Date of Award

5-1-1988

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts (MA)

Department

Psychology

First Advisor

Dr. Wayne Harrison

Second Advisor

Dr. Jim Thomas

Abstract

Previous research has examined sex of evaluator and sex-type of jobs as sources of systematic bias on job evaluation ratings. The present study attempted to go beyond the global notion of sex of evaluator and examine the effect of the information processing characteristics associated with an evaluator's gender self-schema on evaluation ratings. Gender self-schema theory states that gender self-shematics possess more and have increased processing efficiency to relevant gender information. It was proposed that the content and information processing characteristics associated with gender self-schematics would increase the rating accuracy of gender relevant jobs and job evaluation factors. Eighty-four undergraduate college students with masculine, feminine, or androgynous schemata were randomly assigned to either a male or female sex-type job description condition. The results showed that all subjects exhibited greater differential accuracy for masculine and neutral dimensions when rating male and female sex-typed jobs respectively. Gender schema versus self-schema theory, job evaluation training, and accuracy bias are discussed in relation to the present findings.

Comments

A Thesis Presented to the Department of Psychology and the Faculty of the Graduate College University of Nebraska at Omaha In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts University of Nebraska at Omaha. Copyright 1988, John R. Curtis, Jr.

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