with force and weight (or hardness as mentioned earlier) particularly in disciplines where the effect of their research may be far more nuanced and subtle. One Australian research used force to depict the impact of teaching and claimed Impact was like a footprint, and teaching was ‘ a pretty heavy imprint ’ (Environment, UK, Professor, Male) . Participants characterised ‘force and weight’ as masculine, suggesting that some connotations of Impact and the associated activities may be gendered. The word ‘Impact’ was inherently perceived by many researchers as problematic, bound with linguistic connotations and those imposed by the official definitions, which in many cases are perceived as negative or maybe even gendered (Chubb, 2017 ): ‘ The etymology of a word like impact is interesting. I’ve always seen what I do as being a more subtle incremental engagement, relevance, a contribution ’. (Theatre, Film and TV, UK, Professor, Male) .

Researchers associated the word ‘impact’ with hard-ness, weight and force; ‘ anything that sorts of hits you ’ (Languages, UK, Senior Lecturer, Female) . One researcher suggested that Impact ‘ sounds kind of aggressive — the poor consumer! ’ (History, Australia, Professor, Female) . Talking about her own research in the performing arts, one Australian researcher commented: ‘ It’s such a pain in the arse because the Arts don’t fit the model. But in a way they do if you look at the impact as being something quite soft ’ (Music, Australia, Professor, Female) . Likewise, a similar comparison was seen by a female researcher from the mechanical engineering discipline: ‘ My impact case study wasn’t submitted mainly because I’m dealing with that slightly on the woolly side of things ’ (Mechanical Engineering, Australia, Professor, Female) . Largely, gender related comments hailed from the ‘hard’ science and from arts and humanities researchers. Social scientists commented less, and indeed, one levelled that Impact was perhaps less a matter of gender, and more a matter of ability (Chubb, 2017 ): ‘ It’s about being articulate! Both guys and women who are very articulate and communicate well are outward looking on all of these things ’ ( Engineering Education, Australia, Professor, Female).

Gendered notions of performativity were also very pronounced by evaluators who were assessing the outputs only, suggesting how these panel cultures are orientated around notions of gender and scientific outputs as ‘hard’ if represented by numbers. The focus on numbers was perceived by the following panellist as ‘ a real strong tendency particularly amongst the Alpha male types ’ within the panel that relate to findings about the association of certain traits—risk aversion, competitiveness, for example, with a masculinised market logic in HE;

And I like that a lot because I think that there is a real strong tendency particularly amongst the Alpha male types of always looking at the numbers, like the numbers and everything. And I just did feel that steer that we got from the panel chairs, both of them were men by the way, but they were very clear, the impact factors and citations and the rank order of a journal is this is information that can be useful, but it’s not your immediate first stop. (Panel 1, Outputs and Impact, Female)

However, a metric-dominant approach was not the result of a male-dominated panel environment and instead, to the panels credit, evaluators were encouraged not to use one-metric as the only deciding factor between star-rating of quality. However, this is not to suggest that metrics did not play a dominant role. In fact, in order to resolve arguments, evaluators were encouraged to ‘ reflect on these other metrics ’ (Panel 3, Outputs only, Male) in order to rectify arguments where the assessment of quality was in conflict. This use of ‘other metrics’ was preferential to a resolution of differences that are based on more ‘soft’ arguments that are based on understanding where differences in opinion might lie in the interpretation of the manuscript’s quality. Instead, the deciding factor in resolving arguments would be the responsibility, primarily, of a ‘hard’ concept of quality as dictated by a numerical value;

Read the paper, judge the quality, judge the originality, the rigour, the impact — if you have to because you’re in dispute with another assessor, then reflect on these other metrics. So I don’t think metrics are that helpful actually if and until you’ve got a real issue to be able to make a decision. But I worry very much that metrics are just such a simple way of making the process much easier, and I’m worried about that because I think there’s a bit of game playing going on with impact factors and that kind of thing. (Panel 3, Outputs Only, Male)

Table 1 outlines the emergent themes, which, through inductive coding participants broadly categorised domains of research, their qualities and associations, types of activities and the gendered assumption generally made by participants when describing that activity. The table is intended only to provide an indicative overview of the overall tendencies of participants toward certain narratives as is not exhaustive, as well as a guide to interpret the perceptions of Impact illustrated in the below results.

Table one describes the dichotomous views that seemed to emerge from the research but it’s important to note that researchers associated Impact as related to gender in subtle, and in some cases overt ways. The data suggests that some male participants felt that female academics might be better at Impact, suggesting that female academics might find it liberating, linked it to a sense of duty or public service, implying that it was second nature. In addition, some male participants associated types of Impact domains as female-orientated activity and the reverse was the case with female and male-orientated ‘types’ of Impact. For example, at one extreme, a few male researchers seemed to perceive public engagement as something, which females would be particularly good at, generalising that they are not competitive ‘ women are better at this! They are less competitive! ’ (Environment, UK, Professor, Male) . Indeed, one male researcher suggested that competitiveness actually helps academics have an impact and does not impede it:

I get a huge buzz from trying to communicate those to a wider audience and winning arguments and seeing them used. It’s not the use that motivates me it’s the process of winning, I’m competitive! (Economics, UK, Professor, Male)

Analysis also revealed evidence that some researchers has gendered perceptions of Impact activities just as evaluators did. Here, women were more likely to promote the importance of engaging in Impact activities, whereas men were focused on producing indicators with hard, quantitative indicators of success. Some researchers implied that public engagement was not something entirely associated with the kinds of Impact needed to advance one’s career and for a few male researchers, this was accordingly associated with female academics. Certain female researchers in the sciences and the arts suggested similarly that there was a strong commitment among women to carry out public engagement, but that this was not necessarily shared by their male counterparts who, they perceived, undervalued this kind of work:

I think the few of us women in the faculty will grapple with that a lot about the relevance of what we’re doing and the usefulness, but for the vast majority of people it’s not there… [She implies that]…I think there is a huge gender thing there that every woman that you talk to on campus would consider that the role of the university is along the latter statement (*to communicate to the public). The vast majority of men would not consider that’s a role of the university. There’s a strong gender thing. (Chemical Engineering, Australia, Professor, Female)

Notwithstanding, it is important to distinguish between engagement and Impact. This research shows that participants perceive Impact activities to be gendered. There was a sense from one arts female researcher that women might be more interested in getting out there and communicating their work but that crucially, it is not the be-all and end- all of doing research: ‘ Women feel that there’s something more liberating, I can empathise with that, but that couldn’t be the whole job ’. Music, Australia, Professor, Female Footnote 4 . When this researcher, who was very much orientated towards Impact, asked if there were enough interviewees, she added ‘ mind you, you’ve probably spoken to enough men in lab coats ’. This could imply that inward-facing roles are associated with male-orientated activity and outward facing roles as perceived as more female orientated. Such sentiments perhaps relate to a binary delineation of women as more caring, subjective, applied and of men as harder, scientific and theoretical/ rational. This links to a broader characterisation of HE as marketised and potentially, more ‘male’ or at least masculinised—where increasing competitiveness, marketisation and performativity can be seen as linked to an increasingly macho way of doing business (Blackmore, 2002 ; Deem, 1998 ; Grummell et al., 2009 ; Reay, n.d. ). The data is also suggestive of the attitude that communication is a ‘soft’ skill and the interpersonal is seen as a less masculine trait. ‘ This is a huge generalisation but I still say that the profession is so dominated by men, undergraduates are so dominated by men and most of those boys will come into engineering because they’re much more comfortable dealing with a computer than with people ’ (Chemical Engineering, Australia, Professor, Female) . Again, this suggests women are more likely to pursue those scientific subjects, which will make a difference or contribute to society (such as nursing or environmental research, certainly those subjects that would be perceived as less ‘hard’ science domains).

There was also a sense that Impact activity, namely in this case public engagement and community work, was associated with women more than men by some participants (Amâncio, 2005 ). However, public engagement and certain social impact domains appeared to have a lower status and intellectual worth in the eyes of some participants. Some inferred that social and ‘soft’ impacts are seen as associated. With discipline. For instance, research concerning STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Medicine) subjects with females. They in turn may be held in low esteem. Some of the accounts suggest that soft impacts are perceived by women as not ‘counting’ as Impact:

‘ At least two out of the four of us who are female are doing community service and that doesn’t count, we get zero credit, actually I would say it gets negative credit because it takes time away from everything else ’. (Education Engineering, Australia, Professor, Female)

This was intimated again by another female UK computer scientist who claimed that since her work was on the ‘woolly side’ of things, and her impacts were predominantly in the social and public domain, she would not be taken seriously enough to qualify as a REF Impact case study, despite having won an award for her work:

‘ I don’t think it helps that if I were a male professor doing the same work I might be taken more seriously. It’s interesting, why recently? Because I’ve never felt that I’ve not been taken seriously because I’m a woman, but something happened recently and I thought, oh, you’re not taking me seriously because I’m a woman. So I think it’s a part ’. (Computer Science, UK, Professor, Female)

Researchers also connect the ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ associations with Impact described earlier to male and female traits. The relationship between Impact and gender is not well understood and it is not clear how much these issues are directly relatable to Impact or more symptomatic of the broader picture in HE. In order to get a broader picture, it is important to examine how these gendered notions of Impact translate into its evaluation. Some participants suggested that gender is a factor in the securing of grant money—certainly this comment reveals a local speculation that ‘the big boys’ get the grants, in Australia, at least: ‘ ARC grants? I’ve had a few but nothing like the big boys that get one after the other ,’ (Chemical Engineering, Australia, Professor, Female) . This is not dissimilar to the ‘alpha male’ comments from the evaluators described below who note a tendency for male evaluators to rely on ‘hard’ numbers whose views are further examined in the following section.

Gendered excellence in Impact evaluation

In the pre-evaluation interviews, panellists were asked about what they perceived to be ‘excellent’ research and ‘excellent’ Impact. Within this context, are mirrored conceptualisations of impacts as either ‘soft’ or ‘hard’ as was seen with the interviews with researchers described above. These conceptualisations were captured prior to the evaluation began. They can therefore be interpreted as the raw, baseline assumptions of Impact that are free from the effects of the panel group, showed that there were differences in how evaluators perceived Impact, and that these perceptions were gendered.

Although all researchers conceptualised Impact as a linear process for the purposes of the REF2014 exercise (Derrick, 2018 ), there was a tendency for female evaluators to be open to considering the complexity of Impact, even in a best-case scenario. This included a consideration that Impact as dictated within the narrative might have different indicators of value to different evaluators; ‘ I just think that that whole framing means that there is a form of normative standard of perfect impact ’ (Main Panel, Outputs and Impacts, Female) . This evaluator, in particular, went further to state how that their impression of Impact would be constructed from the comparators available during the evaluation;

‘ Given that I’m presenting impact as a good story, it would be like you saying to me; ‘Can you describe to me a perfect Shakespearean play?’…. well now of course, I can’t. You can give me lots of plays but they all have different kinds of interesting features. Different people would say that their favourite play was different. To me, if you’re taking interpretivist view, constructivist view, there is no perfect normative standard. It’s just not possible ’. (Panel 1, Outputs and Impacts, Female)

Female evaluators were also more sensitive to other complex factors influencing the evaluation of Impact, including time lag; ‘ …So it takes a long time for things like that to be accepted…it took hundreds of studies before it was generally accepted as real ’ (Panel 1, Outputs and Impacts, Female ); as well as the indirect way that research influences policy as a form of Impact;

‘ I don’t think that anything would get four stars without even blinking. I think that is impossible to answer because you have to look at the whole evidence in this has gone on, and how that does link to the impact that is being claimed, and then you would then have to look at how that impact, exactly how that research has impacted on the ways of the world, in terms of change or in terms of society or whatever. I don’t think you can see this would easily get four stars because of the overall process is being looked at, as well as the actual outcome ’ . (Panel 3, Outputs and Impact, Female)

Although these typologies were not absolute, there was a lack of complexity in the nuances around Impact. There was also heavily gendered language around Impacts as measurable, or not, that mirrored the association of Impact as being either ‘hard’, and therefore measurable, or ‘soft, and therefore more nuanced in value. In this way, male evaluators expressed Impact as a causal, linear event that occurred ‘ in a very short time ’ (P2, Outputs and Impact, Male) and involved a single ‘ star ’ (P3, Impacts only, Male) or ‘ impact champion ’ (Main Panel, Outputs and Impacts, Male) that drove it from start (research), to finish (Impact). These associations about Impact being ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ made by evaluators, mirror the responses from researchers in the above sections. In the example below, the evaluator used words such as ‘ strong ’ and ‘ big way ’ to describe Impact success, as well as emphasises causality in the argument;

‘ …if it has affected a lot of people or affected policy in a strong way or created change in a big way, and it can be clearly linked back to the research, and it’s made a difference ’. (Panel 2, Outputs and Impact, Male)

These perhaps show disciplinary differences as much as gendered differences. Further, there was a stronger tendency for male evaluators to strive towards conceptualisations of excellence in Impact as measurable or ‘ it’s something that is decisive and actionable ’ (Panel 6, Impacts, Male) . One male evaluator explained his conceptualised version of Impact excellence as ‘ straightforward ’ and therefore ‘ obviously four-star ’ due to the presence of metrics with which to measure Impact. This was a perception more commonly associated with male evaluators;

‘ …if somebody has been able to devise a — let’s say pancreatic cancer — which is a molecular cancer, which hasn’t made any progress in the last 40 years, and where the mortality is close to 100% after diagnosis, if someone devised a treatment where now suddenly, after diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, 90 percent of the people are now still alive 5 years later, where the mortality rate is almost 0%, who are alive after 5 years. That, of course, would be a dramatic, transformative impact ’. (Panel 1, Outputs and Impact, Male)

In addition, his tendency to seek various numeric indicators for measuring, and therefore assessing Impact (predominantly economic impact), as well as compressing its realisation to a small period of time ( ‘ suddenly ’ ) in a causal fashion, was more commonly expressed in male evaluators. This tendency automatically indicates the association of impacts as either ‘soft’ or ‘hard’ and divided along gendered norms, but also expresses Impact in monetary terms;

‘ Something that went into a patient or the company has pronounced with…has spun out and been taken up by a commercial entity or a clinical entity ’ (Panel 3, Outputs and Impacts, Male) , as well as impacts that are marketised; ‘ A new antimicrobial drug to market ’. (Panel 6, Outputs and Impact, Male) .

There was also the perception that female academics would be better at engagement (Johnson et al., 2014 ; Crettaz Von Roten, 2011 ) due to its link with notions of ‘ duty ’ (as a mother), ‘ engagement ’ and ‘ public service ’ are reflected in how female evaluators were also more open to the idea that excellent Impact is achieved through productive, ongoing partnerships with non-academic stakeholders. Here, the reflections of ‘duty’ from the evaluators was also mirrored by in interviews with researchers. Indeed, the researchers merged perceptions of parenthood, an academic career and societal impact generation. One female researcher drew on her role as a mother as supportive of her ability to participate in Impact generation, ‘ I have kids that age so… ’ (Biology, UK, Senior Lecturer, Female) . Indeed, parenthood emerged from researchers of both genders in relation to the Impact agenda. Two male participants spoke positively about the need to transfer knowledge of all kinds to society referencing their role as parents: ‘ I’m all for that. I want my kids to have a rich culture when they go to school ’ (Engineering, Australia, Professor, Male, E2) , and ‘ My children are the extension of my biological life and my students are an extension of my thoughts ’ (Engineering, Australia, Professor, Male, E1) . One UK female biologist commented that she indeed enjoys delivering public engagement and outreach and implies a reference to having a family as enabling her ability to do so: ‘ It’s partly being involved with the really well-established outreach work ,’ (Biology, UK, Senior Lecturer, Female) .

For the evaluators, the idea that ‘public service’ as second nature for female academics, was reflected in how female evaluators perceived the long, arduous and serendipitous nature of Impact generation, as well as their commitment to assessing the value of Impact as a ‘pathway’ rather than in line with impact as a ‘product’. Indeed, this was highlighted by one male evaluator who suggested that the measurement and assessment of Impact ‘ …needs to be done by economists ’ and that

‘ you [need] to put in some quantification one everything…[that] puts a negative value on being sick and a positive large value on living longer. So, yeah, the greatest impact would be something that saves us money and generates income for the country but something broad and improves quality of life ’. (Panel 2, Impacts, Male)

Since evaluators tend to exercise cognitive bias in evaluative situations (Langfeldt, 2006 ), these preconceived ideas about Impact, its generation and the types of people responsible for its success are also likely to permeate the evaluative deliberations around Impact during the peer review process. What is uncertain is the extent that these messages are dominant within the panel discourse, and therefore the extent that they influence the formation of a consensus within the group, and the ‘dominant definition’ of Impact (Derrick, 2018 ) that emerges as a result.

Notions of gender from the evaluators post-evaluation

Similar notions of gender-roles in academia pertaining to notions of scientific productivity were echoed by academics who were charged with its evaluation as part of the UK’s 2014 Research Excellence Framework. Interviews with evaluators revealed not only that the panel working-methods and characteristics about what constituted a ‘good’ evaluator were implicitly along gendered norms, but also that the assumed credit assumptions of performativity were also based on gender.

In assessments of the Impact criterion, an assessment that is not as amenable to quantitative representation requiring panels to conceptualise a very complex process, with unstandardised measures of significance and reach, there was still a gendered perception of Impact being ‘women’s work’ in academia. This perception was based on the tendency towards conceptualising Impact as ‘slightly grubby’ and ‘not very pure’, which echoes previously reported pre-REF2014 tensions that Impact is a task that an academic does when they cannot do real research (de Jong et al., 2015 );

But I would say that something like research impact is — it seems something slightly grubby. It’s not seen as not — by the academics, as not very pure. To some of them, it seems women’s work. Talking to the public, do you see what I mean? (Main Panel, Outputs and Impact, Female)

In addition, gendered roles also relate to how the panel worked with the assessment of Impact. Previous research has outlined how the equality and diversity assessment of panels for REF2014 were not conducted until after panellists were appointed (Derrick, 2018 ), leading to a lack of equal-representation of women on most panels. Some of the female panellists reflected that this resulted not only in a hyper-awareness of one’s own identity and value as a woman on the panel, but also implicitly associating the role that a female panellist would play in generating the evaluation. One panellist below, reflected that she was the only female in a male-dominated panel, and that the only other females in the room were the panel secretariat. The panellist goes further to explain how this resulted in a gendered-division of labour surrounding the assessment of Impact;

I mean, there’s a gender thing as well which isn’t directing what you’re talking about what you’re researching, but I was the only woman on the original appointed panel. The only other women were the secretariat. In some ways I do — there was initially a very gendered division of perspective where the women were all the ones aggregate the quantitative research, or typing it all up or talking about impact whereas the men were the ones who represented the big agenda, big trials. (Main Panel, Outputs and Impact, Female)

In addition, evaluators expressed opinions about what constituted a good and a bad panel member. From this, the evaluation showed that traits such as the ability to work as a ‘team’ and to build on definitions and methods of assessment for Impact through deliberation and ‘feedback’ were perceived along gendered lines. In this regard, women perceived themselves as valuable if they were ‘happy to listen to discussions’, and not ‘too dogmatic about their opinion’. Here, women were valued if they played a supportive, supplementary role in line with Bellas ( 1999 ), which was in clear distinction to men who contributed as creative thinkers and forgers of new ideas. As one panellist described;

A good panel member is an Irish female. A good panel member was someone who was happy to — someone who is happy to listen to discussions; to not be too dogmatic about their opinion, but can listen and learn, because impact is something we are all learning from scratch. Somebody who wasn’t too outspoken, was a team player. (Panel 3, Outputs and Impact, Female)

Likewise, another female evaluator reflected on the reasons for her inclusion as a panel member was due to her ‘generalist perspective’ as opposed to a perspective that is over prescribed. This was suggestive of how an overly specialist perspective would run counter to the reasons that she was included as a panellist which was, in her opinion, due to her value as an ethnic and gender ‘token’ to the panel;

‘ I think it’s also being able to provide some perspective, some general perspective. I’m quite a generalist actually, I’m not a specialist……So I’m very generalist. And I think they’re also well aware of the ethnic and gender composition of that and lots of reasons why I’m asked on panels. (Panel 1, Outputs and Impact, Female)

Women perceived their value on the panel as supportive, as someone who is prepared to work on the team, and listen to other views towards as a generalist, and constructionist, rather than as an enforced of dogmatic views and raw, hard notions of Impact that were represented through quantitative indicators only. As such, how the panel operated reflects general studies of how work can be organised along gender lines, as well as specific to workload and power in the academy. The similarity between the gendered associations towards conceptualising Impact from the researchers and evaluators, combined with how the panel organises its work along gendered lines, suggests how panel culture echoes the implicit tendencies within the wider research community. The implications of this tendency in relation to the evaluation of non-academic Impact is discussed below.

Discussion: an Impact a-gender?

This study shows how researchers and evaluators in two, independent data sets echoed a gendered orientation towards Impact, and how this implies an Impact a-gender. That gendered notions of Impact emerged as a significant theme from two independent data sets speaks to the importance of the issue. It also illustrates the need for policymakers and funding organisations to acknowledge its potential effects as part of their efforts towards embedding a more inclusive research culture around the generation and evaluation of research impact beyond academia.

Specifically, this paper has identified gendered language around the generation of, and evaluation of Impact by researchers in Australia and the UK, as well as by evaluators by the UK’s most recent Research Excellence Framework in 2014. For the UK and Australia, the prominence of Impact, as well as the policy borrowing between each country (Chubb, 2017 ) means that a reliable comparison of pre-evaluation perceptions of researchers and evaluators can be made. In both data sets presumptions of Impact as either ‘soft’ or ‘hard’ by both researchers and evaluators were found to be gendered. Whereas it is not surprising that panel culture reflects the dominant trends within the wider academic culture, this paper raises the question of how the implicit operation of gender bias surrounding notions of scientific productivity and its measurement, invade and therefore unduly influence the evaluation of those notions during peer-review processes. This negates the motivation behind a broad Impact definition and evaluation as inclusive since unconscious bias towards women can still operate if left unchecked and unmanaged.

Gendered notions of excellence were also related to the ability to be ‘competitive’, and that once Impact became a formalised, countable and therefore competitive criterion, it also become masculine where previously it existed as a feminised concept related to female academic-ness. As a feminised concept, Impact once referred to notions of excellence requiring communication such as public engagement, or stakeholder coordination—the ‘softer’ impacts. However, this association only remains ‘soft’ insofar as Impact remains unmeasurable, or more nuanced in definition. This is especially pertinent for the evaluation of societal impact where already conceived ideas of engagement and ‘ women’s work ’ influence how evaluators assess the feasibility of impact narratives for the purposes of its assessment. This paper also raises the question that notions of gender in relation to Impact persist irrespective of the identities assumed for the purposes of its evaluation (i.e., as a peer reviewer). This is not to say that academic culture in the UK and Australia, where Impact is increasingly being formalised into rewards systems, is not changing. More that there is a tendency in some evaluations for the burden of evidence to be applied differently to genders due to tensions surrounding what women are ‘good’ at doing: engagement, versus what ‘men’ are good at doing regarding Impact. In this scenario, quantitative indicators of big, high-level impacts are to be attributable to male traits, rather than female. This has already been noted in student evaluations of teaching (Kogan et al., 2010 ) and of academic leadership performance where the focus on the evaluation is on how others interpret performance based on already held gendered views about competence based on behaviours (Williams et al., 2014 ; Holt and Ellis, 1998 ). As such, when researchers transcend these gendered identities that are specific to societal impact, there is a danger of an Impact-a-gender bias arising in the assessment and forecasting of Impact. This paper extends this understanding and outlines how this may also be the case for assessments of societal impact.

By examining perceptions, as well as using an inductive analysis, this study was able to unearth unconsciously employed gendered notions that would not have been prominent or possible to pick up if we asked the interviewees about gender directly. This was particularly the case for the re-analysis of the post-evaluation interviews. However, future studies might consider incorporating a disciplinary-specific perspective as although the evaluators were from the medical/biomedical disciplines, researchers were from a range of disciplines. This would identify any discipline-specific risk towards an Impact a-gender. Nonetheless, further work that characterises the impact a-gender, as well as explores its wider implications for gender inequities within HE is currently underway.

How research evidence is labelled as excellent and therefore trustworthy, is heavily dictated by an evaluation process that is perceived as impartial and fair. However, if evaluations are compounded by gender bias, this confounds assessments of excellence with gendered expectation of non-academic impact. Consequently, gendered expectations of excellence for non-academic impact has the potential to: unconsciously dissuade women from pursuing more masculinised types of impact; act as a barrier to how female researchers mobilise their research evidence; as well as limit the recognition female researchers gain as excellent and therefore trustworthy sources of evidence.

The aim of this paper was not to criticise the panellists and researchers for expressing gendered perspectives, nor to present evidence about how researchers are unduly influenced by gender bias. The results shown do not support either of these views. However, the aim of this paper was to acknowledge how gender bias in research Impact generation can lead to a panel culture dominated by academics that translate the implicit and explicit biases within academia that influence its evaluation. This paper raises an important question regarding what we term the ‘Impact a-gender’, which outlines a mechanism in which gender bias feeds into the generation and evaluation of a research criterion, which is not traditionally associated with a hard, metrics-masculinised output from research. Along with other techniques used to combat unconscious bias in research evaluation, simply by identifying, and naming the issue, this paper intends to combat its ill effects through a community-wide discussions as a mechanism for developing tools to mitigate its wider effect if left unchecked or merely accepted as ‘acceptable’. In addition, it is suggested that government and funding organisations explicitly refer to the impact a-gender as part of their wider EDI (Equity, Diversity and Inclusion) agendas towards minimising the influence of unconscious bias in research impact and evaluation.

Data availability

Data is available upon request subject to ethical considerations such as consent so as not to compromise the individual privacy of our participants.

Change history

19 may 2020.

An amendment to this paper has been published and can be accessed via a link at the top of the paper.

For the purposes of this paper, when the text refers to non-academic, societal impact, or the term ‘Impact’ we are referring to the change and effect as defined by REF2014/2021 and the larger conceptualisation of impact that is generated through knowledge exchange and engagement. In this way, the paper refers to a broad conceptualisation of research impact that occurs beyond academia. This allows a distinction between Impact as central to this article’s contribution, as opposed to academic impact, and general word ‘impact’.

Impact scholars or those who are ‘good at impact’ are often equated with applied researchers.

One might interpret this as meaning ‘economic impact’.

This is described in the next section as ‘women’s work’ by one evaluator.

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Acknowledgements

This research was funded by the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) Future Research Leaders Programme (ES/K008897/2). We would also like to acknowledge their peers for offering their views on the paper in advance of publication and in doing so thank Dr. Richard Watermeyer, University of Bath, Professor Paul Wakeling, University of York and Dr. Gabrielle Samuel, Kings College London.

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Chubb, J., Derrick, G.E. The impact a-gender: gendered orientations towards research Impact and its evaluation. Palgrave Commun 6 , 72 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-020-0438-z

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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

“you don’t know me so don’t try to judge me”: gender and identity performance on social media among young indian users.

• Department of Psychology, Ashoka University, Sonepat, India

Social media is the preferred communication platform for today’s youth, yet little is known of how online intergender communication is shaped by social identity norms. Drawing from the Social Identity and Deindividuation Effects (SIDE) approach, we argue that through depersonalization, online interactions are marked by the salience of social identities and identity performance conforming to perceived norms of behavior (traditional as well as developing). We specifically look at discursive terms and their meaning-making as a strategic performance of gender in uncontrolled social media interactions. We examined a corpus of 442 comments from selected public Indian Facebook pages in two phases over a span of 1 year (2020–2021). Thematic discourse analysis revealed established (#mansplaining, pseudofeminism) and emerging (choice feminism, MGTOW, #fuckboi etc.) discursive strategies within the major themes on feminism and antifeminism, men’s rights, intersectional feminism, and sexual behavior. These meaningful terms are used to modulate identity performance in a heavily contested space, reflecting both consolidation as well as mobilization functions, as proposed by SIDE. The findings highlight that intergender communication on social media is both dependent on existing offline norms, while challenging the same to create new discourses of gender.

Introduction

There is considerable social psychological work examining interpersonal and intergroup interactions and its consequences. Yet, the majority of this is concentrated on face-to-face interactions. Today, a large part of our interactions are online and social media has become the preferred medium for this globally ( Johnson and Callahan, 2015 ; Bulut and Kesgin, 2016 ). Reports suggest that young adults are communicating and building relationships online, more than via face-to-face communication ( Velten and Arif, 2016 ). Consequently, interactions on social media are now a significant source of contact as well as conflict.

While interacting on social media, users not only meet as individuals, but also as representatives of their larger social identities ( Hogg et al., 2004 ). The absence of face-to-face (FTF) interactions in online spaces can facilitate anonymity ( Ehrlich and Stoerger, 2014 ), but chosen identity markers reveal one’s social identity, which allows them to be perceived in accordance with offline social stereotypes and prejudices ( Cirucci, 2017 ). Gender is a social structure and group-based identity that determines social relationships and behaviors at various levels of the social world ( Goffman, 1976 ; Armentor-Cota, 2011 ). When such a social structure permeates into the online setting, gendered communication norms are formed ( Armentor-Cota, 2011 ; Rose et al., 2012 ; Spears, 2017 ). In the absence of personal identity markers and the presence of gendered norms of communication, gender identity becomes salient in online interactions ( Armentor-Cota, 2011 ; Rose et al., 2012 ; Spears, 2017 ). This creates a “continuous communication loop” where gender identities shape interactions online, which in turn create opportunities and norms that dictate gender relations and expectations of behavior ( Rose et al., 2012 ).

This paper aims to examine cross-gender communication, which is the “communication about and between men and women” ( Ray and Pani, 2019 ) on social media, drawing from the Social Identity and Deindividuation Effects (SIDE) approach ( Spears, 2017 ). Specifically, we take a look at the dominant discourses on gender that are popular online and become persistent references in communication. We examine written text as indicators of identity performance which reinforce and reconstruct online gendered communication. Through this analysis we hope to present a case for how gender interactions on social media are symbolic of social identity representations that are shaping gender interactions and discourses in the virtual space. Here, we acknowledge the presence of multiple gender identities which is beyond the scope of this paper. We analyze traditional cross-gender communication between men and women only, given the larger presence of the same and the novel lens of analysis that we are using with respect to social media use in the Indian context.

Online Interactions and Gender

The focus on contact via computer mediated communication (CMC) has expanded over the last 2 decades. While initial research highlighted the equalizing nature of online spaces, others underscored the rising polarization on social media platforms ( Amichai-Hamburger and Hasler, 2013 ; Cirucci, 2017 ). Work on gender and CMC reveals a similar 2-fold trend, where on one hand, the democratic nature of the virtual space is upheld for equalizing gender interactions and opening a space that disrupts established norms ( Webb and Temple, 2015 ); there are significant gender differences in access to virtual spaces, and communication patterns online ( Yates, 1997 ). Status and visibility differences between men and women can be seen on social media platforms like Twitter where individuals with disadvantaged intersectional identities, like women of color, receive less attention than white men ( Messias et al., 2017 ). Referred to as the “Gender digital divide, the unequal access to, use and awareness of digital spaces” is a worldwide phenomenon, being particularly salient in the Global South ( Antonio and Tuffley, 2014 ; Alozie and Akpan-Obong, 2016 ; Fatehkia et al., 2018 ; Joshi et al., 2020 ). In India, 67% men are Internet users, compared to only 33% women, with even fewer numbers in rural areas ( Kala, 2019 ). Unlike Western social media usage which is becoming increasingly gender-equal ( Greenwood et al., 2016 ; Tankovska, 2021 ), 78% Indian social media users are men.

There is also a complex manifestation of sexual behavior and norms on social media, where along with constructive experiences of gender construction, there are undesirable consequences of body shaming and exposure to sexual content ( Davis, 2018 ). Research also suggests significant differences in how men and women present themselves as well as interact online ( Hudson and Gore, 2017 ). According to Kivran-Swaine et al. (2012) , men initiate more cross-gender friendships while women tend to express more positive emotions and use profile pictures more often. Analysis of Facebook profile pictures revealed that gender stereotypical traits that are dominant offline are represented online with pictures of men being rated higher on traits like active, dominant, and independent while women scoring higher on attractiveness and dependence ( Rose et al., 2012 ). Armentor-Cota (2011) notes that while gender swapping and gender fluidity are often present; stereotypes exist widely and guide online communication to a large extent. For example, in how men and women resist or defend themselves online, distinct patterns emerged where men typically dominated and asserted their viewpoints as opposed to women who often justified or defended theirs. Cirucci (2017) found that women were more conscious and anxious about their posts and comments on social media sites. Through experimental findings, Spears et al. (2014) showed that men tended to dominate most online discussions where gender was salient.

Gender identity becomes particularly salient in online collective action for issues pertaining to gender itself, such as spreading awareness about feminism. With the advent of the fourth wave of feminism, there has been a growth in cyberfeminism on digital platforms where participants not only consume information but also actively participate in the movement through engagement ( Jain, 2020 ). Language plays an important role in digital collective action, especially with the use of hashtags, which are effective tools to mobilize people for social change, raise awareness about important issues, and develop a sense of community ( Storer and Rodriguez, 2020 ). The study of Yoder et al. (2010) on self-labeling found that self–categorization as a feminist predicts engagement in collective action online. Moreover, engaging in Twitter activism in response to sexism was found to promote an enactment of women’s social identity, which led to further mobilization for collective action ( Foster et al., 2020 ). Discussing the “Gender digital divide” in developing countries, Antonio and Tuffley (2014) note that one of the most significant benefits of the internet for women is the potential for forming social networks, self-expression, and a collective identity formation.

However, irrespective of the definitive work on gender and online interactions, there is limited literature examining cross-gender interactions from a social identity and intergroup relations perspective. We were interested in locating gender as a salient social identity category and exploring the influence of norms in shaping communication on social media. To do this, we borrowed from the Social Identity model of Deindividuation Effects or SIDE framework which is useful in contextualizing and explaining CMC. This approach, rooted in social identity and social categorization theories is particularly suited to explore social media interactions among members of historically contested groups, and examine how group identification and the presence of norms facilitate identity performance, assertion, and opposition to outgroups ( Reicher et al., 1995 ; Perfumi, 2020 ). Thus we combined parallel but seldom overlapping approaches by examining online gender performance and its various strategies (underexplored in psychological literature beyond interpersonal approaches) from the lens of contested social identities, existing and emerging intergroup relations ( Webb and Temple, 2015 ).

SIDE and Identity Performance: Theoretical Framework

According to social identity theory, interactions between individuals can be located on a continuum between social identity salience, to the dominance of individual identity where interactions are interpersonal and directed by personal motives and desires. Applying this to CMC, Reicher et al. (1995) propose that in visually anonymous communication, the invisibility of personal identity leads to the salience of social identities, resulting in behavior that is in-group normative, through the process of depersonalization. Individuals self-categorize and perform their social identities in ways that are perceived to be normative, as well as evaluate others in comparison to the prototypical members of the outgroup ( Lea et al., 2001 ; Postmes et al., 2001 ). Interactions on the internet are marked by social identity cues and narratives that are dominant and guide these conversations ( Rains et al., 2017 ). These dominant discourses also influence how identities are performed online.

Identity performance is the “purposeful expression (or suppression) of behaviors relevant to those norms conventionally associated with a salient social identity” ( Klein et al., 2007 ). This performance goes beyond self-presentation as it is motivated by concerns for social identity. According to the “strategic aspect of SIDE,” this serves both functions of identity consolidation (protecting, upholding, and defending the salient social identity) as well as identity mobilization (acting in pursuit of group goals which, for instance includes, antagonizing the outgroup to prove their illegitimacy). Mobilization is particularly important as it closely relates to collective action and how social categories can shape norms, expectations, and social realities. Thus, in interactions between men and women when gender is salient as a social identity, the communication is not only shaped by the awareness of this identity and its normative performance, but also driven by the need to uphold the in-group identity, defend against the “other” as well create opportunities and narratives that the group can strive toward. Online, identity mobilization includes discursive strategies that establish group norms, underscore resistance, and often result in outgroup denigration ( Rains et al., 2017 ). Such interactions can create new rules of communication, new social realities of gender which move beyond online interactions to become larger gender discourses.

Research following the SIDE approach has revealed interesting processes that support its theoretical claims. For instance, Spears et al. (2002) showed that perceived social support in online interactions can facilitate collective in-group action and resistance to powerful outgroups. Rains et al. (2017) found that outgroup presence, previous hostility toward ingroup and intergroup bias were important predictors of online incivility. Applying the SIDE model specifically to the analysis of gender, Spears et al. (2014) , confirmed how women and men managed their identities differently in gender salient online communication. However, most of these were lab based experimental studies that do not necessarily address how identity performance and its various strategies are employed in uncontrolled social media interactions. We expanded this lens to look at how individuals use discursive techniques as strategies to perform their identities. Klein et al. (2007) emphasize the importance of discursive strategies in creating, maintaining, consolidating, and mobilizing social identities in its performative function. Examining intergroup relations through the lens of discursive techniques aid in understanding how identity-based norms prevail and shape interactions and are co-constructed through these very social interactions ( Durrheim et al., 2015 ).

In India, as social media use has expanded, so have conversations on gender norms and relations. More recently, social media have become increasingly politically polarized ( Neyazi, 2017 ) and witnessed intense debates and discussions around themes of sexual harassment ( Pain, 2020 ). Going online and participating on social media is often marked by anxiety and apprehension for Indian women. Women’s online experiences can be unpleasant, with repeated encounters of sexually inappropriate or aggressive behavior ( Karusala et al., 2019 ). Yet, the presence of women on social media has been viewed positively by many as a forum for feminist activism. Many women have participated in online campaigns on women’s safety, harassment, menstruation, and hygiene ( Mirani et al., 2014 ) and are using platforms like Twitter to actively engage in conversations around gender-based violence ( Gurman et al., 2018 ). Social media becoming a significant space for gender performance, resistance, and reconstruction are a globally relevant phenomenon. Ogan and Baş (2020) showed how social media were used as a platform for solidarity, resistance, and emotional expression toward violence against women in Turkey, Sylwander and Gottzén (2020) study revealed the strategic implications and resistance to gendered terms in online communication in Sweden, and, Cook and Hasmath (2014) presented a cross-cultural analysis of participation in the online #Slutwalk campaign, indicating several discourses around feminism, intersectionality, and the construction of gender. Thus, examining social media discourses on gender is not only widely applicable but also presents relevant contemporary debates that will help shape shifting gender understandings. For example, discussing the Men’s Rights Movement in India, Basu (2016) points out that the MRM and similar arguments from men often get represented in a typical anti-feminist discourse that is met with immediate retaliation or dismissal which can neglect underlying anxieties. The author notes that changing gender norms, resistance and laws are deeply embedded in a historical system of patriarchy that has consequences for men and women, and questions around contested feminism in a post-colonial society. This study adds to the relatively limited work on CMC and gender in the Global South ( Nova et al., 2019 ), diversifying this research, adding to the SIDE/CMC literature and its application in varied contexts and through multiple methods.

The Present Study

We explore online intergender communication among Indian social media users through a discursive lens. We approach this analysis from a social identity perspective rooted in social psychological theorization. We argue that in these discursive strategies, users actively perform their identities by reiterating existing and emerging gender norms that shape gender activism, resistance, and anxieties in online spaces. The analysis is informed by a three-step method (i) the context (existing gender norms in India), (ii) social identity (gender as the salient social identity), and (iii) identity performance (as proposed by the SIDE approach). The intersection of these three leads to the emergence of new norms of intergender communication, marked heavily by the use of meaningful terms and language, reshaping the larger context of gender relations ( Figure 1 ).

Figure 1 . Offline norms to online identity performance.

“Discourses are conversations or talk with an agenda” that represent and govern the present nature of social relationships and how individuals make sense of them ( Singer and Hunter, 1999 ). Rooting itself in discursive psychology, discourse analysis assists in providing an understanding of how social identity is constructed, as well as the effects of such identity construction ( Ainsworth and Hardy, 2004 ). Discursive studies of identity thus challenge many of the traditional assumptions of psychological research by showing how social resources construct individual identity ( Potter and Wetherell, 1987 ). Hence our aim was 3-fold (i) to identify and examine consistent language patterns in intergender communication on social media, (ii) to extract meaningful emerging discourses representing gender norms, and (iii) to analyze these themes according to the presented theoretical design: history of gender relations, salience of gender as a social identity category, use of gender normative language as performance of the salient identity, and the emergence of new norms for communication and behavior.

Materials and Methods

Selection procedure.

To explore discursive themes prominent in intergender social media interactions, we started out by scoping different social media forums to get a preliminary idea of the conversations. We chose to include comment threads on public pages on Facebook as our main data corpus. Webb and Temple (2015) identified Facebook as one of the leading online forums where gender performance can be studied given the presence of profile pictures, description and the interactive aspect of responding to posts and comments. Facebook is also the most used social media platform in India (except YouTube), which has public pages on a wide range of topics with a diverse socio-demographic participation ( Chakravarti, 2021 ; Kemp, 2021 ). On Facebook, we were interested in looking at pages which included those where gender was explicitly relevant (ex: pages on feminism) as well as others which were more generic and news oriented (ex: political and entertainment news). This was done to map the landscape of gender discourses across a range of pages with the intent of understanding if the specific terms were only used in gender-polarized pages or regardless of the content of these pages. We selected three public open Indian Facebook pages that emphasized interactions around gender and gendered behavior— Feminism in India , She The People , and Journal of an Indian Feminist ; and one page that showcases interactions between individuals of diverse socio-political views, The Print . Our data corpus timeline was particularly aimed at capturing the significant role that social media has played over the last year (2020–2021), in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting lockdown. While there was a global increase in social media use, the experience of the same was mixed ( Coronavirus: 87% Increase, 2020 ; The two sides of social media during COVID-19, 2021 ). Specifically in the Indian context, conversations around online violence, gender trolling, and sexual harassment almost tripled during the COVID-19 period, with gender trolling having the largest share of 47% of such conversations ( Quilt AI and ICRW, 2021 ).

A purposive sampling was done for posts in a two-phased manner—once in February–March 2020 and again during the same time in 2021—where we looked for words and expressions that were repeated and used as hashtags or specific meaningful terms ( Libutti, 1999 ). The criteria for selection of the comments were such that we only used the “top” comments on each post that had Facebook users replying to each other. One can choose the order in which comments are displayed on Facebook; we used the “Top Comments” order, which means that the comments with the most “likes” and “replies” were displayed first ( Mavoa et al., 2017 ). When comments were reported, usernames were removed, but the comments were copied unedited; as a result, any spelling errors, grammatical mistakes, spacing errors, or other typographic errors were reproduced to present the posts as precisely as possible ( Rademacher, 2018 ). We used the manual extraction (copying and pasting data into a spreadsheet) method to collect our data ( Abramson et al., 2014 ; Franz et al., 2019 ). In the first phase of data collection in 2020, 23 comment threads with a total of 72 comments from gender relevant pages and 14 threads of 37 comments from The Print were included in the sample. For the second phase, the sample consisted of 41 comment threads with a total of 110 comments, and 68 comment threads and a total 223 comments from The Print . In total, 442 comments ( n  = 442) were looked at four levels, as indicated in Table 1 .

Table 1 . Levels of a comment.

Data Analysis

The collected data were analyzed using thematic discourse analysis. The combination of thematic analysis with discourse analysis has been used previously ( Taylor and Ussher, 2001 ; Clarke, 2005 ) and is specifically recommended for analysis of internet-based discussions forums ( Simoni et al., 2014 ; Botelle and Willott, 2020 ). This method identifies themes in a text within a constructionist framework, focusing both on the rhetorical design and on the ideological implications of the themes ( Clarke, 2005 ). As part of social discursive psychology ( Harré and Gillet, 1994 ; Edwards and Potter, 2005 ), the relevance of symbolic artifacts in a community (languages, rituals, and relations) is emphasized to better understand their cultures. These social and discursive dynamics are important in virtual communities as well as individual user profiles who express emotions, beliefs, and desires through their discursive engagement online ( Scardigno and Mininni, 2020 ).

Subject matter, word function, and discursive characteristic were used to assign codes at the sentence or lexical item level ( Mavoa et al., 2017 ). The code frame was built through a mixture of deductive and inductive coding. The deductive code development was partly adapted from the approach of Jones et al. (2019) to studying misogynistic online harassment. An inductive reading of the comments found that this failed to capture some of the forms of interactions that were present and thus further categories were added. The code frame was then refined inductively, drawing on observations and analysis from the close reading of comment threads. This combination of deductive and inductive coding provides a more comprehensive code frame that captures diverse forms of interactions. Such an approach was supported by Freelon (2013 , p. 1186) who states that “researchers should feel free to appropriate and/or develop additional conversational measures” and “it may not always be necessary to measure all features as some will almost never be present in certain forums.” An inter-coder reliability test was conducted with two trained coders on 10% of the sample ( n  = 44), using Krippendorff’s alpha; the reliability scores were 0.944 and 0.956.

We followed six step guide of Braun and Clarke (2006) to analyze the data. The research team consisted of three researchers working on the data simultaneously. First, we read through the data set several times to familiarize ourselves with the material and had discussions to note initial ideas. Repetitive, relevant and meaningful discursive terms were identified as initial codes. These were then grouped together and categorized to form coherent themes that represented a larger discourse. The interpretation of these themes was done by reading and re-reading the text, discussions among the researchers and reference to relevant literature. This was overall informed by the theoretical approach by considering relevant concepts at every step of the analysis ( Taylor and Ussher, 2001 ; Braun and Clarke, 2006 ). As we collected data in two phases, we also reviewed the two datasets together to compare and define overarching themes. There was significant overlap and similarity between the codes generated from Phase I (2020) and Phase II (2021). Hence, we decided to combine the codes from both phases to form themes that represent discourses across the span of this one-year period, as shown in Table 2 .

Table 2 . Themes and codes overview.

Researcher’s Position and Ethical Consideration

We would like to acknowledge our positions as female researchers and social media users, and the influence of our gender identity and personal experiences on the research. However, we upheld the importance of a non-evaluative and non-judgmental stance, engaged reflexively with our social positions, and proceeded with utmost rigor at every step of this study. We had a team of multiple researchers and had regular discussions with a larger group of male and female researchers for feedback on our analysis. This process facilitated a reflexive journey rooted in collaboration and collective critical consciousness ( Mao et al., 2016 ). The study was approved as part of a larger project on online contact and intergroup attitudes by the Institutional Review Board of Ashoka University, India. We maintained complete data secrecy and confidentiality by anonymizing names and any potential identifiers. Facebook allows the use of data from public pages and since Facebook comments are publicly accessible, no consent was necessary or requested from either the page owners or users to evaluate the comments on their posts ( Abramson et al., 2014 ). Therefore, we only included posts and comments from public open pages for our analysis.

After coding and organizing the data, four major themes emerged that have been discussed below. Within each we refer to language and terms that signify what these discourses represent and the new identity norms they facilitate in the process of interaction. The discussion is also supported by direct comments from participants presented in the following section.

Feminism and Antifeminism

One of the most common discourses of contestation was the idea of feminism—what it means and how it is practiced. Firstly, in line with social identity theory, the notable effort to create an exclusive and distinct in-group (feminist) and outgroup (antifeminist) was prominent ( Durrheim et al., 2016 ). This was used both for the purpose of mobilization as well as consolidation, wherein group members willingly reiterated terms and meanings to ensure that their own identity is accepted as a valid ingroup member ( Klein et al., 2007 ). Members asserted and clarified their understanding of the feminist ideology by emphasizing that women should have their individual freedom, wear clothes of their choice, not face any societal pressure, or that feminism did not equate to “men haters” as seen in comments like: “It’s completely their own choice and no one can dictate a women what she should do!”; “If there were one article that ought to have convinced men that feminists aren’t out to get them, this should be it.” There were many instances of asserting the role of feminism against patriarchy , reflected in this comment:

Patriarchy is not gone, gender equality is still an aspiration for most societies, so yes feminism is still fighting for freedoms and will continue to, whether male entitlement likes it or not. And no men will not tell us how to fight and which brand of feminism they like or prefer!

The larger antifeminist discourse in our data included three consistent patterns of thought—the first was the perceived lack of “feminists” to accept critique, second was the perception of feminists as hyper aggressive and reactionary; “Many of these feminist on this page will react very violently and aggressively if something will not match with their views.” Lastly, there were assertions on female role stereotyping. The discursive connotations of female gender role stereotyping broadly reiterate that women should focus on their marriage, calling out female emancipation as being responsible for divorces, questioning their role as a mother and calling them a “gold digger.” In our data, telling women to keep their emotions in check, asking if they were menstruating or if it was their time of the month and blaming their hormones for their behavior was common. Jones et al. (2019) have reported such presence of gender stereotypes in Twitter comments, where sexism encompassed references to “get back to the kitchen” and “make me a sandwich.” One of the comments in our data also suggested something similar: “Apparently, a feminist has never experienced the joy of ironing a shirt and making a sandwich. No wonder they are chronically triggered.” We also found the stereotype of the female emotional brain , allegedly clouding women’s scope for logic. Women were often pronounced as too emotional to evaluate the status quo logically and rationally, to the point of being paralleled to children. Their inclination toward hyperemotionality was correlated to the lack of logic ( Jones et al., 2019 ). Importantly what was observed repeatedly was the need to maintain and establish category distinctions with “you women or your kind.”

(Re) Defining the “Feminist”

Within the feminist/antifeminist discourse, we identified the emergence of newer terms that represent specific definitions of these ideologies, for instance, Feminazi . The term originated in the 90s, when Rush Limbaugh described it as “a feminist to whom the most important thing in life is ensuring that as many abortions as possible occur.” This discursive understanding of feminazi as an avoidance of motherhood and an act of “selfishness” was apparent in our data as participants posted comments like:

If women like you and the feminazis here are incompetent to be a mother, abstain from that. Motherhood is a selfless act and most selfish women nowadays do not want to leave their comfort for their kids. That is postpartum depression in the majority of cases. Pure selfishness.

Carrying a strong weight with the “nazi” suffix, today the word is rather casually used such that in our corpus it was the most frequently appearing. Comments like “Leave these feminazis. These vultures always have problems in everything” and “Being a feminazi it’s her birthright to be a hypocrite. So let her be” used the word almost as synonymous with radicalizing the “feminist” and “female.”

A second term was Pseudofeminist ; which has been defined as a person who claims to be a feminist but ignores the main point of feminism, i.e., equality. This was often seen in the form of male and female participants questioning the feminists and “correcting” it as per their own ideology; one commented that “Most of the feminists do speak hate against men and then say they are just supporting women. So first decide the line of difference between Feminism and pseudo-feminism and then ask us to choose to be feminist or not.”

We found the use of anti-feminist terms by women as well. Here, women dissociated from the so-called feminists or used the same kind of retaliation as by non-feminists (usually men). Most such female participants questioned the idea of feminism: “Pseudo feminism is not feminism. Get your fckin facts straight today. And the women you talk about doing crimes on men are criminals. Start seeing beyond gender if you ever wanna mature.” Research has shown that women and groups of women who self-identify as “non-feminists” or “anti-feminist” often reiterate the discourses largely popularized by Men’s Rights groups ( DeKeseredy et al., 2015 ). Some women feel alienated by the dominant feminist discourse, especially if they are not directly affected by the arguments that shape the normative standards of the ideology, such as equal rights in the workplace ( Lorenzi-Cioldi, 1991 ). Identity performance in front of an outgroup can be both threatening and intimidating. While this leads to some members upholding their norms, being defensive and vindictive toward the outgroup, other individuals may refrain from identifying with the ingroup ( Klein et al., 2007 ).

A third prominent theme here included an assertion that women and feminists accrue power and sympathy through the escalation of “false rape claims” or by “ playing the victim .” This was visible in comments like: “Just another fragile feminist not happy she will not get away with self-victimization narrative!” Playing the victim has become an increasingly common discourse around women specific crimes in India in the recent past with many pointing out that the existing laws on domestic violence, rape and sexual assault are heavily biased toward women, who can easily manipulate and exploit the system at the cost of innocent men ( Mishra, 2019 ; Navin and Jangid, n.d. ). Within the discourse on feminism, “playing the victim card” has been used as strategies for counterattack, often by other women, since it positions those who voice their stories as weak ( Donaghue, 2015 ). Issues of victimization brought up by women were met with a strong assertion of whataboutery , whereby members (mostly men) denied relevance of the female identity experience and rather questioned them about issues of ‘importance’. Comments like “what about the guy who committed suicide because of the extreme harassment by his wife?” directly raise the “what about” question, while others like “media is busy with its agenda of gender discrimination even during a pandemic” indirectly deny the relevance of gender.

Along with instances of women resisting perceived notions of feminism, as well as men aligning with the same, there was a notable amount of solidarity. Women spoke in support of women and men supported men. The solidarity was also expressed by shaming the other and their lack of knowledge, comprehension, and compassion. These were instances of discursive activism on contested and volatile themes seen in comments like, “Stop femsplaining misandrist. We do not need women to tell what should a man do or how should he express his emotions. We know what is best for us.” The scope of CMC to arouse collective emotions, perceptions of commonality, connection and disadvantage, and the ability to express opinions that are believed to be shared by the ingroup ( Spears and Postmes, 2015 ) enhances in-group solidarity when categories are salient, and exchanges are particularly antagonistic.

The Manosphere

Closely connected, but distinct from the discourse on feminism, was the discussion around men’s rights and their position in a transitioning society. This again involved two major threads—the first was a description of the “manosphere,” primarily by women, and the second was the assertion of Men’s rights, largely by men. The manosphere was referred to as a misogynistic space; an identity represented by MCP (Male chauvinist Pigs) with not only salient normative markers (misogynistic) but also associated with negative traits of being uneducated and violent; a few comments read:

“Why do not you go drink with your loser MCP buddies, cry and complain that women are not “traditional” like before, dare to talk back to men, dare to wear eyeliner, cry and wail about it, then go home and beat up your wife to you know, put her in her place? THAT will make you feel like a man.”

“The fact is the inbuilt misogyny of our society. But to see that, one needs to be well-read, cultured and have a balanced mind. Too much to expect from an MCP!”

In these exchanges, we see a denunciation of outgroup values and traits which is also rooted in context, wherein the speakers are challenging traditional societal (patriarchal and sexist) norms defining gender roles. Thus discursively, using terms that describe the “manosphere,” speakers are subverting established norms and performing their salient identities. This was often met by counter claims of Male Bashing , a term used to describe the unreasonable and unnecessary disregarding of men, complimenting the previously mentioned “hyper feminist” discourse, as seen in comments like—“Every toxic feminist on this page are just bashing men aggressively. It just shows huge double standards of these feminazis”; “Typical men hating bigot feminist playing victim card and bashing men. What u are doing to me is just mental harassment if a man say the same thing to u.”

The internet has been key to the popularization of men’s rights activism and discourse ( Lily, 2016 ; Schmitz and Kazyak, 2016 ). While the manosphere includes a variety of groups, including Men’s Rights Activisms (MRAs), men going their own way (MGOW), incels (involuntary celibates), and so on, they share a central belief that feminine values dominate society, which is a fact suppressed by feminists and men must fight back against an overreaching, misandrist culture to protect their very existence ( Marwick and Lewis, 2017 ).

Men Going Their Own Way refers to the group of men who have vowed to not pursue romantic relationships with women to focus on their self-development and preservation ( Jones et al., 2019 ). Comments like “Feminism is a disease, MGTOW is the cure” highlight how the discursive understanding of MGTOW is rooted in the anti-feminist rhetoric. This identity is proudly flaunted as a marker of choice and superiority, even in conversations with unknown women online; one such comment was “I chose MGTOW because I prefer to keep all my life’s earnings, avoid the cheating practices of women, and avoid unnecessary stress and drama.” The core tenets of MGTOW are situated in the MRA discourse; this movement is characterized by the assertion that women hold unfair systemic and social advantages as a result of the feminist movement, which has “oppressed” men ( O’Donnell, 2020 ). This assertion was seen in the comments like:

Men’s Rights Activism is for men that have dealt with the system up front and personal. It’s for men that have dealt with abusive sisters, mothers and girlfriends. It’s for men that have been chewed up and spit out by divorce courts and realize that marriage is not a good deal for men. It’s for men that are tired of the double standards in society that hurt men.

By saying this, MRAs adopt a defensible position as the suffering victim, turning feminist activism on its head and re-framing it as oppressive ( Marwick and Caplan, 2018 ). MRA and MGTOW, which until recently were used almost exclusively within the manosphere, functions as part of a common linguistic practice on social media. This creates a sense of community across divergent subgroups, builds ties between individuals, and helps to solidify the ideological commitment of MRAs to oppose feminism. It also exists as a tool to counter feminist language and ideas ( Marwick and Caplan, 2018 ).

The Incels group is closely associated with the MRA; they are self-identified “involuntary celibates” harboring hostility toward women for denying them sex, which they believe they inherently deserve ( Jones et al., 2019 ). However, this group of the manosphere did not assert their identity, but it was rather used by women as a way of trolling men. Any instances of anti-feminist comments by men were countered or challenged by terming it as “Incel” with a discursive implication of ridiculing and dismissing the other, as seen in a comment: “Ignore him. It’s a faceless incel troll who posts here because this is the only way he will get any interaction with women. Otherwise rejected product in real life.” The creation of fake IDs, abusing women online, keeping their identity anonymous and getting blocked were some of the behaviors that female participants called out in their use of the Incel discourse for any man online, whether they actually identified as such or not: “No one as useless as faceless incel trolls here who made dozens of fake IDs to spam, abuse women daily and post illogical nonsensical comments even after their IDs are restricted repeatedly.” It is interesting to see how the word is used in interactions between ideologically competing groups, during which both MRAs and feminists negotiate the meaning of Incel . In such instances, each group defines and makes meaning of the word according to their own ideologies and beliefs ( Marwick and Caplan, 2018 ). While Incel has a shared meaning, it is leveraged toward different ends. Thus, the use of the term is action- or -practice-oriented, serving to orient one group toward another: Incels against feminists, or feminists against Incels. Additionally, it is important to mention the emergence of the discourse on Manosphere in the Indian (and similar) context. MGTOW is not a familiar term in offline spaces yet, highlighting the influence of social media in creating and reframing gender discourses. These findings support claims made by the SIDE model, that minority influence and activism can help shift opinions toward itself in online settings ( Perfumi, 2020 ).

We also noted the frequently occurring term Mansplaining . The origins of mansplaining can be traced back to a 2008 blog post titled “Men explain things to me” ( Solnit, 2012 ). The term is generally used to refer to an explanation, usually offered by a man, which is patronizing, condescending, or ignores women’s experience and knowledge ( Rothman, 2012 ). In our data, mansplaining was often used by women as a counter to assertions of the perceived manosphere: “Women here know better than trolls and need no mansplaining on any side of any story”; “You learn cooking yourself before mansplaining and lecturing women.” Using hashtags like #Mansplaining is a way to draw from dominant discourses on gender that heavily influence interactions online. It includes a performative aspect of social identity and what is believed to be prototypical in-group behavior ( Postmes and Spears, 2013 ). This term is widely used and has become a common signifier of the feminist discourse ( Lutzky and Lawson, 2019 ). Thus, women often used this term, irrespective of the comment by the outgroup, to uphold ingroup norms and assert their salient identity values that have become markers of the widely perceived feminist discourse, especially on social media.

Intersectional Identities

Intersectionality or the interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender as they apply to a given individual or group is a core element of feminist analysis ( Aldoory et al., 2008 ). In the Indian context, this intersectionality is particularly salient between four facets of one’s social identity—gender (male or female), caste (Upper and lower or Dalits), religion (Hindu or Muslim), and political ideology (Right wing or Left and Liberal). We noted several emerging themes that represent both the establishment of new identity norms (for feminism and gender identity) as well as challenge the power dynamics within existing narratives. Here, labels like Savarna Liberal Feminism and Urban Feminism were used to underline differences within this shared discourse. Speakers questioned the ideological intention of others by emphasizing their privilege and highlighting the elite nature of Indian feminism that has a liberal, usually urban and upper-caste or Savarna perspective. Comments like “Savarna liberal Feminism will never talk about a Dalit woman” and “Ever heard of Dalit Feminism? Please read more about it” point to this. Another term, Choice Feminism was used to indicate the selective and individualistic nature of feminism, with one participant commenting, “Fuck your liberal choice feminism. It’s completely toothless against the patriarchy, as you only think about yourself. You liberals and your individualistic policies.” Another comment read:

These urban feminists will not fight the real fires faced by women in serious oppressive conditions, but will create a pseudo crisis, where there is none, so that you scream fire and do the bare minimum without getting your hands dirty in the real mess.

Interestingly, men used intersectionality as part of the antifeminist discourse, where the ideology of feminism was coupled with right wing extremism, to delegitimize the claim. One of the comments was, “Are you really a feminist? You sound more like a fascist andh bhakt. Control your emotions and stop telling men what to do or not to do.” While the stereotype that feminists hate men is as old as feminism itself, adopting “facism” as a synonym for “feminism” allows men to appropriate the language of authoritarian identity politics and claim a victimized stance. In contemporary India, the Sanskrit term bhakt is used to denote supporters of the Hindu right wing, to equate their following with a devotee’s blind faith in their deity ( Khan, 2015 ). In this discursive exchange, we note a strategic identity performance where a separate but intersectional identity is used to underline authoritarianism and extremism in outgroup’s stance, thereby demobilizing them ( Klein et al., 2007 ). Interestingly, the bhakt or right-wing label is more popularly used for a masculine, militarized stance dominated by men ( Grewal, 2020 ), but in these interactions, similar to the use of the term “Incel” we see the strategic use of a common term, in contrasting ways by men and women.

Threat, Sex, and Violence

In the themes discussed so far, we found many argumentative, defensive, and critical interactions between the speakers. However, there were a few recurring terms that were particularly and intentionally offensive and violent. Most of these related to sexual habits and choices and were used when describing behaviors perceived as threatening to accepted societal norms. These included #Slut for women and #Fuckboi and Simp for men. As identified by Peters (2017) , the term “fuckboy” (alternatively spelled “fuckboi” or “fuccboi”) is the first sexualized insult for men and most studies point to this character as a careless, misogynistic, and sex infatuated man with an absence of social skills. In our analysis, we saw the use of “#Fuckboi” by women when they were labeled as “sluts” or “whores” by men, through comments like, “Fuckbois act so fragile that even an article which has nothing to do with them hurts their glassy balls.” Several comments included terms against men who supported women in the comment threads, with the use of terms like “Sissy,” “Simp,” and “Small Cock.” The term simp refers to a male who overly desires female attention ( Lomas, 2018-2019 ), thus seen as an outlier of the manosphere. One such comment was: “My anti feminism is not women hating. But I hate simps though.” In another instance, a male participant questioned the number of likes a comment by a woman had received, by calling out the men who had liked it: “The saddest part is a few of the likes she got for that comment is from simping small cocks.” As argued by Jones et al. (2019) , the real tension for men is to prove their in-group membership by demonstrating a rejection of women. Such a rejection is more of a performance for their male peers, rather than a specific and deliberate attack on women. Demonstration of this masculinity also involves the rejection of non-masculine men. This corroborates findings that the presence of women on social media is seen as an ambitious threat to the notions of Indian masculinity ( Halder and Jaishankar, 2016 ).

Using hateful and violent language or flaming has been a recurring area of enquiry in CMC research ( Postmes et al., 2000 ; Moor, 2007 ; Hutchens et al., 2015 ). Identification with the ingroup and perceptions of offending by the outgroup, predicts why individuals flame in an online context. Beyond self-directed or individual factors, social identity plays an important role in online flaming. Our data support previous work, given the consistent presence of reactive aggression throughout the exchanges ( Hutchens et al., 2015 ). Comments perceived as threatening to the ingroup social identity were met with particularly hostile responses ( Moor, 2007 ; Perfumi, 2020 ). In the analyzed comments, where gender was salient due to the nature and themes of conversation as well as self-identification and categorization of speakers, the performance of identity was persistently aggressive, largely dismissive of the outgroup, as well as creative in its ability to use terms in ways that are self-serving to the in-group. When social identity cues are visible and relevant in an online context (as in these Facebook pages), participants are more likely to stereotype outgroup members. We noted the strong presence of gender stereotypes that ranged from traditional offline references to relatively novel terms indicating the emergence of new definitions of gender identity. Hutchens et al. (2015) found that online norms supporting flaming was an important determinant of flaming behavior and participants who used online platforms where political flaming was common, were more likely to do the same themselves. Most of our data included highly contested discussion on pages where flaming may be common. Thus, individuals interacting on these pages could perceive this as normative and use aggressive defenses more readily.

Due to the limited scope of our study, we were unable to examine a larger data corpus across a wider range of online pages, which may reveal differences in discursive content. Even though our data corpus picks on intersectionality, it does not completely reflect India’s masculinities and femininities and its rather large offline space. Moreover, even in the online space, future research must investigate a wider corpus of online gender discourses to confirm the consistency of these themes and potentially reveal more cross-cultural discourses. While this analysis sheds light on how the internet has ushered in a new era of digital activism and identity performance, it falls short of elucidating the long-term implications of such discursive digital identities. For instance, our findings are in line with previous research highlighting online incivility and its potential for polarizing discourses among politically aligned groups by highlighting similar patterns of uncivil discourses among gender groups ( Anderson et al., 2018 ). This underscores the need to focus on group-based interactions on social media and its long-term implications beyond political affiliation, to other contested identities. Studying online movements like MRA and Feminism leaves significant gaps in our knowledge of the specific emotions and justification of the speakers. We invite researchers to look into these gaps in the hopes of shedding light on such complexities.

We examined social media interactions between men and women on public Facebook pages, around the contested themes of feminism and gender. In doing so our main aim was to explore these discursive strategies as social identity performances that are goal directed and normative. We analyzed the data with reference to the context which is marked by transforming gender understandings, and identified the emergence of new forms of discursive activism in online forums. We found that speakers conflicted over the discourse of feminism in various ways, by using traditional as well as novel terms that refer to descriptive meanings of gender categories. These included new discourses within feminism (pseudo feminism and choice feminism) and men’s rights (Incels, MGTOW, etc.). There were also instances of flaming where the traditionally contested space of sex and sexual choice was used to challenge shifting gender roles. Lastly, interactions also highlighted several challenges to established meanings of feminism, by pointing toward intersectional identities. The findings add to the examination of digital influences on changing gender relations in the Global South, specifically from a social psychological perspective. They highlight how social identity and related norms are evolving through online interactions and shaping changing meanings and constructs of gender. As Perfumi (2020) suggests, these findings can contribute to an engaged understanding of normative influences on social media interactions and be particularly helpful in identifying both positive identity assertions by historically disadvantaged groups, as well as the negative consequences of online flaming and identity polarization. Moreover, the development of new discourses that are born out of digital spaces and interactions can extend beyond online communities to influence offline identification and gender relations. Thus, the findings reiterate a complicated and critical understanding of CMC that is both enabling gendered expressions and at the same time reinforcing gender-based anxieties that could result in unfulfilling and negative social media experiences.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material; further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.

Ethics Statement

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by Ashoka University Institutional Review Board. Written informed consent for participation was not required for this study in accordance with national legislation and institutional requirements.

Author Contributions

SM was the principal investigator and responsible for designing and undertaking the study overall, specially analysis and reporting. MT was the lead researcher and has worked on the method and design as well as data collection. DJ and KB were research assistants involved in data collation and supervised analysis, literature review and writing. All authors contributed to the article and approved the submitted version.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Keywords: social media, social identity, SIDE, CMC, gender, feminism

Citation: Majumdar S, Tewatia M, Jamkhedkar D and Bhatia K (2022) “You Don’t Know Me so Don’t Try to Judge Me”: Gender and Identity Performance on Social Media Among Young Indian Users. Front. Psychol . 13:855947. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.855947

Received: 16 January 2022; Accepted: 23 May 2022; Published: 17 June 2022.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2022 Majumdar, Tewatia, Jamkhedkar and Bhatia. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Sramana Majumdar, [email protected]

Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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Research Article

Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator

Contributed equally to this work with: Paola Belingheri, Filippo Chiarello, Andrea Fronzetti Colladon, Paola Rovelli

Roles Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Dipartimento di Ingegneria dell’Energia, dei Sistemi, del Territorio e delle Costruzioni, Università degli Studi di Pisa, Largo L. Lazzarino, Pisa, Italy

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Roles Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Methodology, Software, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

* E-mail: [email protected]

Affiliations Department of Engineering, University of Perugia, Perugia, Italy, Department of Management, Kozminski University, Warsaw, Poland

Roles Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing

Affiliation Faculty of Economics and Management, Centre for Family Business Management, Free University of Bozen-Bolzano, Bozen-Bolzano, Italy

• Paola Belingheri, 
• Filippo Chiarello, 
• Andrea Fronzetti Colladon, 
• Paola Rovelli

• Published: September 21, 2021
• https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474
• Reader Comments

9 Nov 2021: The PLOS ONE Staff (2021) Correction: Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator. PLOS ONE 16(11): e0259930. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0259930 View correction

Gender equality is a major problem that places women at a disadvantage thereby stymieing economic growth and societal advancement. In the last two decades, extensive research has been conducted on gender related issues, studying both their antecedents and consequences. However, existing literature reviews fail to provide a comprehensive and clear picture of what has been studied so far, which could guide scholars in their future research. Our paper offers a scoping review of a large portion of the research that has been published over the last 22 years, on gender equality and related issues, with a specific focus on business and economics studies. Combining innovative methods drawn from both network analysis and text mining, we provide a synthesis of 15,465 scientific articles. We identify 27 main research topics, we measure their relevance from a semantic point of view and the relationships among them, highlighting the importance of each topic in the overall gender discourse. We find that prominent research topics mostly relate to women in the workforce–e.g., concerning compensation, role, education, decision-making and career progression. However, some of them are losing momentum, and some other research trends–for example related to female entrepreneurship, leadership and participation in the board of directors–are on the rise. Besides introducing a novel methodology to review broad literature streams, our paper offers a map of the main gender-research trends and presents the most popular and the emerging themes, as well as their intersections, outlining important avenues for future research.

Citation: Belingheri P, Chiarello F, Fronzetti Colladon A, Rovelli P (2021) Twenty years of gender equality research: A scoping review based on a new semantic indicator. PLoS ONE 16(9): e0256474. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474

Editor: Elisa Ughetto, Politecnico di Torino, ITALY

Received: June 25, 2021; Accepted: August 6, 2021; Published: September 21, 2021

Copyright: © 2021 Belingheri et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License , which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Data Availability: All relevant data are within the manuscript and its supporting information files. The only exception is the text of the abstracts (over 15,000) that we have downloaded from Scopus. These abstracts can be retrieved from Scopus, but we do not have permission to redistribute them.

Funding: P.B and F.C.: Grant of the Department of Energy, Systems, Territory and Construction of the University of Pisa (DESTEC) for the project “Measuring Gender Bias with Semantic Analysis: The Development of an Assessment Tool and its Application in the European Space Industry. P.B., F.C., A.F.C., P.R.: Grant of the Italian Association of Management Engineering (AiIG), “Misure di sostegno ai soci giovani AiIG” 2020, for the project “Gender Equality Through Data Intelligence (GEDI)”. F.C.: EU project ASSETs+ Project (Alliance for Strategic Skills addressing Emerging Technologies in Defence) EAC/A03/2018 - Erasmus+ programme, Sector Skills Alliances, Lot 3: Sector Skills Alliance for implementing a new strategic approach (Blueprint) to sectoral cooperation on skills G.A. NUMBER: 612678-EPP-1-2019-1-IT-EPPKA2-SSA-B.

Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Introduction

The persistent gender inequalities that currently exist across the developed and developing world are receiving increasing attention from economists, policymakers, and the general public [e.g., 1 – 3 ]. Economic studies have indicated that women’s education and entry into the workforce contributes to social and economic well-being [e.g., 4 , 5 ], while their exclusion from the labor market and from managerial positions has an impact on overall labor productivity and income per capita [ 6 , 7 ]. The United Nations selected gender equality, with an emphasis on female education, as part of the Millennium Development Goals [ 8 ], and gender equality at-large as one of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030 [ 9 ]. These latter objectives involve not only developing nations, but rather all countries, to achieve economic, social and environmental well-being.

As is the case with many SDGs, gender equality is still far from being achieved and persists across education, access to opportunities, or presence in decision-making positions [ 7 , 10 , 11 ]. As we enter the last decade for the SDGs’ implementation, and while we are battling a global health pandemic, effective and efficient action becomes paramount to reach this ambitious goal.

Scholars have dedicated a massive effort towards understanding gender equality, its determinants, its consequences for women and society, and the appropriate actions and policies to advance women’s equality. Many topics have been covered, ranging from women’s education and human capital [ 12 , 13 ] and their role in society [e.g., 14 , 15 ], to their appointment in firms’ top ranked positions [e.g., 16 , 17 ] and performance implications [e.g., 18 , 19 ]. Despite some attempts, extant literature reviews provide a narrow view on these issues, restricted to specific topics–e.g., female students’ presence in STEM fields [ 20 ], educational gender inequality [ 5 ], the gender pay gap [ 21 ], the glass ceiling effect [ 22 ], leadership [ 23 ], entrepreneurship [ 24 ], women’s presence on the board of directors [ 25 , 26 ], diversity management [ 27 ], gender stereotypes in advertisement [ 28 ], or specific professions [ 29 ]. A comprehensive view on gender-related research, taking stock of key findings and under-studied topics is thus lacking.

Extant literature has also highlighted that gender issues, and their economic and social ramifications, are complex topics that involve a large number of possible antecedents and outcomes [ 7 ]. Indeed, gender equality actions are most effective when implemented in unison with other SDGs (e.g., with SDG 8, see [ 30 ]) in a synergetic perspective [ 10 ]. Many bodies of literature (e.g., business, economics, development studies, sociology and psychology) approach the problem of achieving gender equality from different perspectives–often addressing specific and narrow aspects. This sometimes leads to a lack of clarity about how different issues, circumstances, and solutions may be related in precipitating or mitigating gender inequality or its effects. As the number of papers grows at an increasing pace, this issue is exacerbated and there is a need to step back and survey the body of gender equality literature as a whole. There is also a need to examine synergies between different topics and approaches, as well as gaps in our understanding of how different problems and solutions work together. Considering the important topic of women’s economic and social empowerment, this paper aims to fill this gap by answering the following research question: what are the most relevant findings in the literature on gender equality and how do they relate to each other ?

To do so, we conduct a scoping review [ 31 ], providing a synthesis of 15,465 articles dealing with gender equity related issues published in the last twenty-two years, covering both the periods of the MDGs and the SDGs (i.e., 2000 to mid 2021) in all the journals indexed in the Academic Journal Guide’s 2018 ranking of business and economics journals. Given the huge amount of research conducted on the topic, we adopt an innovative methodology, which relies on social network analysis and text mining. These techniques are increasingly adopted when surveying large bodies of text. Recently, they were applied to perform analysis of online gender communication differences [ 32 ] and gender behaviors in online technology communities [ 33 ], to identify and classify sexual harassment instances in academia [ 34 ], and to evaluate the gender inclusivity of disaster management policies [ 35 ].

Applied to the title, abstracts and keywords of the articles in our sample, this methodology allows us to identify a set of 27 recurrent topics within which we automatically classify the papers. Introducing additional novelty, by means of the Semantic Brand Score (SBS) indicator [ 36 ] and the SBS BI app [ 37 ], we assess the importance of each topic in the overall gender equality discourse and its relationships with the other topics, as well as trends over time, with a more accurate description than that offered by traditional literature reviews relying solely on the number of papers presented in each topic.

This methodology, applied to gender equality research spanning the past twenty-two years, enables two key contributions. First, we extract the main message that each document is conveying and how this is connected to other themes in literature, providing a rich picture of the topics that are at the center of the discourse, as well as of the emerging topics. Second, by examining the semantic relationship between topics and how tightly their discourses are linked, we can identify the key relationships and connections between different topics. This semi-automatic methodology is also highly reproducible with minimum effort.

This literature review is organized as follows. In the next section, we present how we selected relevant papers and how we analyzed them through text mining and social network analysis. We then illustrate the importance of 27 selected research topics, measured by means of the SBS indicator. In the results section, we present an overview of the literature based on the SBS results–followed by an in-depth narrative analysis of the top 10 topics (i.e., those with the highest SBS) and their connections. Subsequently, we highlight a series of under-studied connections between the topics where there is potential for future research. Through this analysis, we build a map of the main gender-research trends in the last twenty-two years–presenting the most popular themes. We conclude by highlighting key areas on which research should focused in the future.

Our aim is to map a broad topic, gender equality research, that has been approached through a host of different angles and through different disciplines. Scoping reviews are the most appropriate as they provide the freedom to map different themes and identify literature gaps, thereby guiding the recommendation of new research agendas [ 38 ].

Several practical approaches have been proposed to identify and assess the underlying topics of a specific field using big data [ 39 – 41 ], but many of them fail without proper paper retrieval and text preprocessing. This is specifically true for a research field such as the gender-related one, which comprises the work of scholars from different backgrounds. In this section, we illustrate a novel approach for the analysis of scientific (gender-related) papers that relies on methods and tools of social network analysis and text mining. Our procedure has four main steps: (1) data collection, (2) text preprocessing, (3) keywords extraction and classification, and (4) evaluation of semantic importance and image.

Data collection

In this study, we analyze 22 years of literature on gender-related research. Following established practice for scoping reviews [ 42 ], our data collection consisted of two main steps, which we summarize here below.

Firstly, we retrieved from the Scopus database all the articles written in English that contained the term “gender” in their title, abstract or keywords and were published in a journal listed in the Academic Journal Guide 2018 ranking of the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS) ( https://charteredabs.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/AJG2018-Methodology.pdf ), considering the time period from Jan 2000 to May 2021. We used this information considering that abstracts, titles and keywords represent the most informative part of a paper, while using the full-text would increase the signal-to-noise ratio for information extraction. Indeed, these textual elements already demonstrated to be reliable sources of information for the task of domain lexicon extraction [ 43 , 44 ]. We chose Scopus as source of literature because of its popularity, its update rate, and because it offers an API to ease the querying process. Indeed, while it does not allow to retrieve the full text of scientific articles, the Scopus API offers access to titles, abstracts, citation information and metadata for all its indexed scholarly journals. Moreover, we decided to focus on the journals listed in the AJG 2018 ranking because we were interested in reviewing business and economics related gender studies only. The AJG is indeed widely used by universities and business schools as a reference point for journal and research rigor and quality. This first step, executed in June 2021, returned more than 55,000 papers.

In the second step–because a look at the papers showed very sparse results, many of which were not in line with the topic of this literature review (e.g., papers dealing with health care or medical issues, where the word gender indicates the gender of the patients)–we applied further inclusion criteria to make the sample more focused on the topic of this literature review (i.e., women’s gender equality issues). Specifically, we only retained those papers mentioning, in their title and/or abstract, both gender-related keywords (e.g., daughter, female, mother) and keywords referring to bias and equality issues (e.g., equality, bias, diversity, inclusion). After text pre-processing (see next section), keywords were first identified from a frequency-weighted list of words found in the titles, abstracts and keywords in the initial list of papers, extracted through text mining (following the same approach as [ 43 ]). They were selected by two of the co-authors independently, following respectively a bottom up and a top-down approach. The bottom-up approach consisted of examining the words found in the frequency-weighted list and classifying those related to gender and equality. The top-down approach consisted in searching in the word list for notable gender and equality-related words. Table 1 reports the sets of keywords we considered, together with some examples of words that were used to search for their presence in the dataset (a full list is provided in the S1 Text ). At end of this second step, we obtained a final sample of 15,465 relevant papers.

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https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t001

Text processing and keyword extraction

Text preprocessing aims at structuring text into a form that can be analyzed by statistical models. In the present section, we describe the preprocessing steps we applied to paper titles and abstracts, which, as explained below, partially follow a standard text preprocessing pipeline [ 45 ]. These activities have been performed using the R package udpipe [ 46 ].

The first step is n-gram extraction (i.e., a sequence of words from a given text sample) to identify which n-grams are important in the analysis, since domain-specific lexicons are often composed by bi-grams and tri-grams [ 47 ]. Multi-word extraction is usually implemented with statistics and linguistic rules, thus using the statistical properties of n-grams or machine learning approaches [ 48 ]. However, for the present paper, we used Scopus metadata in order to have a more effective and efficient n-grams collection approach [ 49 ]. We used the keywords of each paper in order to tag n-grams with their associated keywords automatically. Using this greedy approach, it was possible to collect all the keywords listed by the authors of the papers. From this list, we extracted only keywords composed by two, three and four words, we removed all the acronyms and rare keywords (i.e., appearing in less than 1% of papers), and we clustered keywords showing a high orthographic similarity–measured using a Levenshtein distance [ 50 ] lower than 2, considering these groups of keywords as representing same concepts, but expressed with different spelling. After tagging the n-grams in the abstracts, we followed a common data preparation pipeline that consists of the following steps: (i) tokenization, that splits the text into tokens (i.e., single words and previously tagged multi-words); (ii) removal of stop-words (i.e. those words that add little meaning to the text, usually being very common and short functional words–such as “and”, “or”, or “of”); (iii) parts-of-speech tagging, that is providing information concerning the morphological role of a word and its morphosyntactic context (e.g., if the token is a determiner, the next token is a noun or an adjective with very high confidence, [ 51 ]); and (iv) lemmatization, which consists in substituting each word with its dictionary form (or lemma). The output of the latter step allows grouping together the inflected forms of a word. For example, the verbs “am”, “are”, and “is” have the shared lemma “be”, or the nouns “cat” and “cats” both share the lemma “cat”. We preferred lemmatization over stemming [ 52 ] in order to obtain more interpretable results.

In addition, we identified a further set of keywords (with respect to those listed in the “keywords” field) by applying a series of automatic words unification and removal steps, as suggested in past research [ 53 , 54 ]. We removed: sparse terms (i.e., occurring in less than 0.1% of all documents), common terms (i.e., occurring in more than 10% of all documents) and retained only nouns and adjectives. It is relevant to notice that no document was lost due to these steps. We then used the TF-IDF function [ 55 ] to produce a new list of keywords. We additionally tested other approaches for the identification and clustering of keywords–such as TextRank [ 56 ] or Latent Dirichlet Allocation [ 57 ]–without obtaining more informative results.

Classification of research topics

To guide the literature analysis, two experts met regularly to examine the sample of collected papers and to identify the main topics and trends in gender research. Initially, they conducted brainstorming sessions on the topics they expected to find, due to their knowledge of the literature. This led to an initial list of topics. Subsequently, the experts worked independently, also supported by the keywords in paper titles and abstracts extracted with the procedure described above.

Considering all this information, each expert identified and clustered relevant keywords into topics. At the end of the process, the two assignments were compared and exhibited a 92% agreement. Another meeting was held to discuss discordant cases and reach a consensus. This resulted in a list of 27 topics, briefly introduced in Table 2 and subsequently detailed in the following sections.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t002

Evaluation of semantic importance

Working on the lemmatized corpus of the 15,465 papers included in our sample, we proceeded with the evaluation of semantic importance trends for each topic and with the analysis of their connections and prevalent textual associations. To this aim, we used the Semantic Brand Score indicator [ 36 ], calculated through the SBS BI webapp [ 37 ] that also produced a brand image report for each topic. For this study we relied on the computing resources of the ENEA/CRESCO infrastructure [ 58 ].

The Semantic Brand Score (SBS) is a measure of semantic importance that combines methods of social network analysis and text mining. It is usually applied for the analysis of (big) textual data to evaluate the importance of one or more brands, names, words, or sets of keywords [ 36 ]. Indeed, the concept of “brand” is intended in a flexible way and goes beyond products or commercial brands. In this study, we evaluate the SBS time-trends of the keywords defining the research topics discussed in the previous section. Semantic importance comprises the three dimensions of topic prevalence, diversity and connectivity. Prevalence measures how frequently a research topic is used in the discourse. The more a topic is mentioned by scientific articles, the more the research community will be aware of it, with possible increase of future studies; this construct is partly related to that of brand awareness [ 59 ]. This effect is even stronger, considering that we are analyzing the title, abstract and keywords of the papers, i.e. the parts that have the highest visibility. A very important characteristic of the SBS is that it considers the relationships among words in a text. Topic importance is not just a matter of how frequently a topic is mentioned, but also of the associations a topic has in the text. Specifically, texts are transformed into networks of co-occurring words, and relationships are studied through social network analysis [ 60 ]. This step is necessary to calculate the other two dimensions of our semantic importance indicator. Accordingly, a social network of words is generated for each time period considered in the analysis–i.e., a graph made of n nodes (words) and E edges weighted by co-occurrence frequency, with W being the set of edge weights. The keywords representing each topic were clustered into single nodes.

The construct of diversity relates to that of brand image [ 59 ], in the sense that it considers the richness and distinctiveness of textual (topic) associations. Considering the above-mentioned networks, we calculated diversity using the distinctiveness centrality metric–as in the formula presented by Fronzetti Colladon and Naldi [ 61 ].

Lastly, connectivity was measured as the weighted betweenness centrality [ 62 , 63 ] of each research topic node. We used the formula presented by Wasserman and Faust [ 60 ]. The dimension of connectivity represents the “brokerage power” of each research topic–i.e., how much it can serve as a bridge to connect other terms (and ultimately topics) in the discourse [ 36 ].

The SBS is the final composite indicator obtained by summing the standardized scores of prevalence, diversity and connectivity. Standardization was carried out considering all the words in the corpus, for each specific timeframe.

This methodology, applied to a large and heterogeneous body of text, enables to automatically identify two important sets of information that add value to the literature review. Firstly, the relevance of each topic in literature is measured through a composite indicator of semantic importance, rather than simply looking at word frequencies. This provides a much richer picture of the topics that are at the center of the discourse, as well as of the topics that are emerging in the literature. Secondly, it enables to examine the extent of the semantic relationship between topics, looking at how tightly their discourses are linked. In a field such as gender equality, where many topics are closely linked to each other and present overlaps in issues and solutions, this methodology offers a novel perspective with respect to traditional literature reviews. In addition, it ensures reproducibility over time and the possibility to semi-automatically update the analysis, as new papers become available.

Overview of main topics

In terms of descriptive textual statistics, our corpus is made of 15,465 text documents, consisting of a total of 2,685,893 lemmatized tokens (words) and 32,279 types. As a result, the type-token ratio is 1.2%. The number of hapaxes is 12,141, with a hapax-token ratio of 37.61%.

Fig 1 shows the list of 27 topics by decreasing SBS. The most researched topic is compensation , exceeding all others in prevalence, diversity, and connectivity. This means it is not only mentioned more often than other topics, but it is also connected to a greater number of other topics and is central to the discourse on gender equality. The next four topics are, in order of SBS, role , education , decision-making , and career progression . These topics, except for education , all concern women in the workforce. Between these first five topics and the following ones there is a clear drop in SBS scores. In particular, the topics that follow have a lower connectivity than the first five. They are hiring , performance , behavior , organization , and human capital . Again, except for behavior and human capital , the other three topics are purely related to women in the workforce. After another drop-off, the following topics deal prevalently with women in society. This trend highlights that research on gender in business journals has so far mainly paid attention to the conditions that women experience in business contexts, while also devoting some attention to women in society.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g001

Fig 2 shows the SBS time series of the top 10 topics. While there has been a general increase in the number of Scopus-indexed publications in the last decade, we notice that some SBS trends remain steady, or even decrease. In particular, we observe that the main topic of the last twenty-two years, compensation , is losing momentum. Since 2016, it has been surpassed by decision-making , education and role , which may indicate that literature is increasingly attempting to identify root causes of compensation inequalities. Moreover, in the last two years, the topics of hiring , performance , and organization are experiencing the largest importance increase.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g002

Fig 3 shows the SBS time trends of the remaining 17 topics (i.e., those not in the top 10). As we can see from the graph, there are some that maintain a steady trend–such as reputation , management , networks and governance , which also seem to have little importance. More relevant topics with average stationary trends (except for the last two years) are culture , family , and parenting . The feminine topic is among the most important here, and one of those that exhibit the larger variations over time (similarly to leadership ). On the other hand, the are some topics that, even if not among the most important, show increasing SBS trends; therefore, they could be considered as emerging topics and could become popular in the near future. These are entrepreneurship , leadership , board of directors , and sustainability . These emerging topics are also interesting to anticipate future trends in gender equality research that are conducive to overall equality in society.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g003

In addition to the SBS score of the different topics, the network of terms they are associated to enables to gauge the extent to which their images (textual associations) overlap or differ ( Fig 4 ).

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.g004

There is a central cluster of topics with high similarity, which are all connected with women in the workforce. The cluster includes topics such as organization , decision-making , performance , hiring , human capital , education and compensation . In addition, the topic of well-being is found within this cluster, suggesting that women’s equality in the workforce is associated to well-being considerations. The emerging topics of entrepreneurship and leadership are also closely connected with each other, possibly implying that leadership is a much-researched quality in female entrepreneurship. Topics that are relatively more distant include personality , politics , feminine , empowerment , management , board of directors , reputation , governance , parenting , masculine and network .

The following sections describe the top 10 topics and their main associations in literature (see Table 3 ), while providing a brief overview of the emerging topics.

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.t003

Compensation.

The topic of compensation is related to the topics of role , hiring , education and career progression , however, also sees a very high association with the words gap and inequality . Indeed, a well-known debate in degrowth economics centers around whether and how to adequately compensate women for their childbearing, childrearing, caregiver and household work [e.g., 30 ].

Even in paid work, women continue being offered lower compensations than their male counterparts who have the same job or cover the same role [ 64 – 67 ]. This severe inequality has been widely studied by scholars over the last twenty-two years. Dealing with this topic, some specific roles have been addressed. Specifically, research highlighted differences in compensation between female and male CEOs [e.g., 68 ], top executives [e.g., 69 ], and boards’ directors [e.g., 70 ]. Scholars investigated the determinants of these gaps, such as the gender composition of the board [e.g., 71 – 73 ] or women’s individual characteristics [e.g., 71 , 74 ].

Among these individual characteristics, education plays a relevant role [ 75 ]. Education is indeed presented as the solution for women, not only to achieve top executive roles, but also to reduce wage inequality [e.g., 76 , 77 ]. Past research has highlighted education influences on gender wage gaps, specifically referring to gender differences in skills [e.g., 78 ], college majors [e.g., 79 ], and college selectivity [e.g., 80 ].

Finally, the wage gap issue is strictly interrelated with hiring –e.g., looking at whether being a mother affects hiring and compensation [e.g., 65 , 81 ] or relating compensation to unemployment [e.g., 82 ]–and career progression –for instance looking at meritocracy [ 83 , 84 ] or the characteristics of the boss for whom women work [e.g., 85 ].

The roles covered by women have been deeply investigated. Scholars have focused on the role of women in their families and the society as a whole [e.g., 14 , 15 ], and, more widely, in business contexts [e.g., 18 , 81 ]. Indeed, despite still lagging behind their male counterparts [e.g., 86 , 87 ], in the last decade there has been an increase in top ranked positions achieved by women [e.g., 88 , 89 ]. Following this phenomenon, scholars have posed greater attention towards the presence of women in the board of directors [e.g., 16 , 18 , 90 , 91 ], given the increasing pressure to appoint female directors that firms, especially listed ones, have experienced. Other scholars have focused on the presence of women covering the role of CEO [e.g., 17 , 92 ] or being part of the top management team [e.g., 93 ]. Irrespectively of the level of analysis, all these studies tried to uncover the antecedents of women’s presence among top managers [e.g., 92 , 94 ] and the consequences of having a them involved in the firm’s decision-making –e.g., on performance [e.g., 19 , 95 , 96 ], risk [e.g., 97 , 98 ], and corporate social responsibility [e.g., 99 , 100 ].

Besides studying the difficulties and discriminations faced by women in getting a job [ 81 , 101 ], and, more specifically in the hiring , appointment, or career progression to these apical roles [e.g., 70 , 83 ], the majority of research of women’s roles dealt with compensation issues. Specifically, scholars highlight the pay-gap that still exists between women and men, both in general [e.g., 64 , 65 ], as well as referring to boards’ directors [e.g., 70 , 102 ], CEOs and executives [e.g., 69 , 103 , 104 ].

Finally, other scholars focused on the behavior of women when dealing with business. In this sense, particular attention has been paid to leadership and entrepreneurial behaviors. The former quite overlaps with dealing with the roles mentioned above, but also includes aspects such as leaders being stereotyped as masculine [e.g., 105 ], the need for greater exposure to female leaders to reduce biases [e.g., 106 ], or female leaders acting as queen bees [e.g., 107 ]. Regarding entrepreneurship , scholars mainly investigated women’s entrepreneurial entry [e.g., 108 , 109 ], differences between female and male entrepreneurs in the evaluations and funding received from investors [e.g., 110 , 111 ], and their performance gap [e.g., 112 , 113 ].

Education has long been recognized as key to social advancement and economic stability [ 114 ], for job progression and also a barrier to gender equality, especially in STEM-related fields. Research on education and gender equality is mostly linked with the topics of compensation , human capital , career progression , hiring , parenting and decision-making .

Education contributes to a higher human capital [ 115 ] and constitutes an investment on the part of women towards their future. In this context, literature points to the gender gap in educational attainment, and the consequences for women from a social, economic, personal and professional standpoint. Women are found to have less access to formal education and information, especially in emerging countries, which in turn may cause them to lose social and economic opportunities [e.g., 12 , 116 – 119 ]. Education in local and rural communities is also paramount to communicate the benefits of female empowerment , contributing to overall societal well-being [e.g., 120 ].

Once women access education, the image they have of the world and their place in society (i.e., habitus) affects their education performance [ 13 ] and is passed on to their children. These situations reinforce gender stereotypes, which become self-fulfilling prophecies that may negatively affect female students’ performance by lowering their confidence and heightening their anxiety [ 121 , 122 ]. Besides formal education, also the information that women are exposed to on a daily basis contributes to their human capital . Digital inequalities, for instance, stems from men spending more time online and acquiring higher digital skills than women [ 123 ].

Education is also a factor that should boost employability of candidates and thus hiring , career progression and compensation , however the relationship between these factors is not straightforward [ 115 ]. First, educational choices ( decision-making ) are influenced by variables such as self-efficacy and the presence of barriers, irrespectively of the career opportunities they offer, especially in STEM [ 124 ]. This brings additional difficulties to women’s enrollment and persistence in scientific and technical fields of study due to stereotypes and biases [ 125 , 126 ]. Moreover, access to education does not automatically translate into job opportunities for women and minority groups [ 127 , 128 ] or into female access to managerial positions [ 129 ].

Finally, parenting is reported as an antecedent of education [e.g., 130 ], with much of the literature focusing on the role of parents’ education on the opportunities afforded to children to enroll in education [ 131 – 134 ] and the role of parenting in their offspring’s perception of study fields and attitudes towards learning [ 135 – 138 ]. Parental education is also a predictor of the other related topics, namely human capital and compensation [ 139 ].

Decision-making.

This literature mainly points to the fact that women are thought to make decisions differently than men. Women have indeed different priorities, such as they care more about people’s well-being, working with people or helping others, rather than maximizing their personal (or their firm’s) gain [ 140 ]. In other words, women typically present more communal than agentic behaviors, which are instead more frequent among men [ 141 ]. These different attitude, behavior and preferences in turn affect the decisions they make [e.g., 142 ] and the decision-making of the firm in which they work [e.g., 143 ].

At the individual level, gender affects, for instance, career aspirations [e.g., 144 ] and choices [e.g., 142 , 145 ], or the decision of creating a venture [e.g., 108 , 109 , 146 ]. Moreover, in everyday life, women and men make different decisions regarding partners [e.g., 147 ], childcare [e.g., 148 ], education [e.g., 149 ], attention to the environment [e.g., 150 ] and politics [e.g., 151 ].

At the firm level, scholars highlighted, for example, how the presence of women in the board affects corporate decisions [e.g., 152 , 153 ], that female CEOs are more conservative in accounting decisions [e.g., 154 ], or that female CFOs tend to make more conservative decisions regarding the firm’s financial reporting [e.g., 155 ]. Nevertheless, firm level research also investigated decisions that, influenced by gender bias, affect women, such as those pertaining hiring [e.g., 156 , 157 ], compensation [e.g., 73 , 158 ], or the empowerment of women once appointed [ 159 ].

Career progression.

Once women have entered the workforce, the key aspect to achieve gender equality becomes career progression , including efforts toward overcoming the glass ceiling. Indeed, according to the SBS analysis, career progression is highly related to words such as work, social issues and equality. The topic with which it has the highest semantic overlap is role , followed by decision-making , hiring , education , compensation , leadership , human capital , and family .

Career progression implies an advancement in the hierarchical ladder of the firm, assigning managerial roles to women. Coherently, much of the literature has focused on identifying rationales for a greater female participation in the top management team and board of directors [e.g., 95 ] as well as the best criteria to ensure that the decision-makers promote the most valuable employees irrespectively of their individual characteristics, such as gender [e.g., 84 ]. The link between career progression , role and compensation is often provided in practice by performance appraisal exercises, frequently rooted in a culture of meritocracy that guides bonuses, salary increases and promotions. However, performance appraisals can actually mask gender-biased decisions where women are held to higher standards than their male colleagues [e.g., 83 , 84 , 95 , 160 , 161 ]. Women often have less opportunities to gain leadership experience and are less visible than their male colleagues, which constitute barriers to career advancement [e.g., 162 ]. Therefore, transparency and accountability, together with procedures that discourage discretionary choices, are paramount to achieve a fair career progression [e.g., 84 ], together with the relaxation of strict job boundaries in favor of cross-functional and self-directed tasks [e.g., 163 ].

In addition, a series of stereotypes about the type of leadership characteristics that are required for top management positions, which fit better with typical male and agentic attributes, are another key barrier to career advancement for women [e.g., 92 , 160 ].

Hiring is the entrance gateway for women into the workforce. Therefore, it is related to other workforce topics such as compensation , role , career progression , decision-making , human capital , performance , organization and education .

A first stream of literature focuses on the process leading up to candidates’ job applications, demonstrating that bias exists before positions are even opened, and it is perpetuated both by men and women through networking and gatekeeping practices [e.g., 164 , 165 ].

The hiring process itself is also subject to biases [ 166 ], for example gender-congruity bias that leads to men being preferred candidates in male-dominated sectors [e.g., 167 ], women being hired in positions with higher risk of failure [e.g., 168 ] and limited transparency and accountability afforded by written processes and procedures [e.g., 164 ] that all contribute to ascriptive inequality. In addition, providing incentives for evaluators to hire women may actually work to this end; however, this is not the case when supporting female candidates endangers higher-ranking male ones [ 169 ].

Another interesting perspective, instead, looks at top management teams’ composition and the effects on hiring practices, indicating that firms with more women in top management are less likely to lay off staff [e.g., 152 ].

Performance.

Several scholars posed their attention towards women’s performance, its consequences [e.g., 170 , 171 ] and the implications of having women in decision-making positions [e.g., 18 , 19 ].

At the individual level, research focused on differences in educational and academic performance between women and men, especially referring to the gender gap in STEM fields [e.g., 171 ]. The presence of stereotype threats–that is the expectation that the members of a social group (e.g., women) “must deal with the possibility of being judged or treated stereotypically, or of doing something that would confirm the stereotype” [ 172 ]–affects women’s interested in STEM [e.g., 173 ], as well as their cognitive ability tests, penalizing them [e.g., 174 ]. A stronger gender identification enhances this gap [e.g., 175 ], whereas mentoring and role models can be used as solutions to this problem [e.g., 121 ]. Despite the negative effect of stereotype threats on girls’ performance [ 176 ], female and male students perform equally in mathematics and related subjects [e.g., 177 ]. Moreover, while individuals’ performance at school and university generally affects their achievements and the field in which they end up working, evidence reveals that performance in math or other scientific subjects does not explain why fewer women enter STEM working fields; rather this gap depends on other aspects, such as culture, past working experiences, or self-efficacy [e.g., 170 ]. Finally, scholars have highlighted the penalization that women face for their positive performance, for instance when they succeed in traditionally male areas [e.g., 178 ]. This penalization is explained by the violation of gender-stereotypic prescriptions [e.g., 179 , 180 ], that is having women well performing in agentic areas, which are typical associated to men. Performance penalization can thus be overcome by clearly conveying communal characteristics and behaviors [ 178 ].

Evidence has been provided on how the involvement of women in boards of directors and decision-making positions affects firms’ performance. Nevertheless, results are mixed, with some studies showing positive effects on financial [ 19 , 181 , 182 ] and corporate social performance [ 99 , 182 , 183 ]. Other studies maintain a negative association [e.g., 18 ], and other again mixed [e.g., 184 ] or non-significant association [e.g., 185 ]. Also with respect to the presence of a female CEO, mixed results emerged so far, with some researches demonstrating a positive effect on firm’s performance [e.g., 96 , 186 ], while other obtaining only a limited evidence of this relationship [e.g., 103 ] or a negative one [e.g., 187 ].

Finally, some studies have investigated whether and how women’s performance affects their hiring [e.g., 101 ] and career progression [e.g., 83 , 160 ]. For instance, academic performance leads to different returns in hiring for women and men. Specifically, high-achieving men are called back significantly more often than high-achieving women, which are penalized when they have a major in mathematics; this result depends on employers’ gendered standards for applicants [e.g., 101 ]. Once appointed, performance ratings are more strongly related to promotions for women than men, and promoted women typically show higher past performance ratings than those of promoted men. This suggesting that women are subject to stricter standards for promotion [e.g., 160 ].

Behavioral aspects related to gender follow two main streams of literature. The first examines female personality and behavior in the workplace, and their alignment with cultural expectations or stereotypes [e.g., 188 ] as well as their impacts on equality. There is a common bias that depicts women as less agentic than males. Certain characteristics, such as those more congruent with male behaviors–e.g., self-promotion [e.g., 189 ], negotiation skills [e.g., 190 ] and general agentic behavior [e.g., 191 ]–, are less accepted in women. However, characteristics such as individualism in women have been found to promote greater gender equality in society [ 192 ]. In addition, behaviors such as display of emotions [e.g., 193 ], which are stereotypically female, work against women’s acceptance in the workplace, requiring women to carefully moderate their behavior to avoid exclusion. A counter-intuitive result is that women and minorities, which are more marginalized in the workplace, tend to be better problem-solvers in innovation competitions due to their different knowledge bases [ 194 ].

The other side of the coin is examined in a parallel literature stream on behavior towards women in the workplace. As a result of biases, prejudices and stereotypes, women may experience adverse behavior from their colleagues, such as incivility and harassment, which undermine their well-being [e.g., 195 , 196 ]. Biases that go beyond gender, such as for overweight people, are also more strongly applied to women [ 197 ].

Organization.

The role of women and gender bias in organizations has been studied from different perspectives, which mirror those presented in detail in the following sections. Specifically, most research highlighted the stereotypical view of leaders [e.g., 105 ] and the roles played by women within firms, for instance referring to presence in the board of directors [e.g., 18 , 90 , 91 ], appointment as CEOs [e.g., 16 ], or top executives [e.g., 93 ].

Scholars have investigated antecedents and consequences of the presence of women in these apical roles. On the one side they looked at hiring and career progression [e.g., 83 , 92 , 160 , 168 , 198 ], finding women typically disadvantaged with respect to their male counterparts. On the other side, they studied women’s leadership styles and influence on the firm’s decision-making [e.g., 152 , 154 , 155 , 199 ], with implications for performance [e.g., 18 , 19 , 96 ].

Human capital.

Human capital is a transverse topic that touches upon many different aspects of female gender equality. As such, it has the most associations with other topics, starting with education as mentioned above, with career-related topics such as role , decision-making , hiring , career progression , performance , compensation , leadership and organization . Another topic with which there is a close connection is behavior . In general, human capital is approached both from the education standpoint but also from the perspective of social capital.

The behavioral aspect in human capital comprises research related to gender differences for example in cultural and religious beliefs that influence women’s attitudes and perceptions towards STEM subjects [ 142 , 200 – 202 ], towards employment [ 203 ] or towards environmental issues [ 150 , 204 ]. These cultural differences also emerge in the context of globalization which may accelerate gender equality in the workforce [ 205 , 206 ]. Gender differences also appear in behaviors such as motivation [ 207 ], and in negotiation [ 190 ], and have repercussions on women’s decision-making related to their careers. The so-called gender equality paradox sees women in countries with lower gender equality more likely to pursue studies and careers in STEM fields, whereas the gap in STEM enrollment widens as countries achieve greater equality in society [ 171 ].

Career progression is modeled by literature as a choice-process where personal preferences, culture and decision-making affect the chosen path and the outcomes. Some literature highlights how women tend to self-select into different professions than men, often due to stereotypes rather than actual ability to perform in these professions [ 142 , 144 ]. These stereotypes also affect the perceptions of female performance or the amount of human capital required to equal male performance [ 110 , 193 , 208 ], particularly for mothers [ 81 ]. It is therefore often assumed that women are better suited to less visible and less leadership -oriented roles [ 209 ]. Women also express differing preferences towards work-family balance, which affect whether and how they pursue human capital gains [ 210 ], and ultimately their career progression and salary .

On the other hand, men are often unaware of gendered processes and behaviors that they carry forward in their interactions and decision-making [ 211 , 212 ]. Therefore, initiatives aimed at increasing managers’ human capital –by raising awareness of gender disparities in their organizations and engaging them in diversity promotion–are essential steps to counter gender bias and segregation [ 213 ].

Emerging topics: Leadership and entrepreneurship

Among the emerging topics, the most pervasive one is women reaching leadership positions in the workforce and in society. This is still a rare occurrence for two main types of factors, on the one hand, bias and discrimination make it harder for women to access leadership positions [e.g., 214 – 216 ], on the other hand, the competitive nature and high pressure associated with leadership positions, coupled with the lack of women currently represented, reduce women’s desire to achieve them [e.g., 209 , 217 ]. Women are more effective leaders when they have access to education, resources and a diverse environment with representation [e.g., 218 , 219 ].

One sector where there is potential for women to carve out a leadership role is entrepreneurship . Although at the start of the millennium the discourse on entrepreneurship was found to be “discriminatory, gender-biased, ethnocentrically determined and ideologically controlled” [ 220 ], an increasing body of literature is studying how to stimulate female entrepreneurship as an alternative pathway to wealth, leadership and empowerment [e.g., 221 ]. Many barriers exist for women to access entrepreneurship, including the institutional and legal environment, social and cultural factors, access to knowledge and resources, and individual behavior [e.g., 222 , 223 ]. Education has been found to raise women’s entrepreneurial intentions [e.g., 224 ], although this effect is smaller than for men [e.g., 109 ]. In addition, increasing self-efficacy and risk-taking behavior constitute important success factors [e.g., 225 ].

Finally, the topic of sustainability is worth mentioning, as it is the primary objective of the SDGs and is closely associated with societal well-being. As society grapples with the effects of climate change and increasing depletion of natural resources, a narrative has emerged on women and their greater link to the environment [ 226 ]. Studies in developed countries have found some support for women leaders’ attention to sustainability issues in firms [e.g., 227 – 229 ], and smaller resource consumption by women [ 230 ]. At the same time, women will likely be more affected by the consequences of climate change [e.g., 230 ] but often lack the decision-making power to influence local decision-making on resource management and environmental policies [e.g., 231 ].

Research gaps and conclusions

Research on gender equality has advanced rapidly in the past decades, with a steady increase in publications, both in mainstream topics related to women in education and the workforce, and in emerging topics. Through a novel approach combining methods of text mining and social network analysis, we examined a comprehensive body of literature comprising 15,465 papers published between 2000 and mid 2021 on topics related to gender equality. We identified a set of 27 topics addressed by the literature and examined their connections.

At the highest level of abstraction, it is worth noting that papers abound on the identification of issues related to gender inequalities and imbalances in the workforce and in society. Literature has thoroughly examined the (unconscious) biases, barriers, stereotypes, and discriminatory behaviors that women are facing as a result of their gender. Instead, there are much fewer papers that discuss or demonstrate effective solutions to overcome gender bias [e.g., 121 , 143 , 145 , 163 , 194 , 213 , 232 ]. This is partly due to the relative ease in studying the status quo, as opposed to studying changes in the status quo. However, we observed a shift in the more recent years towards solution seeking in this domain, which we strongly encourage future researchers to focus on. In the future, we may focus on collecting and mapping pro-active contributions to gender studies, using additional Natural Language Processing techniques, able to measure the sentiment of scientific papers [ 43 ].

All of the mainstream topics identified in our literature review are closely related, and there is a wealth of insights looking at the intersection between issues such as education and career progression or human capital and role . However, emerging topics are worthy of being furtherly explored. It would be interesting to see more work on the topic of female entrepreneurship , exploring aspects such as education , personality , governance , management and leadership . For instance, how can education support female entrepreneurship? How can self-efficacy and risk-taking behaviors be taught or enhanced? What are the differences in managerial and governance styles of female entrepreneurs? Which personality traits are associated with successful entrepreneurs? Which traits are preferred by venture capitalists and funding bodies?

The emerging topic of sustainability also deserves further attention, as our society struggles with climate change and its consequences. It would be interesting to see more research on the intersection between sustainability and entrepreneurship , looking at how female entrepreneurs are tackling sustainability issues, examining both their business models and their company governance . In addition, scholars are suggested to dig deeper into the relationship between family values and behaviors.

Moreover, it would be relevant to understand how women’s networks (social capital), or the composition and structure of social networks involving both women and men, enable them to increase their remuneration and reach top corporate positions, participate in key decision-making bodies, and have a voice in communities. Furthermore, the achievement of gender equality might significantly change firm networks and ecosystems, with important implications for their performance and survival.

Similarly, research at the nexus of (corporate) governance , career progression , compensation and female empowerment could yield useful insights–for example discussing how enterprises, institutions and countries are managed and the impact for women and other minorities. Are there specific governance structures that favor diversity and inclusion?

Lastly, we foresee an emerging stream of research pertaining how the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic challenged women, especially in the workforce, by making gender biases more evident.

For our analysis, we considered a set of 15,465 articles downloaded from the Scopus database (which is the largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature). As we were interested in reviewing business and economics related gender studies, we only considered those papers published in journals listed in the Academic Journal Guide (AJG) 2018 ranking of the Chartered Association of Business Schools (CABS). All the journals listed in this ranking are also indexed by Scopus. Therefore, looking at a single database (i.e., Scopus) should not be considered a limitation of our study. However, future research could consider different databases and inclusion criteria.

With our literature review, we offer researchers a comprehensive map of major gender-related research trends over the past twenty-two years. This can serve as a lens to look to the future, contributing to the achievement of SDG5. Researchers may use our study as a starting point to identify key themes addressed in the literature. In addition, our methodological approach–based on the use of the Semantic Brand Score and its webapp–could support scholars interested in reviewing other areas of research.

Supporting information

S1 text. keywords used for paper selection..

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0256474.s001

Acknowledgments

The computing resources and the related technical support used for this work have been provided by CRESCO/ENEAGRID High Performance Computing infrastructure and its staff. CRESCO/ENEAGRID High Performance Computing infrastructure is funded by ENEA, the Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Economic Development and by Italian and European research programmes (see http://www.cresco.enea.it/english for information).

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Three Essays on Gender Role Socialization, Gender Equality, and Gendered Policy

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• Affiliation: College of Arts and Sciences, Department of Public Policy
• Gender role attitudes measure opinions about men’s and women’s roles in society. The attitudes can guide individual behaviors and policy decisions. This dissertation explores the generation of gender role attitudes in the family, how the attitudes change women’s social participation with other indicators, and whether it can predict gendered policies that protect women’s rights. This is the first study to focus on the transmission of gender role attitudes inside families in China. It also collects province-level data on gender role attitudes in China and analyzes the dynamics between gender ideology and gendered policy. This dissertation also uses comparative methods to study the role of gender ideology in women’s labor force participation and political representation.In the second chapter, I find that parental behaviors, such as the distribution of housework, have significant correlations with children’s knowledge of gender equality in China. When parents undertake housework responsibilities more equally, it is associated with the finding that children would better understand gender equality. The correlation differentiates in various family patterns based on the number of children and their genders. The third and fourth chapters examine the impact of gender role attitudes. The third chapter evaluates the effect of female political representation on the gender gap in labor force participation, along with the influence of gender role attitudes and paid maternity leave. I find that female representation influences women in the labor market majorly through gendered policy in developing countries, which has an immediate effect but may not last in the long term. In developed countries, gender role attitudes are the key factor in the relationship between political representation and labor force participation.The fourth chapter examines the geographic distribution of gender role attitudes at the province level in China. I also analyze the association between gender ideology and gendered policy. Although provincial gender role attitudes are not a significant factor in explaining policy change, they still provide insights into how provincial governments in China make policy decisions. It also shows that social development, rural-urban segregation, cultural traditions, and ethnic groups are profoundly associated with local policymaking on gender.
• Gender Equality
• Gender Role Socialization
• Public policy
• Gender Role Attitudes
• https://doi.org/10.17615/v72f-0r68
• Dissertation
• In Copyright - Educational Use Permitted
• Kreitzer, Rebecca J
• Moulton, Jeremy G
• Addo, Fenaba R
• Smith, Richard L
• Doctor of Philosophy
• University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Graduate School

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Does the Mormon Church Empower Women? A Social Media Storm Answers.

A church Instagram post tapped into a long-running seam of discontent among some women, who have chafed at restrictions.

By Ruth Graham

On Sunday night, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints encouraged women around the world to gather to celebrate the Relief Society, a women’s organization in the church that was observing its 182nd anniversary.

In a video produced for the event, J. Anette Dennis, a leader in the Relief Society, spoke glowingly about women’s roles in the church. “There is no other religious organization in the world, that I know of, that has so broadly given power and authority to women,” she said.

But when the church’s official Instagram page posted an excerpt from Ms. Dennis’s speech, including that quote, the response was immediate, overwhelming and largely negative. “What a joke!” one commenter wrote. “The sexism in this organization runs deep.” The post had more than 14,500 comments as of Friday morning, with some critical comments receiving thousands of approving likes.

Anger had flared a couple days earlier when comments were deleted before being restored. In a comment on the post and in emails to The Times, the church blamed an Instagram glitch. A spokesman for Meta, which owns Instagram, said there was no issue that had affected comments.

The conversation quickly burst out of the bounds of the church’s comments section and into a flurry of text messages among L.D.S. women, who shared accounts of feeling marginalized and belittled in their interactions with church leaders.

The Instagram post had tapped into a long-running seam of discontent among some women in the church, who have chafed at the church’s restrictions and say that its discussion of empowering women is essentially hollow. Women are not eligible for the church’s priesthood, a designation of God-given authority that applies to only men.

The church makes a distinction between “priesthood authority,” accessible only to men, and “priesthood power,” available to all. As in many other religious traditions, women are barred from specific leadership roles, and from some meetings.

“We are collecting and reading the comments on all the posts and appreciate knowing these heartfelt messages, concerns, thoughts and experiences,” the global president of the Relief Society, Camille N. Johnson, said in an email sent by a spokesman for the church. The church provided the comments by Ms. Johnson in response to a request to interview Ms. Dennis.

Ms. Johnson noted that hundreds of thousands of people watched a broadcast of the Relief Society’s celebration. “The intense interest we experienced demonstrates the importance of these issues to women of faith,” she said.

The current groundswell began last fall, when a regional authority cracked down on a practice in the San Francisco Bay Area of inviting women leaders to sit on “the stand,” a raised seating area facing the congregation during Sunday services. The stand is a place of status, reserved for “presiding authorities,” roles for which only men are eligible, along with any others participating in a specific service, including women and children. Local leaders had extended that invitation to some women leaders who were not participating in services.

When the church took away this gesture of representation, Amy Watkins Jensen was indignant. She has three daughters and is a lifelong church member, who had been able to sit on the stand in her capacity as a volunteer leader. “We do this labor and it should not be invisible,” she said.

She spoke with her bishop, and continued up the chain of authority, all of whom were men. Nothing changed. She wrote a public letter , which almost 3,000 Latter-day Saints signed, and started an Instagram account, Women on the Stand, asking for clarity and consistency on the issue for the global church.

Ms. Watkins Jensen’s immediate concern was local but spread quickly to other communities.

In Seattle, a therapist and lifelong church member named Kierstyn Kremer Howes was awake with her newborn in the middle of the night when she read about the removal of women from the stand in Ms. Watkins Jensen’s region.

“I was just like, ‘I’m so tired of this,’” she recalled.

“You go to church and all you see are male leaders, and all the people we talk about in the scriptures are male,” Ms. Kremer Howes said. “Everything good and glorious and wonderful is in the male voice or looks male.”

She dashed off a fiery opinion essay (“I call it pissy, my mom calls it saucy”) calling for L.D.S. women to stay home from church on March 17, the anniversary of the Relief Society.

“We do a lot of work, and when we ask for representation for that work, we get denied,” she said. “So let’s just stop doing it.”

Ms. Kremer Howes doesn’t believe many women actually stayed home from church on Sunday. (Several women said they supported the idea but realized if they stayed home they would have to ask other women to cover their volunteer responsibilities.) But the church’s Instagram post kept the discussion going.

“There’s not one single decision a woman can make in this church that cannot be overruled by a man,” said Cynthia Winward, a co-host of the podcast “At Last She Said It,” which focuses on women in L.D.S. culture.

She said that the discussion of women’s access to the stand is a notable milestone in the ongoing conversation about women in the church, because it is being driven by women who by definition are deeply involved in the church. The women given access to the stand had been seated there because of their volunteer work and leadership. “It’s not fitting the narrative anymore of, ‘It’s just fringy feminists,’” Ms. Winward said. “These are mainstream women.”

For some women, the backlash over the post does not capture their own experiences. “I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve been with a male leader or a male counterpart in the church and felt like they didn’t hear me because I’m a woman,” said Hayley Clark, who lives in Utah. She compared her experience in the church favorably with the condescension she has occasionally faced as a female business owner, and said she was encouraged by the quote posted by the church.

For others, the contretemps reminded them of deeper disagreements they have with the church. About a quarter of American Latter-day Saints say they have thought about leaving, compared with 16 percent of the population overall who have considered leaving their religion, according to a 2022 survey by the Public Religion Research Institute.

Sarah Schow is pregnant with her second child, a boy. As a preteen, her son “will have more authority in the church than I will ever have,” she said, referring to a rule allowing boys to be ordained to the all-male priesthood the year they turn 12.

Ms. Schow, who now lives in Canada, belonged to wards in Montana, California and Washington as a child. She recalled being taught as a child that she had a “divine nature,” of which femininity, procreation and nurturing were essential pieces.

Now, however, she wonders about the church’s vision for her. Is her only role to be silent and supportive? She cited an emotional ballad from the movie “Barbie” in describing her disillusionment with the institution she has belonged to her whole life: “What was I made for?”

Ruth Graham is a national reporter, based in Dallas, covering religion, faith and values for The Times. More about Ruth Graham

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“No [Right] Way to be a Black Woman”: Exploring Gendered Racial Socialization Among Black Women

Author Note

BreAnna L. Davis Tribble is now at Evaluation Division, School Readiness Consulting; John R. Hart is now at Health Policy Research Consortium.

Using the theoretical lenses of intersectionality and racial-ethnic socialization, we conducted a focus group study with 29 Black women. We analyzed transcripts for the sources of messages about skin color and hair and for participants’ responses to these messages via a grounded theory approach. Family members were the primary source of messages about skin color and hair. Peers and the media also communicated such messages. Messages ranged from endorsement of Western standards of beauty to an embrace of darker skin colors and natural hair texture. Rather than serving as passive recipients of messages, participants sifted through and reconciled messages with varying degrees of resolution. Their accounts reflected their intersectional experiences as Black women, representing a variety of physical attributes. We discuss the influence of these physical attributes on their individual racial-gender identity development in light of a second burgeoning Black hair movement that embraces Black natural hair in the U.S. Findings may help families and others build understanding of and increase sensitivity towards the intra- and interpersonal implications of colorism for Black women. Findings may also inform institutional policies (e.g., school, work) and practices such that they no longer create barriers or yield consequences for the Black women navigating these settings.

For generations, Black women have endured the dominant beauty narrative that white skin, a narrow nose, thin lips, and long, straight hair are the standards for beauty to which all women should aspire ( Awad et al., 2014 ; Okazawa-Rey, Robinson, & Ward, 1986; Russell, Wilson, & Hall, 2013 ). Despite the longevity and pervasiveness of colorism in the U.S., little is known about how messages about beauty, skin color, and hair factor into socialization messages about race ( Brown, Blackmon, Rosnick, Griffin-Fennell, & White-Johnson, 2016 ; Lesane-Brown, Scottham, Nguyen, & Sellers, 2008 ; Stevenson, Cameron, Herrero-Taylor, & Davis, 2002 ). Further, only a small amount of research has addressed types of racial socialization messages that are specifically conveyed to Black girls and young women regarding the meaning and importance of their skin color and hair (i.e., colorism; Leonard, 2009 ), even though these physical characteristics are core parts of femininity and gender socialization for all women.

Researchers are increasing their attention to gender as a focal variable in the racial socialization process ( Brown, Linver, & Evans, 2010 ; McHale et al., 2006 ; Thomas & Blackmon 2015 ; Thomas & King, 2007 ; Thomas & Speight 1999 ). Seeking to consider the role of race coupled with gender in day-to-day experiences, we conducted a series of focus groups to learn about the gendered racial socialization of African American men and women ( Smith-Bynum, 2013 ). We present a subset of data from that study, focusing on the experiences of the women with regard to their gendered socialization experiences around hair and skin color.

Research has established that racial socialization is a key parenting practice that fosters positive development in Black youth and young adults, and one that helps protect youth from experiences of racism ( Bynum, Burton, & Best, 2007 ; Harrison, Wilson, Pine, Chan, & Buriel, 1990 ). The dominant theoretical racial socialization frameworks do not differentiate children and youth by gender; scholars focus largely on themes of preparing children and young adults to cope with racial bias and promotion of cultural pride (e.g., Hughes et al., 2006 ; Lesane-Brown, 2005 ; Stevenson et al., 2002 ). However, a growing body of research demonstrates that the gender of the child influences the types of messages that parents give ( Brown et al., 2010 ; Butler-Barnes, Richardson, Chavous, & Zhu, in press ; Caughy, Nettles, O’Campo, & Lohrfink, 2006 ; Priest et al., 2014 ; Thomas & King, 2007 ; Varner & Mandara, 2013 ).

Findings from studies suggest that parents not only deliver different messages based on a child’s gender, but that children receive different types of racial socialization messages based on their gender. For example, African American girls report receiving more messages about cultural pride and fewer messages about racial bias, while African American boys report receiving more coping with racial bias messages and fewer messages about cultural pride promotion ( Bowman & Howard, 1985 ; Burt & Simons, 2015 ; McHale et al., 2006 ; McNeil Smith, Reynolds, Fincham, & Beach, 2016 ). In one study of African American mothers and their adolescent children (ages 14–17), mothers of daughters were more likely to communicate plans to advocate on behalf of their daughters and less likely to provide strategies on how to respond to racial dilemmas than mothers of sons ( Smith-Bynum, Anderson, Davis, Franco, & English, 2016 ). These findings indicate that gender is a factor in the racial socialization process and that further investigation is warranted to deepen our understanding of gendered racial socialization experiences for individuals in Black families.

To our knowledge, there is only one published study that examines how (and from whom) Black women learn about skin color ( Wilder & Cain, 2011 ). Utilizing five focus groups with Black women between the ages of 18 and 40 ( N = 26), the authors highlighted the continued existence and negative effects of colorism in the lives of Black women, maintained, in part, by Black families. The authors also drew awareness to what they call the “race paradox” within Black families: “Although many participants’ families engaged in racial socialization practices to celebrate Blackness and to protect them from the realities of racism, families also engaged in practices of color socialization that simultaneously denigrate darkness” ( Wilder & Cain, 2011 , p. 597).

Black Women and Colorism in the U.S.

One topic that may be a direct or indirect component of racial socialization—particularly for women—is the importance and relevance of skin color and hair. Colorism is a global ideology that denigrates darker skin and tightly coiled hair, two unmistakable physical traits associated with African heritage ( Adams, Kurtz-Costes, & Hoffman, 2016 ; Awad et al., 2014 ; Burke, 2008 ; Greene, 1994 , M.E. Hill, 2002 ; Hunter, 2007 ; Patton, 2006 ; Thompson & Keith, 2001 ). Studies conducted over decades and across multiple fields of study have demonstrated that colorism has measurable consequences for Black women in the United States ( Choma & Prusaczyk, 2018 ; Drake & Cayton, 1945 ; Fischer & Shaw, 1999 ; Golden, 2004 ; Haizlip, 1994 ; Parham, 1989 ; Thomas, Hacker, & Hoxha, 2011 ; Townsend, Thomas, Neilands, & Jackson, 2010 ).

On average, women with darker skin colors have poorer mental health, physical health, self-esteem, and lower socioeconomic status than their lighter skinned counterparts ( Adams et al., 2016 ; Mathews & Johnson, 2015 ; Sweet, McDade, Kiefe, & Liu, 2007 ). Studies also have shown that women with lighter skin fare better in the mate selection market, securing higher status spouses than their counterparts with darker skin ( Drake & Cayton, 1945 ; Hughes & Hertel, 1990 ; Keith & Herring, 1991 ). Natural hair has largely been considered to be unprofessional, unattractive, and unfeminine, and is associated with various negative socio-professional outcomes (e.g., lower incomes, harsher workplace conditions; Greene, White & Whitten, 2000 ; Hall, Everett, & Hamilton-Mason, 2012 ; Thompson, 2009 ; White, 2005 ).

During the late 1960s and 1970s, the “Black is Beautiful” era ushered in a temporary reprieve from the dominance of colorism among Black Americans in the U.S. ( Goering, 1971 ; Neal & Wilson, 1989 ; Okazawa-Ray et al., 1987 ). The advantages afforded to lighter skinned people weakened during this period. Substantive numbers of Black Americans, and notably women, began wearing Afros rather than chemically straightening their hair. Black Americans with darker skin complexions faced less inter-racial and intra-racial discrimination during this period ( Udry, Bauman, & Chase, 1971 ). However, some disadvantages still remained. While Black men with dark skin generally experienced an increase in upward mobility, Black women with dark skin did not.

Skin color and hair are both known phenotypic features that people reference to determine a person’s race ( Brown & Dane, 1998 ; Maddox, 2004 ); however, there is little empirical research examining how conversations about race include messages regarding one’s hair and skin color. In a study of Black families with pre-teen children ( N = 767), Landor and colleagues (2013) found that boys with darker skin reported receiving mistrust messages more frequently from their parents than did boys with lighter skin colors. Girls’ skin color was unrelated to the frequency of these same messages. Children of parents with lighter skin received more messages advocating promotion of mistrust from their parents if they were boys rather than if they were girls. In contrast, children of parents with darker skin colors promoted more messages of mistrust with their daughters than with their sons. While one’s parent skin color is not our primary factor of interest, Landor and colleagues’ (2013) findings provide evidence to support the phenomenon of gendered racial socialization.

Recently, Bailey-Fakhoury (2014) focused on hair in a study exploring gendered racial socialization processes among mothers seeking to promote a positive racial identity in their elementary-age daughters attending a predominantly White school. Specifically, mothers used an imaging strategy to teach and show their daughters how to embrace their Black features. They highlighted the versatility of their child’s hair and exposed them to images of other Black girls and women with similar hair through pictures of family and friends, and the media.

At least two racial socialization measures focus on instilling cultural pride by teaching children to not be ashamed of their appearance, including their skin color ( Lesane-Brown et al., 2008 ; Stevenson et al., 2002 ). These studies demonstrate that parent-child communication about racial issues includes messages about physical features. And these studies highlight the gendered nature of these conversations; thus, they illuminate the relevancy of explicitly examining physical attributes within gendered racial socialization processes.

We combined a traditional racial socialization theoretical approach ( Hughes et al., 2006 ) with intersectionality theory ( Crenshaw, 1989 ) in order to frame the experiences of racial socialization among Black women (e.g., see Brown et al., 2016 ). Intersectionality theory reconceptualizes classic feminist theory to include the experiences and concerns of Black women. Further, intersectionality theoretical scholars emphasize not only the simultaneous contributions of multiple social locations, but the oppression inherent in each of them ( Collins, 2000 ; Settles, 2006 ). This is important as theory on racial socialization usually only focuses on racial oppression and often does not consider other oppressions, including those related to being a girl or a woman.

Integrating gender with existing racial socialization theory allowed us to consider both race and gender and how these identities simultaneously contribute to Black women’s distinct lived experiences. With this framework, we were also able to consider how the interlocking systems of gender oppression and racial oppression shaped our participants’ understanding of the messages that they received regarding their physical characteristics from their families and others ( Capodilupo & Kim, 2014 ).

Using an intersectional framework and previous research as guides, we explored the gendered racial socialization experiences regarding messages of skin color and hair in Black women. We examined how these attributes contribute to Black individuals’ racialized experiences and, as such, how these messages about hair or skin color exist within racial socialization processes (e.g., different skin colors or hair styles may elicit different racial socialization messages). Only a few studies to date have explored this phenomenon in depth ( Bailey-Fakhoury, 2014 ; Landor et al., 2013 ; Ward, 1996 ; Wilder & Cain, 2011 ). We utilized grounded theory methodology ( LaRossa, 2005 ; Strauss & Corbin, 1998 ) via semi-structured focus groups to answer two research questions: (1) What messages do Black women receive about skin color and hair from family members? and (2) How do Black women manage and make sense of these messages?

Participants

We used data from a larger study focused on the gendered racial experiences of Black young adult men ( n = 30) and women ( n = 29; Smith-Bynum, 2013 ). We analyzed the women’s data for the present study. The eligibility criteria for the larger study included the following (a) self-identified as African American, (b) 18 years of age or older, and (c) an undergraduate student. As noted in the Procedure below, several prospective participants who responded to the study advertisements had immigrant backgrounds. The sample participants in the current study represented a variety of ethnic backgrounds: African American ( n = 19), African ( n = 7), Caribbean/West Indian ( n = 2), and Afro-Latino ( n = 1). Three women were first-generation immigrants. Participants ranged in age from 18 to 22 years (mean age = 20) and a majority were in their senior year of college (see Table 1 ).

Participant Demographic Information.

Note . Names listed here are pseudonyms selected by each participant. Generational status is based on information shared about immigrant background and place of birth during the focus group and/or during the recruitment and screening process.

Recruitment and enrollment.

We collected the data for the current study at a large, public Mid-Atlantic predominantly White university (PWI) between July and November 2013. According to institutional data on the racial composition of the college campus where data were collected, the U.S. Black/African American enrollment ranged from 12–13% over the course of the 2012–2013 academic year. Less than 1% of undergraduates were Black students from foreign countries during that time period ( The Office of Institutional Research, Planning, and Assessment, 2013 ). We distributed a flyer describing the study and the inclusion criteria on a listserv comprised of Black students at the university. We also disseminated the flyer to Black student organizations and made direct requests to students during organizational meetings. Last, flyers were strategically placed around campus in spaces known to be frequented areas by African American students (e.g., the campus Black cultural center).

Prospective study participants completed a Google-based screening survey assessing their year in school, gender, age, race/ethnicity (e.g., African American, African, Caribbean/West Indian, multiracial), and contact information. We contacted individuals who met the baseline enrollment criteria for a telephone screening, during which, we provided an overview of the study objectives and procedures. We also reassessed the enrollment criteria during the telephone interview and provided information about the risks and benefits of participating in the study.

Participants received reminders via email or text of the focus group date. Focus groups for men and women were conducted separately. Seven focus groups were conducted with the women on the university campus. At the beginning of the focus groups, participants completed a consent form. In addition, participants completed a confidentiality pledge that they would not reveal the participation of any group members. Each participant also selected a pseudonym, which they put on a nameplate on the table in front of them to aid discussion. The interviews were audio-recorded and lasted between 75–150 minutes. The groups ranged between 3 to 6 participants per group. Participants were given $15 for their time.

During the first 2 weeks of data collection for the larger study, we noticed that some participants ranged in their familiarity with the African American experience, despite the fact that they identified as African American during enrollment. At this point, we had completed 2 focus groups with men ( n = 8) and 5 focus groups with women participants ( n = 17). In one instance, a male participant referred to African Americans as an outgroup rather than as a group of which he was a member. We queried some participants with immigrant backgrounds to assess whether our enrollment procedures had been effective. Participants reported that some people with immigrant backgrounds adopt the ethnic label “African American” in certain circumstances, even when they did not feel a deep connection to the group (e.g., racial centrality; Asante, Sekimoto, & Brown, 2016 ; Benson, 2006 ; Clark, 2008 ; Sellers, Smith, Shelton, Rowley, & Chavous, 1998 ). Though we retained all participants for data analysis, we concluded that the overall screening process needed adjusting to better ensure that we were capturing the African American experience.

With IRB approval, we modified our screening process by first asking about “place of birth” and screening out participants who immigrated after age 10. General and racial-ethnic identity development becomes particularly salient in early adolescence ( Marcia, 1980 ; Phinney, 1992 ), therefore we assumed that participants who had immigrated to the U.S. by this age would have had an identity development process in the U.S. raced-based context ( Case & Hunter, 2014 ; Marcia, 1980 ; Phinney, 1992 ; Sellers et al., 1998 ).

Secondly, we asked foreign-born students who met the age criterion, “On a scale from 0 to 10, 10 being most able to relate, how much do you feel you can relate to the African American experience?” We deemed prospective participants who reported a “9” or “10” as having sufficiently strong identification with the African American experience, thus able to answer questions on the study protocol as members of the group ( Asante et al., 2016 ; Sellers et al., 1998 ).

Using this same criterion, we assessed the background of the 25 individuals who had already participated in focus groups. Six individuals ( n = 3 men, n = 3 women) had been born outside of the U.S, two of whom had come to the U.S after age 10. We also reassessed their experiences. Of interest to this study, all of the women were able to describe experiences that fit within the narrative of African American life; thus, their experiences were not excluded from analysis.

Semi-structured focus group interviews.

Focus group methodology permits multiple perspectives on the meaning of a phenomenon of interest and facilitates saturation of a subject ( Kerr, Nixon, & Wild, 2010 ). Using previous research on racial socialization and intersectionality theory as a guide, we created a semi-structured, open-ended interview protocol to encourage participants to provide in-depth descriptions of racial socialization messages that they had received, based on whether they identified as a Black woman or man ( Strauss & Corbin, 1998 ; see Appendix A ). For the purposes of this study, we analyzed answers to the question, “Talk to us about issues of skin color, hair texture, body shape in the Black community.” Facilitators presented a follow-up prompt to identify the sources of the messages participants received (e.g., parents). Facilitators also asked participants to share how messages about skin color, hair, and body shape have shaped how they view themselves (i.e., Question 5, Appendix A ). We omitted data on body shape from the present study for two reasons: (1) participants provided a large number of responses to the topic, presenting space and focus challenges; and (2) our preliminary review of the data indicated that messages about body shape deserved its own data analytic inquiry to excavate the meaning making process fully and accurately.

Data Analysis

The transcription team consisted of the authors and three trained undergraduate research assistants who received course credit for their efforts. Transcribers listened to each digital audio recording of the interviews verbatim. Prior to analysis, the first author reviewed transcribed data and cleaned all data of the transcripts as necessary. The data were analyzed using a grounded theory approach ( LaRossa, 2005 ). Milliken and Schreiber (2001) assert that in grounded theory, “the researcher’s job is to investigate the socially constructed meanings that form the participants’ realities and the behaviors that flow from those meanings” (p. 180). The goal of grounded theory is to understand phenomena based on the personal accounts of a participant’s experience and their interpretations of their experiences ( Charmaz, 2006 ).

There are three distinct yet overlapping processes of analysis involved in grounded theory: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. The coding team consisted of an African American woman (first author), a second-generation Haitian American woman, a second-generation Liberian American man (third author), and a Biracial Chinese-White woman. The first and third authors conducted the open coding by allowing the codes to emerge inductively as codes were being identified. There was no preset coding scheme beyond focusing on experiences pertaining to the constructs of interest: skin color and hair, responses to the prompts (Questions 4 and 5), or comments regarding skin color and hair that emerged at other times within the discussion. We used NVivo software (version 9) to organize and analyze the data.

The open-coding analysis entailed a repeated reading of the transcripts, identifying concepts and generating initial codes. The team met to discuss initial codes generated during the open coding phase and evaluated the similarity and the consistency of the meaning of the codes. The team also discussed codes produced by each of the two single coders and determined whether to include or discard them (i.e., inter-rater agreement; Campbell, Quincy, Osserman, & Pederson, 2013 ). The team organized agreed upon codes under potential themes after reviewing codes in relation to one another (i.e., axial coding; Charmaz, 2006 ). The team completed the final stage, selective coding, which entails defining the core theme or category to develop a storyline around. This process yielded an overarching storyline of the reconciliation of messages regarding one’s appearance (i.e., skin color, hair).

Data Quality

The research team devoted substantial efforts to establish trustworthiness, which is a crucial marker in demonstrating the merit of qualitative research and ensuring that the data are of high quality ( Krefting, 1991 ; Lincoln & Guba, 1985 ). We sought to achieve trustworthiness by demonstrating credibility (i.e., establishing confidence in the truth of findings), transferability (i.e., assessing whether the finding could be applicable to other contexts, situations, times, and/or populations) and dependability (i.e., assessing whether the finding would be consistent in the event the inquiry were replicated in a similar context).

The semi-structured interview format allowed for dialogue between the interviewer and the participants; this format provided the opportunity for participants to evaluate the truth in the conversation and to correct the interviewer if there was a misunderstanding about a participant’s experience. This common method, member checking, was used to establish credibility ( Krefting, 1991 ). We also used a time sampling strategy, which enhances credibility and transferability of strategies for ensuring trustworthiness. We accomplished this by interviewing individuals in different times of the academic year (i.e., Summer vs. Fall) and on different days of the week and times of the day. We also used triangulation of investigators ( Krefting, 1991 ), which involved having different team members analyze the data to prevent selective perceptions, illuminate blind spots in an interpretive analysis, and understand multiple ways of seeing the data.

Positionality and Reflexivity

In line with grounded theory methods, the research team considered how their positions and backgrounds might have influenced the study. This process is termed reflexivity ( Hall & Callery, 2001 ; Mauthner & Doucet, 2003 ; Watt, 2007 ). We accounted for two types of interactions: 1) researcher influence on research design and decisions and 2) researcher-participant interactions during data collection ( Gentles, Jack, Nicholas, & McKibbon, 2014 ).

After an assessment of how much time was needed per question, the research team decided to shift the pacing of the focus group protocol. We discovered in the first two focus groups that the time that remained when we reached Questions 4 and 5 was not sufficient for the participants to share all their experiences. During those groups, facilitators provided participants with the opportunity to stay longer if they wished to continue sharing. The research team agreed to adjust the pacing of the protocol for future groups to better ensure that participants would be able to share their experiences regarding hair and skin color.

We were also mindful of the researcher-participant interactions and how these interactions influenced the construction of the data ( Hall & Callery, 2001 ). It is likely that participants assessed who led the conversations, with consideration for the researcher’s age, gender, race/ethnicity, etc. ( Gentles et al., 2014 ). The first author, an African American woman, served as one of two co-facilitators for all of the focus groups with the women. The third author, a second-generation Liberian American man, facilitated 6 of the 7 groups with the first author. An African American woman, the fifth author, co-facilitated the 7th group with the first author. At the time of the study, the facilitators were in their mid-20s and the third facilitator in middle age. Both women facilitators have light brown skin and the man has dark brown skin. One woman facilitator (first author) wore a natural hair style, the second wore a relaxed hair style and the man wore a wavy buzz cut.

Occasionally, participants referenced one of the facilitators to help explain themselves. For example, the first author’s skin complexion was brought up and used as a point of reference: “She was light-skinned like you.” In some cases, the participants shared information about natural hair that the male facilitator was not familiar with. The women readily shared definitions when deemed relevant. Facilitators also monitored participant verbal and nonverbal responses, and subsequently asked pertinent follow up questions for clarification or inquired further about unanticipated responses.

Data analysis revealed three major categories that captured a number of participants’ gendered racial socialization and colorism experiences: 1) shades of black ( n = 27), 2) the politics of hair ( n = 27), and 3) the ramifications and resolution of skin and hair messages, ( n = 29). The following sections describe the experiences of Black women receiving messages about skin color and hair as well as the appraisal of these messages.

Theme 1: Shades of Black

Participants in several focus groups shared that their skin color is the subject of family and societal judgment and debate. Their narratives echoed the longstanding burden of colorism that African American women have faced for generations ( Thompson, 2009 ). Whether they ascribed to it or not, almost all participants ( n = 23) conveyed that the colorism hierarchy that placed light skin at the top existed. Messages about the hierarchy came most often from mothers and aunts.

Many women stated that a common notion that their families conveyed to them was that lighter skin is more beautiful and better than darker skin. Participants reported that family messages associated lighter skin color with more respect and better opportunities. Participants also revealed the different things that their parents would encourage them to do, or not to do, in order to maintain a preferred complexion (i.e., lighter). Beloved recalled that in the summertime her mother would ask her to stay inside more:

My mom, she would just be like don’t stay in the sun too long. When I was growing up… I loved playing basketball… me and my brother would be outside every single day. My mom…she be like you’ve been getting a little bit darker, you should stay inside a little bit.

Thus, parents not only shared their preferences, but also encouraged their children to partake in activities that would uphold these preferences.

It appeared that some conversations around skin color evoked negative feelings for some women. Ann reported feeling great discomfort when her mother, whom she described as having a darker complexion than she did, associated her skin color as being good and pretty. Nan recalled that her aunts, who she described as “very dark skinned,” felt animosity towards her mother because her mother was of a lighter complexion. Nan’s aunts told of their belief that her mother had a better life because of her skin color. She quoted one aunt as saying, “‘Well you know it’s harder for a darker sister out here in the world, and a light skin sister… they don’t know our struggle at all.’”

Some participants described a family narrative in which no particular skin color had been articulated as more valuable or preferred over another ( n = 5). Reflecting back on her childhood, Jade recalled that her mother did not indicate a preference for a particular Black skin color. Her mother endorsed anything that would promote pride in the skin color of Black people:

Growing up my mom always made sure to get me not Barbie, but Kristy, the Black Barbie, and uh (laugh) she always made sure like with books I had or whatever that other was always like a she tried to give me stuff where there was a Black character.

Participants disclosed that romantic partners also communicated the idea that lighter skin is better than darker skin. Beloved shared a story where her friend became darker after working outdoors at a summer camp. Beloved recalled that her friend’s boyfriend, who was also Black, requested that she not get any darker. While the explicit intentions of the boyfriend’s statement are unknown, Beloved interpreted his request to be consistent with the notion that “light skin is preferred.” This comment supports the idea that one’s skin color defines, in part or in full, a Black woman’s desirability or physical attractiveness.

Non-Black peers also appeared to endorse colorism. Sara recounted a time she found herself stuck after a White roommate made a comment about the skin color of a new member in their all-women fraternity:

[My roommate] was talking about her “little,” “Oh, my ‘little’ has light skin. She just lucked out genetically because [my little’s] [biological] sister has very dark skin.” Every single person looked at me and was like “oh well are you going to say something.” [Internally] I’m like “WHAT did you say??” but I didn’t say a word.

These examples showcase that messages about the hierarchy also emanated from romantic partners and peers.

In contrast to the frequently reported messages about perceived problems due to having darker skin, or perceived privileges due to having lighter skin, there were reports of problems as result of having a light skin tone. Specifically, some light-skinned women reported having their identity redefined by others (e.g., peers, neighborhood members). Michelle shared that people would insist that she was mixed-race, even after she explained how she identified herself:

People will demand, “No, you don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re mixed, your half.” I’m like “No I am actually African American, I’m Black.” I get that a lot, people telling me what I am… I’m like how are you gonna tell me?

Similarly, Sarah recounted her experiences as a light-complected Black woman. She noted that after she moved, African Americans in her new neighborhood called her “White” due to her skin color and because she appeared to fit some stereotypes they held about White Americans (i.e., not being lactose intolerant). Both of these examples suggest a more nuanced, “lighter-isn’t-always-better” understanding of colorism ( Russell et al., 2013 ). Furthermore, the reports from our participants, in conjunction with other research, showcase the consistently contested nature, and complexity, of skin color.

Theme 2: The Politics of Hair

The majority of the women described having to make decisions regularly about how to wear and style their hair based on messaging from the broader society about mainstream definitions of pretty and/or acceptable hair and hair styles. In some cases, White Eurocentric ideals, endorsed by family or friends and/or enforced by institutions such as school or work, influenced women to choose specific hairstyles, while other women purposely defied the standard by wearing their hair naturally. Family members often encouraged or discouraged certain hairstyles. As has been shown in previous work, hair can be complex. Two subthemes emerged from the data that reflect the multilayered, and often emotional dilemmas surrounding African American women’s hair.

Subtheme 2a: Family knows best.

Racial socialization messages occurred frequently in the form of family advice, praise, and admonitions about how participants should wear their hair. A few women shared the experience of their hair falling out or breaking off and how their family advised them. Sara reflected on the engagement of her parents and their messages of encouragement to get braids:

Both of my parents were extremely, like they were PUSHING me to get braids cause like my hair was falling out with the relaxer, and it was not looking good. And my hair is very thick naturally, and it was thinning out. I didn’t like that. My mom was like “whoa as soon as you get your braids out you need to get natural like for real.” So, we’re going to see how that goes…

Similarly, Kendra was advised by family to wear her hair naturally:

Interviewer 2: What made you decide to go natural 3 years ago?

Kendra: Well the only person in my family that has a perm is my grandmother. I feel like [my hair] was breaking off… My aunt was like “how you gonna have a like such an Afrocentric boyfriend and have like permed hair” And I was like…”okay.”

Interviewer 1: She felt like having relaxed hair was giving off a certain message that was not…

Kendra: …Afrocentric

Interviewer 1: …not congruent with his beliefs and your beliefs?

Kendra: And how I was raised too…yea so she said that and [the perm] wasn’t doing that much for my hair so I was like, “lemme go natural.”

While “going natural” was a logical step for Kendra, her aunt’s beliefs about permed and natural hair appeared to have also influenced her decision.

In other cases, the women themselves embraced their natural hair, while their family endorsed a Eurocentric beauty standard (i.e., long and straight hair). Beloved described her mother’s reaction when she cut her hair short (see “The Big Chop”; Williams, 2014 ). “Hair is a big thing for my mom, she had her own salon. When I did the big chop last summer, my mom was so upset. I’ve never seen her like that, and I don’t want to ever see her like that again.” Tensions also ran high in Nicole’s family:

I cut my hair [and] I came back from like Christmas break or whatever, and umm I had my junior prom. [My family] was saying “Oh you’re going to have to get a weave now. Like how are you gonna do your hair? Why would you cut it before prom? You’re going to get it straightened.” So I had A LOT of negativity from like wearing my hair the way it grows out of my scalp.

These examples highlight the conflicts that can arise when there are varying beliefs about how Black women should wear their hair.

In some cases, parents advised against certain hair styles because they believed it would have consequences for their daughter. Jane disclosed: “My mom says you can’t wear braids or dreads or even natural hair; that you really have to have straight hair for like a upper level job, like white collar jobs.” In this instance, Jane’s mom believed that ethnic hairstyles would not be appropriate for the type of job she hoped her daughter would obtain.

Nan recalled a similar experience when she told her mother that she wanted to dye her hair purpose:

My mom was like “You’re gonna look ghetto like that. Please don’t.” But, you see all these White girls dying their hair purple, but they don’t look trashy! They just look like they’re up with the style. But when I want to dye it this color or that color, and it’s just like no, you have to think about how you are going to portray yourself, because you don’t wanna come off as looking lazy… unkempt or that you don’t look like you respect yourself as much as you should.

Nan concluded that her mom’s request came out of concern that she will be viewed or treated negatively by others if she dyes her hair purple. Messages like these left women grappling with whether to comply or rebel against the idea that wearing their hair a certain way (i.e., naturally) meant they were not polished or respectable.

Conversations about beauty also involved the attention and engagement from the men in the participants’ lives. A few women recalled conversations with their fathers about hair, including how it should look or cared for. Brittany noted how much her father loved her hair before it became damaged by flat irons and curling irons:

My hair used to be my father’s pride and joy… my hair was really long and thick and my father absolutely loved it, and then as it gradually got shorter as I got older, he was so upset. My father is like so tied to the appearance of my hair so he would be very unhappy right now.

Based on his reaction, Brittany’s father appears to favor longer hair against shorter hair. Furthermore, his disappointment at an earlier point in time led Brittany to believe that he would also be displeased with her hair at the time of the study.

Jade shared that her father also took pride in her hair. It was important to him that her hair looked good, so he would give her money to get her hair done regularly. Sara shared that her father affirmed her decisions to style her hair in ways that suited her: “His big thing was to just find something that accentuated me. That I’m a Black woman with this kind of hair, and I need to feel beautiful in that hair.” While families often promoted styles that endorsed certain hair lengths and/or that involved relaxing or straightening methods (i.e., a more Eurocentric hairstyle), their efforts appeared to be either aimed to protect or uplift the young woman in their life.

Subtheme 2b: Going natural.

Despite messages by family members to promote long, straight hair (i.e., Eurocentric standards), a majority of participants described experiences of wearing their hair in its natural state ( n = 18). Some women begin the process of wearing natural hair with “the big chop.” The others went through a “transitioning” period, growing out their hair, and cutting off chemically relaxed ends over time ( Perkins, 2017 ; Williams, 2014 ). For many of the women, going natural was linked to cultural pride, akin to reclaiming one’s roots and expressing one’s Blackness and ( Jeffries & Jeffries, 2014 ; White, 2005 ). Participants stated that wearing natural hairstyles helped them broaden what society deemed acceptable and beautiful ( Ellis-Hervey, Doss, Davis, Nicks, & Araiza, 2016 ). However, wearing natural hair styles elicited some conflict, debate, and negative reactions from others. Several of the women noted that the question to go natural or relax one’s hair was a source of controversial debate among their friends and family. Sasha, disclosed how her mother reacted when she went natural:

I went natural like sophomore year…. I cut off all my hair, and just like had really short hair. I cut it all off ‘cause I’m sick of having my hair not being healthy. My mom said it was ugly, and she wanted me to like get a perm or like a um texturizer, something in it to make the curl pattern different.

Interestingly, a few women experienced dissension with family members who believed that that being natural was an expression of cultural pride, when the participant did not. Mary shared the backlash that she experienced by choosing not to wear her hair naturally:

I commend people that can go natural cause like I know I couldn’t. But all my sisters and my cousins have, and whenever we’re all around they’re just like “Why are you denying your African roots?” My family will say “Why are you tryna be like a white woman right now? You need to embrace your Black side.”

Those who did not wish to wear their hair naturally described being pressured, and did not like having their racial/ethnic/cultural identity judged in the process.

Theme 3: Ramifications and Resolution of Skin and Hair Messages

All of the women shared their experience with making sense of the hair and skin color messages and endorsements that their family members, and sometimes peers, communicated to them. These responses are classified into two subthemes. Many participants described a negative reaction to the racial socialization messages focused on skin color and hair that they received, which included self-criticism (Subtheme 3a). Some of these participants reported arriving at a positive space where they fully and proudly embraced their hair and/or skin color (Subtheme 3b).

Subtheme 3a: Self-criticism.

Some women reported feelings of low self-esteem, and even depression, when their skin color or hairstyle did not “meet” the standards to which their parents, other family members, peers, or romantic partners believed that they should ascribe. After discussing standards of beauty for African American women, Rachel described issues with self-esteem and identity as pervasive in the community:

I was super critical of myself. “Why can’t I look this way?”… like before, I wished I was White! I feel every Black girl goes through a phase where she has a hard time with her self-esteem and self-identity. My sister [went] through it, I have cousins who go through it, and I [went] through it.

This process, Rachel said, distracts from a focus on “important stuff like our futures, and academics, and things that actually help us and matter.” It seemed that for Rachel, and for other women in her family, self-criticism was a result of not appearing in the ways endorsed by their families and peers; and it had unfortunate repercussions in their personal and professional lives.

The women used various tactics to cope with the messages they received about skin color and hair texture. For some women, coping manifested as attempts to appease others’ expectations; several women talked about limiting their time outside in an effort to pacify their family or friend’s opinions about perceived drawbacks of getting darker. Some women conformed by wearing a weave in their hair to meet the desired style or length as defined by family or friends. For Liz, coping involved disengaging from people she felt imposed their beliefs onto her. After having negative experiences with critics of her appearance, Liz shared:

I choose to be around like-minded people who will not, like, challenge who I am. I pretend like it doesn’t exist, because it really frustrates me when, you know, people put [a] stigma on how you should be and how you should act because you look a certain way.

Some women reported that they had internalized Western norms of beauty more deeply than they realized when life events triggered self-awareness in this area. Faith described how she expected to experience negative feedback from others after cutting her hair. The negative feedback did not occur. Instead, she found that negative judgments about her hair came from herself:

I always had hair, so I didn’t know how it would look, doing the big chop…so like when I cut my hair like, oh my goodness, like I couldn’t take in how I looked! I wore like so much makeup to class. I never wear makeup to class…but I wore make-up. A lot of people gave me a lot of good comments. It was only me that was hard on myself, ‘cause like I don’t feel as pretty ‘cause I don’t have long hair right now.

Faith’s stated insecurity resulted from her own internalized ideal of beauty, long hair, likely a result from her socialization in the broader American culture. She attempted to cope by engaging in a cosmetic activity that was unusual for her, with the intention to offset the beauty she thought she had lost.

Subtheme 3b: Reconciliation and Black girl resilience.

Several of the participants described a process of reconciliation and acceptance of their skin color and hair texture. All of the narratives reflected a quest for ways to accept how they looked and feel confident in their attributes amid the conflicting messages they received from family and friends (e.g., Phelps-Ward & Laura, 2016 ). Michelle shared that she used to think less of herself, but learned to embrace how she looked over time and through her lived experiences:

I’m given what I’m given. I embrace it. I don’t have any negative views upon myself just because I’m Black or ‘cause I have a certain hair texture. I [realize] you’re born with what you have, and you have to work with it.

It appears that the ultimate goal for the women during this reconciliation process was to appreciate their natural features (e.g., skin color, hair texture). Sara explained how she realized that she was unique and that self-love was especially important:

It’s been like a long journey of me just becoming comfortable with myself. Because I [went] through this whole period of where I’m the only one who’s like me, who looks like me, who has hair like me. And I just need to love myself. I’m gonna love…my color and my skin and my hair and just accept myself for who I am.

Some women achieved this goal this by actively resisting the general beauty standards for all women, and for Black women in particular. Rachel explained how at one point she wanted to look like what she perceived as the ideal for a Black woman (i.e., light in complexion, curvy), but decided she should not and will not consume that ideal:

I’ve kinda reached to a point where I adamantly disagree with any type of rules. Like there is no [right] way to be Black. I’m a Black woman; there is no way to define me. I shouldn’t have a certain type of body style. There is no way my hair should look.

For women like Rachel, it was important to be able to define one’s self both in their own terms, and on their own terms. This process seemed to lead to increased feelings of confidence.

Nicole indicated that by embracing herself the way she is, she would feel more confident in advocating for herself as a Black woman:

I have to be confident in who I am and walk into a room for interview or something with a white man and say well you’re going to respect me. You’re going to take me seriously. I think going natural has made me more confident in who I am. You know saying this is my hair, this is the way it grows out of my scalp. I really don’t care what you have to say. That’s just what it is. I love being a Black woman.

And while the objective in reconciliation was more about self-love, most of the women recognized that having self-appreciation and confidence could motivate others, like their family and peers, to also appreciate them.

The current study advances the literature by illuminating the ways in which hair and skin color are included gendered racial socialization. Families were the primary source of gendered racial socialization in these arenas. Consistent with Hughes and colleague’s (2006) approach, family messages were both direct and indirect; they were deliberate and spontaneous. And attitudes about Black women’s hair was a fundamental component of these messages, too, supporting those who extend colorism to include other physical features beyond skin colors (e.g., Thompson, 2009 ).

Similar to other studies, our data suggest that families are not the only agents communicating hair and skin-based messages to young, Black women ( Adams & Stevenson, 2012 ; Martin & McAdoo, 2007 ). Romantic partners, friends, and classmates also perpetuated gendered racial socialization and messages about skin and hair hierarchies’ endemic to colorism, as did White peers. Such experiences underscore that colorism is one manifestation of the larger European hierarchy that affects Black Americans both intra-and inter-racially and in multiple settings ( Adams et al., 2016 ; Burke, 2008 ; M.E. Hill, 2002 ).

Some participants in our sample reported that family members and other people in their lives conveyed affirming messages that taught them to be proud of their skin color and hair.

These findings are consistent with the “raising resisters” and “oppositional narrative” approaches as reported by Ward (1996) and Wilder and Cain (2011) , respectively. These parenting strategies can be construed as a type of cultural pride reinforcement ( Stevenson et al., 2002 ), which is a form of racial socialization that helps build up a positive racial identity and sense of self ( Davis, Smith-Bynum, Saleem, Francois, & Lambert, 2017 ).

In some cases, participants described their parents’ disapproval of certain hair styles, including short hair, natural hair, and brightly colored hair, in fear that they would be perceived negatively and/or experience discriminated in various settings (e.g., school, work; Russell et al., 2013 ). Researchers ( Humphrey, 2008 ; Lewis, 1999 ) suggest that family messaging about hair style preferences appears to begin early in life through the emblematic ritual of Black mothers styling their daughters’ hair. This process of styling the hair is a major vehicle through which standards of beauty and physical attractiveness are conveyed along with messaging about daughters’ hair texture and style. This is a central to the gendered racial socialization of Black women.

Family messages about hair texture and style represent a type of preparation for confronting racial bias within the context of colorism, with messages highlighting the prejudices and judgement about hairstyles Black women confront as they go about their lives ( Hughes et al., 2006 ; Humphrey, 2008 ; Stevenson et al., 2002 ). Parental admonitions about hair styles are communication strategies designed to minimize the effect of racism and discrimination aimed at Black women. Simultaneously, however, a portion of the gendered racial socialization messages about hair styles and textures described in this study and others also advance Eurocentric beauty standards. Thus, counter to the general narrative in the literature that racial socialization is positive and protective, it also reflects a type of internalized racism on the part of some Black parents.

Negotiating Gendered Racial Socialization Messages as a Developmental Process

To date, little published research addresses how young people respond to these racial socialization messages and how they find solutions to racial dilemmas. Our results indicate that the young women in this study exercised varying degrees of agency in how they process gendered racial socialization messages about skin color and hair from various sources. A proportion of the women reported feeling trapped by negative narratives they had internalized about skin color and hair before finding a way to create a personal definition of their Black womanhood. Others reported a continued sense of struggle with these issues at the time of the study. Their poignant accounts point to aspects of racial, ethnic, and gender identity development that are truly intersectional in nature.

The ages of our participants suggest they were actively engaged in the process of gender, racial, and ethnic identity development at the time of data collection ( Arnett, 2000 ; Marcia, 1980 ; Phinney, 1992 ). Participants’ resolution of skin color and hair messages suggests that a developmental process may affect how they engage in individual meaning-making processes that inform their identities as Black women. Current theoretical models of racial, ethnic, and gender identity would generally argue that identity development in these specific arenas proceed independently alongside each other (e.g., Phinney. 1992 ). Our data suggest that these processes can operate dependently and inform each other. Thus, the current practice of investigating identity development by race, ethnicity, or gender separately is inadequate for understanding the intersectional experiences of Black women ( Crenshaw, 1989 ; Warner, Settles, & Shields, 2018 ).

Rethinking Racial Socialization Theory

The challenge for some Black families, as they have conversations about race, is what some prominent scholars in the field have referred to as a “race paradox” ( Wilder & Cain, 2011 ; Landor et al., 2013 ). That is, while families engage in racial socialization—a process known to shield children from the realities of racism and imbue in them a sense of racial pride—some families are simultaneously advancing colorism, which has harmful consequences. Consistent with previous research ( Adams et al., 2016 ; Burke, 2008 ; Landor et al., 2013 ), participants recalled the promotion of colorism (whether intentional or unintentional) during their gendered racial socialization experiences.

Though novel and informative, it seems that the term “race paradox” does not highlight the full extent of the phenomenon from a theoretical perspective. The race paradox is about the racial socialization processes in Black families; it is not a paradox about their race, per se. Thus, we suggest the term be amended to the “racial socialization paradox,” more accurately reflecting the process in which the paradox manifests.

It is important to note that our data indicated that the racial socialization paradox is not uniform for all Black women. Though nearly all the women’s narratives corroborated the existence of the racial socialization paradox, some participants’ narratives did not. Women of varying backgrounds described family and friend affirmations for darker skin colors and/or natural hair; thus, they experienced messaging that ran counter to an endorsement of colorism. Other factors or axes of identity may have contributed to these women’s racial socialization experiences (e.g., contextual spheres; Allen & Mendez, 2018 ). Though we were unable to explore other factors or identities in the current study, we implore researchers to consider other influences of gendered racial socialization. It is plausible that validating messages will help buffer against other oppressions that Black women experience, as these messages promote pride, boost confidence, and enhance one’s sense of self.

Implications for Future Research

Research connecting theory about racial socialization messaging more generally to messaging to Black women about hair texture and hair style, vis à vis standards of beauty, has received almost no attention in the literature to date. Additional research that explores how hair is included in conversations about race is warranted for at least two reasons. First, the most recent natural hair movement, focused on the promotion of wearing and styling natural Black hair has continued to flourish since the early 2000s ( Jeffries & Jeffries, 2014 ; Spaulding & Metcalf, 2015 ). Wearing one’s hair naturally was a relevant experience for a majority of the participants in this study. Even participants who did not wear their hair naturally, shared experiences of their family or friends who did. Thus, capturing individual’s feelings about Black hair texture, length, and style is timely. Further, women (and men) who came of age during this movement are starting to have their own children. It would be interesting to examine the kind of messages that they and other socializing agents share with the next generation of Black girls.

Second, Black girls and women may experience criticism or bias from people in their social networks or institutions like school and work settings because of how they style their hair ( Allen, 2016 ; Manuel-Logan, 2013 ; Underwood, 2016 ). Additional research may help unpack the ways in which Black women prepare for and cope with criticism or discrimination in various settings. Scholars should further investigate the ways in which these standards are maintained as well as how the frequency in which Black women and girls have to confront these experiences can be reduced ( Marira & Mitra, 2013 ; Norwood & Foreman, 2014 ). We believe that the support of family and others can help in this process.

Additionally, as this work provided additional support for the assertion that Black women live in differing gendered racial spaces than their male counterparts ( Collins, 2000 ; Crenshaw, 1989 ; Greene, Way, & Pahl, 2006 ; S. Hill, 2001 ; 2002 ), we recommend that researchers draw on research paradigms beyond the gender-neutral, self-report measures of racial socialization currently in wide use ( Hughes et al., 2006 , Lesane, 2005 ; Stevenson et al., 2002 ). We echo other researchers regarding the need for valid measures of gendered racial socialization (e.g., Brown et al., 2016 ) in order to capture a more meaningful understanding of the experiences of Black women.

Lastly, though we recruited participants under the ethnic label “African American,” this study attracted Black women of diverse backgrounds, including those who were first and second generation Americans. We believe this heterogeneity made our findings and our understanding of the phenomenon of Black women’s physical attributes richer. Thus, we chose to retain our full sample and describe the participants with the more inclusive term “Black.” We encourage other scholars to be mindful of the ways that racial/ethnic identity may be fluid and be prepared to adapt to as much as your inquiry will allow. The knowledge gained may lead to policies and practices that produce meaningful experiences for a larger group of persons of color.

Practice Implications

We provide several recommendations for clinicians and practitioners that work with Black women and girls. First, sensitivity towards the extensive nature of colorism is imperative when working with both girls and women. It is important to understand not only the ways colorism affects Black women internally—for our sample, this included feelings of depression, lack of confidence, and anxiety—but also the ways in which Black families are responsible for conveying colorist messages. These findings can inform clinicians’ work with both individual patients and their family members. Given participants’ descriptions of colorism within school- and work-based climates and policies, it behooves practitioners to also consider the institutions and schools that have the potential to promote or exacerbate depression, anxiety, and other self-esteem issues ( Blake, Keith, Luo, Le, & Salter, 2017 ; McGill Johnson, Godsil, MacFarlane, Tropp, & Atiba, 2017 ; Ryabov, 2013 ). Further, consideration of romantic partners, peer groups, and other non-family members is important, as such individuals may also reinforce negative racial socialization messages, or contradict those originating elsewhere (e.g., the workplace has different expectations and desires for hair than one’s family).

Second, although clinical training programs have made strides in training culturally competent therapists (e.g., Bean, Benjamin, & Bedell, 2002 ; McGeorge & Carlson, 2011 ; Taylor, Gambourg, Rivera, & Laureano, 2006 ), we appeal to clinicians to embrace the burgeoning trend of considering inter-group diversity. Being aware of, and inquisitive towards, nuanced experiences within broader demographic categories (e.g., race, class, ethnic group) may reveal dynamics that might have otherwise been ignored, aid in the efficacy of clinical services, and strengthen the therapeutic relationship with such clients, a critical aspect of the therapeutic process ( Friedlander, Wildman, Heatherington, & Skowron, 1994 ; Shields, Sprenkle, & Constantine, 1991 ).

Lastly, we ask parents and other family members to be thoughtful of what they say to their children, both sons and daughters, in regard to their physical attributes. We recognize that these messages are generally well-intentioned, but in some cases, participants reported that they were hurtful and negative. Research has demonstrated messages about hair and skin color have the ability to harm the self-concept and self-esteem of girls and young women ( Davis et al., 2017 ; Thomas & King, 2007 ). Further, these messages can complicate young Black girl’s identity development, particularly with regard to race and gender ( Bailey-Fakhoury, 2014 ; Brown et al., 2016 ; Thomas et al., 2011 ; Townsend et al., 2016).

Strengths and Limitations

To our knowledge, ours is the first study to qualitatively examine Black women’s experiences about hair and skin color in the context of racial socialization. Further, our research extended what we know in general about racial socialization by adopting the lens of gendered experiences and exploring areas that have been historically overlooked in the racial socialization literature, but are heavily tied to girls’ and women’s culture and race (i.e., hair, skin color). In addition, this study explored these processes among college-aged students, an especially important time when one’s understanding of their race, gender, and other identities becomes fortified by every day experiences ( Arnett & Brody, 2008 ; Thomas et al., 2011 ).

We analyzed narratives from a diverse sample of young Black women. This diversity helped illuminate the similar and different experiences that Black women have around hair and skin color. And we employed a diverse team of researchers for data collection, transcription, and analysis, which proved fruitful in a number of ways: it allowed us to match on race and gender for the interviews, offering the participants facilitators to whom they could seemingly relate and thus increase their comfort and ease in discussing sensitive topics. The diversity of the research team also proved beneficial during the phases of analysis, as it allowed a space for a plethora of insights about the data to be presented and weighed by individuals with different backgrounds (i.e., race/ethnicity, gender, sexual identity, age). Qualitative scholars support such diversity on research teams and the benefits it provides ( Baca Zinn, 1979 ; Stanley & Slattery, 2003 ).

It is also important to note the shortcomings of the current study. First, while the limited age range of our participants was intentional and provided a nuanced understanding of their racial socialization perspectives, our data cannot illuminate the full extent to which these perspectives might vary across age and developmental stage. Second, because the data for the current research project came from a broader study of gendered racial socialization—and not specifically of messages specifically about hair or skin—we may have not captured the full extent of these types of messages and experiences. Thus, a study with a specific focus on the messages from family and/or other sources about skin and hair within gendered racial socialization might uncover aspects of these processes that we did not.

Conclusions

Using a theoretical framework that combined Black feminist intersectionality and racial-ethnic socialization ( Crenshaw, 1989 ; Hughes et al., 2006 ), we explored the gendered racial socialization experiences of Black women as they received and made meaning of messages about skin color and hair. The women in this study, who represented different ethnic backgrounds, received and interpreted messages about skin color and hair length, texture, and style. The interpretation of messages about how one should, or should not, look as a Black woman was not a superficial process, but rather a complex one. This study extends the field’s understanding about gendered racial socialization processes and provides evidence that these conversations include messages about physical appearance and self-image. It is important to continue to identify and employ gendered racial socialization practices that foster the healthy identity development for and wellbeing of Black women in schools, workplaces, and homes.

Acknowledgments

The data analyzed in this study are not publicly available because of specifications outlined in the IRB-approved informed consent process. Requests for data access should be directed to the fifth author at [email protected] . The Consortium for Race, Gender, and Ethnicity at the University of Maryland, College Park funded this research. This research was presented at the 2014 conference of the Society of Research on Adolescence. We would like to thank the numerous research assistants involved in this research and the young women who participated in this study.

FOCUS GROUP QUESTIONS

• What was it like for you growing up as a Black [fe]male in your community?
• In the context of one’s family? (role as brother/sister, son/daughter, father/mother)
• Expectations for education?
• How should you talk, dress, carry yourself?
• Do you believe these experiences are unique to you?
• Do you believe that your peers (especially those of different races) also experience them?
• Talk to us about issues of skin color, hair texture, body shape in the Black community.
• How have these things (i.e. skin color, hair texture, body shape) shaped how you view yourself?
• Of everything we have talked about, what was most relevant or important to you?
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