Burgess1999Who Women Are Who Women Should Be

Psychology, Public Policy, and Law Copyright 1999 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.
1999, Vol. 5, No. 3, 665-692 1076-8971/99/S3.00 DOI: 10.1037//1076-8971.5.3.665
WHO WOMEN ARE, WHO WOMEN SHOULD BE

Descriptive and Prescriptive Gender Stereotyping
in Sex Discrimination
Diana Burgess and Eugene Borgida
University of Minnesota
The authors discussed the ways in which the distinction between the descriptive and
prescriptive components of gender stereotypes may provide a context for thinking
about the role of gender stereotyping in sex discrimination and sexual harassment.
They reviewed the research literature involving the descriptive and prescriptive
components of gender stereotypes, with particular emphasis on research published
since the American Psychological Association's 1991 amicus brief in Price Water-
house v. Hopkins (1989). They suggested that incidents of sex discrimination that
involve disparate treatment are more likely to reflect the prescriptive component of
gender stereotypes and that incidents of sex discrimination that result in disparate
impact are more likely to reflect the descriptive component. The authors discussed
the implications of this distinction for sex discrimination and sexual harassment
litigation.
Almost a decade after psychological research on gender stereotyping first was

considered by the U.S. Supreme Court in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins (1989),
gender stereotyping research continues to play a role in litigation involving gender
discrimination and sexual harassment (e.g., Butler et al. v. Home Depot, 1997;
Huffman v. Pepsi Cola, 1994; Jenson v. Eveleth Taconite Co., 1993; Robinson v.
Jacksonville Shipyards, Inc., 1989). In the intervening years since the American
Psychological Association (APA, 1991) presented its amicus brief in Price
Waterhouse v. Hopkins, the research literature on gender stereotyping and gender
prejudice has continued to expand and mature (Borgida & Fiske, 1995; Deaux,
1995; Deaux & La France, 1998). In this article we discuss the ways in which the
long-standing distinction from this literature between the descriptive and prescrip-
tive components of gender stereotypes may provide a context for thinking about
their role in cases of sex discrimination and sexual harassment. In addition, we
suggest that these two components of gender stereotypes result in incidents of
discrimination that can be understood in the context of the distinction in employ-
ment discrimination law between disparate treatment and disparate impact (Case,
1995).
As may be seen in Table 1, the descriptive component of gender stereotypes
consists of beliefs about the characteristics that women do possess, whereas the
Diana Burgess, Graduate School of Business, Stanford University; Eugene Borgida, Depart-
ment of Psychology, University of Minnesota.
This article is based on research support from the College of Liberal Arts and a doctoral
dissertation fellowship from the Graduate School. We gratefully acknowledge the advice of Susan
M. Wolf and the comments of Kay Deaux, Pat Frazier, Peter Glick, and Madeline Heilman on an
earlier version of this article.
Correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Eugene Borgida, Department of
Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota 55455. Electronic mail may be sent
to borgi001@tc.umn.edu.
665
666 BURGESS AND BORGIDA
Table 1
How Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of Gender Stereotypes Result
in Gender Discrimination ~
Descriptive component Prescriptive component
Beliefs about the attributes, roles, and Beliefs about the attributes, roles, and
behaviors that characterize men and behaviors to which men and women are
women expected to conform
Results in discrimination through disparate Results in discrimination through disparate
impact when women are perceived in treatment when women are devalued or
terms of the traditional female subjected to a hostile workplace
stereotype and consequently are deemed because they violate prescriptions about
inappropriate for stereotypically how women should behave (e.g., Price
masculine occupations (e.g., EEOC v. Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 1989; Jenson v.
Sears, Roebuck & Co., 1986) Eveleth Taconite Co., 1993)
Discrimination may be unintentional Discrimination is motivated by hostility
and gender prejudice
Stereotype serves to structure the flow of Stereotype serves to maintain power
information in daily life inequities in society
Individuating information undercuts Individuating information has no bearing
discrimination on discrimination
Men and women may be equally likely to Men are more likely to discriminate than
discriminate are women
prescriptive component consists of beliefs about the characteristics that women

should possess (Cota, Reid, & Dion, 1991; Eagly, 1987; Fiske & Stevens, 1993;
Terborg, 1977). Whereas the descriptive component of the female stereotype
might consist of beliefs that women are nurturing and soft-spoken, the prescriptive
component might consist of beliefs that women should be nurturing and soft-
spoken. Although the content of these two components may overlap (e.g., Eagly,
1987; Stoppard & Kalin, 1978), the processes by which the descriptive and
prescriptive components of gender stereotypes theoretically lead to discrimination
are different.
The descriptive component of the female stereotype is expected to lead to
workplace discrimination when women are perceived in terms of a "lack of fit" for
traditionally male occupations. When the evaluation criteria for male-dominated
occupations are based on masculine stereotypes, the use of these gender-stereo-
typic criteria in hiring and promotion decisions has an adverse impact on women,
who are less likely to be viewed as possessing the requisite masculine attributes
than men (Fiske, Bersoff, Borgida, Deaux, & Heilman, 1991; Heilman, 1983).
Under Title VII doctrine (Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act), this type of
discrimination falls under the rubric of disparate impact, in which institutional
practices result in hiring and promotion decisions that are biased against a class
of people (Case, 1995). One example of how the descriptive component of gender
stereotypes may lead to discrimination against women, through disparate impact,
was Sears and Roebuck's past use of criteria for selecting commissioned sales-
DESCRIPTIVE AND PRESCRIPTIVE GENDER STEREOTYPING 667
people on the basis of masculine stereotypes, such as a "vigor test" that favored
applicants with deep voices who liked to hunt and fish (Equal Employment
Opportunity Commission [EEOC] v. Sears, Roebuck & Ccr., 1986). Because
stereotypes of women were incongruent with the stereotypically male attributes
associated with the screening devices used by Sears, women were less likely than
men to be hired for commissioned sales jobs. Although Sears personnel who were
responsible for making hiring decisions may not have intentionally set out to
discriminate against women, the result of this institutional practice had an adverse
impact on female applicants.
As this example illustrates, discrimination based on descriptive gender ste-
reotypes does not require any prejudicial intent to discriminate, nor does it require
the decision maker to harbor any hostility toward women. Instead, as may be seen
in Table 1, discrimination is due to a mismatch between masculine occupational
qualifications and feminine stereotypes about the attributes women are believed to
possess—the descriptive component of gender stereotypes. As may be seen in
Table 1, this type of discrimination may be reduced through the use of procedures
that induce evaluators to process information in a data-driven manner, such as the
use of assessment devices that provide impartial measures of men's and women's
qualifications and the use of selection criteria that are based on the objective
requirements of the job rather than on gender stereotypes.
Whereas the descriptive component of gender stereotypes is expected to lead
to discrimination against women who are perceived as lacking the necessary
attributes to succeed in male-dominated occupations, the prescriptive component
is expected to lead to discrimination against women who violate shared beliefs
about how women should behave. Such discrimination generally takes the form of
disparate treatment, in which women who violate prescriptive stereotypes of
femininity are punished, either through hostile environment harassment or
through the devaluation of their performance (e.g., Case, 1995; Franke, 1997;
Schultz, 1998). For example, women who enter male-dominated occupations are
often the recipients of hostile, degrading actions from men, who resent the
intrusion of women into their domain (e.g., Butler et al. v. Home Depot, 1997;
Huffman v. Pepsi Cola, 1994; Jenson v. Eveleth Taconite Co., 1993; Robinson v.
Jacksonville Shipyards, Inc., 1989). Women who do not conform to prescriptive
beliefs about femininity also may be negatively evaluated and be denied positions
and promotions, even when they have achieved objective standards of compe-
tence—a fate that befell Ann Hopkins, an accountant who was denied partnership
at Price Waterhouse, despite her stellar performance record, because she was
deemed to be lacking "femininity" (Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, 1989).
In both of these examples, women who were perceived to have violated
prescriptions of the female gender role were subjected to disparate treatment.
Unlike incidents in which descriptive gender stereotypes result in discrimination
through disparate impact, discrimination that is directed toward women who
violate prescriptive gender stereotypes may stem from gender prejudice, rather
than from a failure to process information in an objective, data-driven manner. In
other words, the knowledge that a female employee is supremely competent at
performing the tasks required for a stereotypic male occupation—individuating
information that contradicts descriptive gender stereotypes—is unlikely to alle-
viate discrimination that serves to punish women who violate prescriptions about
how women should behave. Moreover, as may be seen in Table 1, discrimination

based on the prescriptive component of gender stereotypes is more likely to be
perpetrated by men, because this type of discrimination serves to maintain power
inequities in society that favor men. In contrast, men and women may be equally
likely to engage in discrimination based on the descriptive component of gender
stereotypes, because such stereotypes are cultural representations that are shared
by both men and women.
In the concluding section of this article, we contend that the prescriptive
rather than the descriptive component of gender stereotypes is most directly
related to sexual harassment. That sexual harassment is more a function of
prescriptive gender stereotypes, we suggest, is consistent with Franke's (1997)
recent legal analysis of why sexual harassment constitutes gender discrimination.
According to Franke's theoretical framework, sexual harassment is a form of
gender discrimination because it is de facto designed to enforce and regulate
prescriptive gender stereotypes. In Franke's analysis, the sexual harassment of
women and men who violate prescriptive or normative gender expectancies is a
means of punishing gender nonconformity. We suggest that the distinction be-
tween the prescriptive and descriptive aspects of gender stereotyping is particu-
larly informative to an understanding of the empirical basis for the heart of
Franke's framework.
In the next section, we review the research literature involving the descriptive
and prescriptive components of gender stereotypes, with particular emphasis on
research published since the American Psychological Association's 1991 amicus
brief in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins, and discuss the way in which these two
components may be linked to incidents of sex discrimination through different
psychological processes. We then focus on the different functions that descriptive
and prescriptive components of gender stereotypes may serve and further discuss
how these two components may result in discrimination that results from disparate
treatment versus disparate impact. Finally, we discuss the implications of this
descriptive-prescriptive distinction for sex discrimination and sexual harassment
litigation.
I. The Distinction Between Descriptive and Prescriptive Components

The distinction between the descriptive and prescriptive aspects of gender
stereotypes has long been recognized in the field (e.g., Eagly, 1987; Spence &
Helmreich, 1978). The descriptive component of gender stereotypes consists of
beliefs about the characteristics that women do possess, whereas the prescriptive
component consists of beliefs about the characteristics that women should possess
(Cota et al., 1991; Eagly, 1987; Fiske & Stevens, 1993; Terborg, 1977). More-
over, both men and women may be "sanctioned and disliked" when they flout
traditional gender role prescriptions (Fiske, 1998, p. 378). Indeed, some research-
ers have argued that gender stereotypes may contain an especially strong pre-
scriptive component, compared to other social stereotypes (e.g., Fiske, 1998;
Fiske & Stevens, 1993).
Although the content of these two components may overlap (e.g., Eagly,
1987; Stoppard & Kalin, 1978), the processes by which the descriptive and
prescriptive components of gender stereotypes theoretically lead to discrimination
are different. The descriptive component of the female stereotype, for example, is
expected to lead to workplace discrimination when women are perceived in terms
of that stereotype, and those perceptions are incongruent with the attributes
required by certain occupations or the attributes believed to be necessary for
success at certain tasks (Fiske et al., 1991). For example, a female job candidate
might be passed over for the position of trial attorney because she is perceived in
gender-stereotypic terms (e.g., soft-spoken and compliant), irrespective of her
actual interpersonal style, and because being an attorney is believed to require
stereotypically masculine attributes.
By contrast, the prescriptive component of the female stereotype is expected
to lead to discrimination when women are judged to have violated, or to have
behaved in a manner that is incongruent with, prescriptive aspects of the female
stereotype. In this case, discrimination becomes a means of sanctioning violations
of gender role prescriptions. For instance, a female trial attorney might be disliked
and shunned because she is too aggressive, or a woman who rejects her boss's
advances may be sexually harassed. In both cases, discrimination in the form of
a hostile workplace environment is a means by which prescriptive gender stereo-
types are enforced (Franke, 1997). Whereas these incidents involve discrimination
against women who are believed to violate gender role prescriptions, discrimina-
tion on the basis of the descriptive component typically involves women who are
perceived in a manner that is consistent with the female stereotype. Although this
distinction is subtle, it has important implications for understanding which aspects
of the scientific data base on gender stereotyping are more or less pertinent in sex
discrimination cases, especially those that involve sexual harassment.
This distinction between the descriptive and prescriptive components of
gender stereotypes was a part of the amicus literature review submitted by APA
(1991) in Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins (1989). In that landmark case, Ann
Hopkins, the accountant who was denied partnership by Price Waterhouse, then
one of the country's "big-eight" accounting firms, alleged that she was denied
partnership because of gender stereotyping which resulted in discriminatory
treatment. According to the amicus, the distinction between descriptive and
prescriptive gender stereotypes was crucial to understanding Hopkins's claim that
stereotyping played a role in Price Waterhouse's failure to promote her to partner.
On the one hand, Hopkins appeared to be successful in transcending the tradi-
tional female stereotype. Although women are often perceived stereotypically, in
ways that are detrimental to their role as workers (e.g., illogical, emotional,
passive) and particularly in ways that are detrimental to success in male-domi-
nated professions (e.g., Click, Zion, & Nelson, 1988; Heilman, Block, & Martell,
1995; Heilman, Block, Martell, & Simon, 1989), Hopkins was able to demonstrate
that she possessed the qualities of competence, ambition, and tenacity. Indeed, she
received excellent evaluations from her clients, brought in more billable hours
than any of the other candidates considered for partnership, and was considered
ambitious and hard-working by her supporters. On the other hand, although
Hopkins was viewed as competent, she was also viewed as having "interpersonal
skills problems," being "macho," and needing a "course in charm school." Her
lack of social skills, according to Price Waterhouse, contributed to the decision to
deny her a partnership. Even one of her supporters advised her to "walk more
femininely, talk more femininely, dress more femininely, wear make-up, have her
hair styled, and wear jewelry" (Fiske et al., 1991, p. 1050).
Ironically, Hopkins was in part denied partnership not because she was
deemed too "feminine" to succeed in a male-dominated occupation, but because
she was perceived as not feminine enough. Although Hopkins was successfully
able to avoid being portrayed in terms of the descriptive aspects of the female
stereotype, she was nonetheless penalized for violating other more prescriptive
aspects. "Despite her work-related competence (or perhaps because of it) she was
seen as behaving in ways that are considered inappropriate for women. She met
certain expectations, but .not others, and she was expected to meet both" (Fiske et
al., 1991, p. 1056).
As the authors of the amicus brief point out, theories of gender stereotyping
posit descriptive and prescriptive components (e.g., Eagly, 1987; Spence &
Helmreich, 1978; Terborg, 1977), but the preponderance of stereotyping research
has focused on the descriptive component. This research has identified the
attributes that characterize stereotypes of men and women and has identified the
antecedents and consequences of this type of stereotyping (Deaux, 1995). As the
amicus review suggests, less research has been conducted on the prescriptive
component of gender stereotypes (Fiske et al., 1991; Fiske, Bersoff, Borgida,
Deaux, & Heilman, 1993). Nonetheless, more recent research, some of which has
been published since the amicus brief was completed, has contributed to an
understanding of this prescriptive component. Although not all of this research is
framed in terms of stereotyping, we believe that it adds to the social scientific
database regarding the prescriptive component of gender stereotypes. In the next
section we summarize key findings from research on the descriptive and prescrip-
tive components of gender stereotypes.
II. Evidence on the Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

Gender Stereotypes
Descriptive Component of Gender Stereotypes
A great deal of research has been conducted on the content of the descriptive
component of gender stereotypes. In general, women are believed to be warm,
caring, deferential, and interpersonally skilled, whereas men are believed to be
strong, controlling, assertive, and achievement-oriented. Women are seen as "nice
but incompetent"; men are seen as "competent but maybe not so nice" (Fiske,
1998, p. 377).-This cluster of interpersonally oriented attributes associated with
women has been labeled communal and expressive; the cluster of achievement-
oriented attributes associated with men has been labeled agentic and instrumental
(e.g., Bakan, 1966; Deaux & Kite, 1993; Eagly, 1987; Williams & Best, 1982).
This descriptive component of gender stereotypes appears to be quite resilient,
showing "remarkable durability" over time and place (e.g., Deaux & Kite, 1993,
p. 114; also see J. K. Swim, Aikin, Hall, & Hunter, 1995). In addition to
personality traits, gender stereotypes also contain attributes associated with phys-
ical appearance, biological features, gender, roles, and occupational roles (Ash-
more & Del Boca, 1981; Deaux & Lewis, 1983, 1984). Cues related to physical
appearance appear to be especially powerful in activating gender stereotypes

(Beckett & Park, 1995; Deaux & Lewis, 1984), which may in part account for the
pervasiveness of gender stereotyping (as opposed to those stereotypes for which
physical cues are less visible, such as sexual orientation or hidden disability).
Evidence suggests that the global stereotype of woman is not used to classify
all women. Instead, women more often are classified at the level of subgroups,
subordinate categories of women with distinct qualities and attributes. These
subgroups are associated with distinct cognitive representations and evaluations.
Converging evidence (Clifton, McGrath, & Wick, 1976; Eckes, 1994; England &
Hyland, 1987; Glick, Diebold, Bailey-Werner, & Zhu, 1997; Noseworthy & Lott,
1984; Six & Eckes, 1991) suggests that primary subgroups of women consist of
the traditional woman (e.g., housewife, mother), the sexy woman (e.g., bunny),
and the nontraditional, masculine woman (e.g., career woman). Researchers have
also found additional, related subgroups such as female athlete (Clifton et al.,
1976; Deaux, Winton, Crowley, & Lewis, 1985; Noseworthy & Lott, 1984) and
feminist (e.g., Eckes, 1994). Importantly, the global stereotype of the typical
woman shares similar features with the traditional female (Clifton et al., 1976)
who is a housewife (Eckes, 1994) or mother (Deaux et al., 1985). By contrast, the
global female stereotype does not overlap with the career woman or the feminist
(Riedle, 1991). Moreover, the global female stereotype bears a closer resemblance
to White, middle-class women than to Black women, or lower class women
(Landrine, 1985).
The descriptive component of stereotypes is posited to lead to discrimination
when stereotypes of women are associated with the attribution of traits, abilities,
and roles to the target that influence the way in which female employees are
evaluated and treated in the workplace. The "lack of fit" model (Heilman, 1983)
is one such theory of how characteristics typically associated with women may
prevent women from being selected for male-typed occupations. According to this
model, female job candidates may be viewed as inappropriate for certain types of
occupations because the traits associated with success in those occupations do not
match the traits women are generally believed to possess. This model has been
supported by research demonstrating that women are less likely to be selected for
male-typed occupations (e.g., Glick et al., 1988; Glick, 1991; Heilman, 1983;
Pratto, Stall worth, Sidanius, & Sie'rs, 1997). Specifically, controlled laboratory
experiments have demonstrated that an equally qualified woman is less likely to
be hired for a male-typed occupation than her male counterpart. Providing
gehder-incongruent information indicating that the female candidate is more
masculine than the typical woman ameliorates but does not eliminate the hiring
biases (e.g., Glick, 1991; Pratto et al., 1997).
The descriptive component of gender stereotypes may also lead to an evalu-
ative bias against women's accomplishments. In one classic experimental para-
digm (Goldberg, 1968), individuals are asked to judge work that is attributed to
either a man or women. Results show that work attributed to a woman is evaluated
somewhat more negatively than identical work that is attributed to a man (see the
meta-analysis by J. K. Swim, Borgida, Maruyama, & Myers, 1989, and qualitative
reviews by Heilman, 1983, and Nieva & Gutek, 1980). Similarly, women's
resumes are evaluated somewhat more negatively than identical resumes attrib-
uted to men (see meta-analysis by Olian, Schwab, & Haberfeld, 1988). Gender
stereotypes also influence attributions of performance, with women's successes on

masculine tasks being more likely to be attributed to effort than skill compared to
men's successes, and men's failures being more likely to be attributed to a lack
of effort compared to women's failures (see meta-analysis by J. K. Swim &
Sanna, 1996).
Although these three meta-analyses (Olian et al., 1988; J. K. Swim et al.,
1989; J. K. Swim & Sanna, 1996) have revealed that the magnitude of these
differential evaluations or attributions of men and women are relatively weak,
particularly compared to individuating information about a candidate's qualifica-
tions (Olian et al., 1988), consistent with lack of fit models, gender discrimination
was reliably stronger for male-typed tasks (J. K. Swim & Sanna, 1996; J. K. Swim
et al., 1989). Moreover, a recent computer simulation by Martell and his col-
leagues (Martell, Lane, & Emrich, 1996) has demonstrated the powerful cumu-
lative effects of very small biases against women. After eight rounds of compe-
tition for "promotion" to the next level of the organizational hierarchy, a gender
bias favoring men accounted for 1% of the variance in hiring decisions, yet men
outnumbered women at the highest level of management 65% to 35%. This
simulation demonstrates how even small biases that favor men may result in a
profound disadvantage for women.
The descriptive component of gender stereotypes and gender subtypes has
also been demonstrated to influence perceptions of sexual harassment. According
to this research, certain types of women are more likely to fit the prototype of a
victim of specific types of sexual harassment because of the particular attributes
they are believed to possess. For example, the prototypical incident of sexual
coercion consists of a vulnerable woman being threatened by a more powerful
man. To the extent that the female target is not perceived as especially vulnerable,
she is less likely to be perceived as having been sexually coerced. Accordingly,
compared to women employed in female-dominated occupations, women em-
ployed in blue-collar, male-dominated occupations are less likely to be viewed as
sexually coerced, because they are less likely to be perceived in terms of the
traditional stereotype of a helpless and vulnerable woman (Burgess & Borgida,
1997a, 1997b). By contrast, women who are heavily made-up (Workman &
Johnson, 1991) and women in female-dominated occupations (Sheffey & Tindale,
1992) are less likely to be judged as sexually harassed for incidents of unwanted
sexual attention, because they are more likely to be perceived in terms of the "sex
object" subtype (Burgess & Borgida, 1997a).
In summary, this research suggests that assimilation of female employees in
terms of particular subtypes influences the extent to which particular incidents are
judged to be sexually harassing. Such judgments, in turn, may determine the
threshold of harassment an employee must endure before her harassers are
disciplined, and indeed, even the likelihood that such behavior is construed as
harassment. Thus, a target of unwanted sexual attention who is perceived as a sex
object, or a target of gender harassment who is perceived as a nontraditional
woman, may each have a harder time convincing others that the behaviors
directed toward them were unwanted and unwelcome and contributed to their
perception of a hostile workplace.
Prescriptive Component of Gender Stereotypes

The belief that men and women should behave in clearly differentiated ways
and should occupy distinct roles in society is a cornerstone of prescriptive gender
role beliefs. Perhaps the most widely used measure of explicit beliefs about the
proper roles of men and women is the Attitudes Toward Women Scale (AWS;
Spence & Helmreich, 1978), which was designed to measure beliefs about the
"rights, roles, and privileges women ought to have or be permitted" (pp. 38-39).
Many items on the AWS assess beliefs regarding women's proper role in the
household and the extent to which women are expected to fulfill the traditional
roles of wife and mother. A typical item from the AWS indicating the presence
of strong gender role prescriptions states that "women should worry less about
their rights and more about being good wives and mothers," whereas an item
indicating the absence of traditional gender role prescriptions states that "women
should assume their rightful place in business and all the professions along with
men." The AWS items tap beliefs about gender roles, rather than appropriate
gender-related traits or behaviors (although one item refers to whether swearing
and obscenity is more "repulsive in the speech of a woman than a man"). Perhaps,
for this reason, the AWS is more often considered as a measure of sexist attitudes
or gender prejudice (e.g., Campbell, Schellenberg, & Senn, 1997) rather than as
a measure of gender stereotypes. However, classifying the AWS as a measure of
prescriptive gender stereotypes is entirely consistent with traditional definitions of
gender stereotypes (e.g., Fiske & Stevens, 1993) because the AWS assesses
beliefs about the roles women should fulfill.
In contrast to the descriptive component of gender stereotypes, the content of
which has remained relatively stable (Deaux & Kite, 1993), endorsement of
traditional gender role prescriptions as assessed by the AWS has been on the
decline over the past 20 years (Spence & Hahn, 1997; Twenge, 1997). This may
be due, in part, to the relatively transparent nature of the scale, which sensitizes
people to their concern not to appear sexist (J. K. Swim et al., 1995) but may also
be due to real attitudinal changes associated with the increased entry of women
into the workforce (Eagly & Mladinic, 1994; McHugh & Frieze, 1997; Spence &
Hahn, 1997; Twenge, 1997). Nonetheless, as many researchers have shown, many
of these "old fashioned" attitudes persist among certain types of individuals who
idealize women who fulfill the traditional role of wife and mother but denigrate
women who they perceive as "career women" or "feminists" (e.g., Click et al.,
1997; Glick & Fiske, 1997; Haddock & Zanna, 1994; MacDonald & Zanna, 1996;
J. K. Swim & Cohen, 1997). More recent work in this area moves beyond the
simple dichotomy of woman as homemaker versus woman as paid worker and
examines the influence of gender prescriptions at a finer grain level of analysis,
investigating prescriptions regarding certain types of occupational roles that
women are expected to fulfill and the particular types of behaviors that women are
expected to exhibit within those roles.
Eagly, Makhijani, and Klonsky's (1992) meta-analysis of studies examining
the evaluation of male and female leaders is an example of such a fine-grained
analysis of the conditions under which female leaders are negatively evaluated
relative to men. Specifically, Eagly and her colleagues found that female leaders
were not discriminated against across the board. Rather, female leaders were
devalued relative to men when they behaved in an autocratic and directive manner
and when they worked in male-dominated fields (e.g., in the military, as athletic
coaches). By contrast, women who led in a participatory or democratic style were
evaluated as positively as their male counterparts. Thus, the devaluation of female
leaders was restricted to incidents in which women behaved in ways that were
stereotypically masculine, behaviors that may have disrupted "traditional patterns
of gender deference" (p. 16). Not surprisingly, a subsequent meta-analysis on the
effectiveness of male and female leaders found that female leaders were more
effectual when they behaved in a manner that conformed to those gender role
prescriptions (e.g., using a democratic rather than an autocratic leadership style;
Eagly, Karau, & Makhijani, 1995). Hence, not only are women who lead in an
autocratic style evaluated more negatively than their male peers, but they are less
effective. Moreover, women in leadership positions appear to be quite aware of
these prescriptions and behave accordingly. For example, a meta-analysis of
women's natural leadership styles reveals that female leaders tend to behave in a
manner that is congruent with stereotypic prescriptions, leading in a style that is
more participatory and democratic and less autocratic than the style of male
leaders (Eagly & Johnson, 1990). In summary, Eagly and her associates' meta-
analyses demonstrate that certain deviations from the traditional female role are
more heavily sanctioned than others and, moreover, that women in management
are likely to be aware of those prescriptions and may even model their own
leadership style accordingly.
Consistent with evidence that female leaders are more likely to be negatively
evaluated when they occupy traditionally male roles is research demonstrating
that women in male-dominated occupations are more likely to experience sexual
harassment compared to women in female-dominated or integrated occupations.
This environment often takes the form of a hostile work environment designed to
alienate and denigrate women (e.g., Coles, 1986; Fitzgerald, 1993; Gutek, 1985;
Gutek & Dunwoody, 1987). The harassment women face when they move into
male-dominated roles is widely regarded as a consequence of the hostility elicited
by these women's violations of gender role prescriptions, as well as a manifes-
tation of the more "realistic" group threat posed by female workers invading a
traditionally male domain (e.g., Carothers & Crull, 1984; Fiske & Glick, 1995;
Franke, 1997; Pryor & Whalen, 1996; Schultz, 1998; Yoder, 1994).
Other research provides insight into the prescriptive component of gender
stereotypes by examining the evaluations and perceptions of women who deviate
from the traditional female role. For example, Heilman and her colleagues
(Heilman et al., 1995; Heilman et al., 1989) have examined the traits that male
managers attributed to women who were described as "middle-managers" or
"successful middle-managers." On the upside, describing a woman as a middle
manager seems to undercut the stereotype of women as less competent on
work-related attributes. On the downside, a woman who was described as a
middle-manager was also more likely to be rated as "bitter, hasty, quarrelsome,
selfish" and "less understanding" than a man who was described as a middle-
manager (Heilman et al., 1989, p. 939). In a separate study, a woman described
as a successful manager was viewed as more hostile toward others than a man
described as a successful manager, although again, the successful female manager
was believed to be as competent, as strong, and as emotionally stable as a
successful male manager (Heilman et al., 1995). These results provide some
insight into the process by which women who step out of traditional gender roles
may be negatively sanctioned. Such women may be particularly vulnerable to
having their interpersonal abilities and personality derogated, although their
work-related, instrumental strengths may be acknowledged.
This tendency for gender-role conformists to be evaluated more positively
than gender-role nonconformists, particularly on the dimensions of overall liking,
is manifested in the more general evaluations of different subgroups of women.
For example, research on the evaluative 'component of the global female stereo-
type of women reveals that women tend to be favorably evaluated. Stereotypes of
women have been demonstrated to be extremely positive and, in fact, are more
positive than stereotypes of men (e.g., Eagly & Mladinic, 1989; Eagly, Mladinic,
& Otto, 1991). Importantly, this positivity bias hinges on a traditional conceptu-
alization of women as communal rather than agentic. In other words, women are
viewed more favorably than men because the communal attributes (e.g., helpful,
warm, kind, understanding) attributed to them are evaluated more favorably than
the agentic characteristics (e.g., independent, self-confident) attributed to their
male counterparts. More pointedly, the stereotype of the traditional woman is
consistently evaluated more favorably than the nontraditional or feminist sub-
group (Haddock & Zanna, 1994; MacDonald & Zanna, 1996), and feminine
women are evaluated more favorably than masculine women (e.g., Rajecki, De
Graaf-Kaser, & Rasmussen, 1992). Additionally, there is some evidence that sexy
women are divided into positive and negative types, such as "babes" and "sluts"
(Glick et al., 1997), suggesting that women may be rewarded or sanctioned for
fulfilling or transgressing certain prescriptions related to female sexuality.
Recent research reveals that these extreme positive or negative evaluations of
different subgroups of women are especially likely to be held by certain types of
people such as right-wing authoritarians (e.g., Haddock & Zanna, 1994; Mac-
Donald & Zanna, 1996; J. K. Swim & Cohen, 1997) or ambivalent sexists (Glick
et al., 1997). For example, Glick and his colleagues (1997) have demonstrated that
two types of sexism, hostile sexism and benevolent sexism, influence the extent
to which evaluations of women who fulfill traditional gender role prescriptions
(i.e., homemaker) and women who violate those prescriptions (i.e., "career
women") are extremely polarized. Men who are high in hostile sexism evaluate
career women particularly negatively, whereas men who are high in benevolent
sexism evaluate homemakers in a particularly favorable light. Moreover, men
who are high in both benevolent and hostile sexism (i.e., ambivalent sexists) tend
to hold especially polarized views of women, evaluating some types of women
especially positively (e.g., "babes," "mothers") and others especially negatively
(e.g., "sluts"). Again, this illustrates the way in which the evaluative content
associated with female subgroups may serve to punish women who violate
prescriptive gender stereotypes and reward women who conform to those
prescriptions.
It is important to point out that evaluations of women who violate traditional
gender role prescriptions do not tend to be uniformly negative. Hostile sexists, for
example, did not evaluate career women in negative terms across the board.
Instead, both sexist and nonsexist men tended to view career women positively on
work-related dimensions, viewing them as "intelligent, hard working and profes-
sional." However, sexist men attributed negative interpersonal traits such as

"aggressive, selfish, greedy, and cold" to career women, stating "that they feared,
envied, were intimidated by, or felt competitive toward them" (Click et al., 1997,
p. 1330). Similarly, right-wing authoritarian men felt ambivalent toward women
described as "feminists," rating these women as positive on the agentic dimension
but negative on the dimension of affection (MacDonald & Zanna, 1996). This is
consistent with previously described research (Heilman et al., 1995; Heilman et
al., 1989) in which negative interpersonal traits and positive competency traits
were more likely to be attributed to successful female managers. Overall, this
evidence suggests that violations of prescriptive gender stereotypes are likely to
influence evaluations on the interpersonal, rather than on the competency dimen-
sion, and to take the form of personal dislike. It is this negative evaluation as it
affects performance evaluations that is legally problematic. A woman who is
perceived as equally competent as her male colleague but less interpersonally
skilled may well be the loser in terms of promotion or merit raises.
Another aspect of prescriptive gender stereotypes involves the expectation
that women be sexually attractive and be receptive to sexual advances by men
(e.g., Fiske & Stevens, 1993; Gutek, 1985). These prescriptions may be especially
strong for women in female-dominated or "pink collar" occupations (Carothers &
Crull, 1984). For example, women in female-dominated occupations were most
likely to report that their job required them to be physically attractive (Gutek,
1985). Moreover, women who worked in female-dominated occupations in a
work-context that was male-dominated were the group next most likely to report
being sexually harassed, second to women in male-dominated occupations
(Gutek, 1985). Fiske and Glick's (1995) model of ambivalent sexism proposes
that women in such occupations may be expected to be receptive to male sexual
advances. According to this model, women who refuse these advances may be the
object of sexually coercive and hostile behaviors. Sexual harassment of these
women may be a way of enforcing the prescriptive aspects of the female
stereotype regarding sexual availability, aspects that may be made salient by
features in the environment (e.g., sexualized images of women; McKenzie-Mohr
& Zanna, 1990; Rudman & Borgida, 1995). As such, sexual harassment may
represent a form of sanctioning violations of prescriptive stereotypes (Franke,
1997).
The distinction between the descriptive and prescriptive components of gen-
der stereotypes highlights the two ways in which stereotypes may lead to dis-
crimination. Descriptive aspects of gender stereotypes may result in women being
assimilated to various conceptualizations of the female stereotype. Consequently,
women may be perceived as unfit for male-typed tasks and occupations, which
may result in biases against hiring women for certain types of occupations and
may lead to lower performance evaluations on male-typed tasks. Under Title VII,
this type of discrimination may fall under the rubric of disparate impact. Stereo-
typing on the basis of the descriptive component may also result in the failure to
perceive certain types of women as having been the victims of certain types of
sexual harassment because such women do not match the prototype of a typical
victim. By contrast, the prescriptive component of gender stereotypes may lead to
the devaluation and even harassment of women who violate certain gender role
prescriptions, and as such may be more pertinent to legal cases involving hostile
workplace or other claims of sex discrimination that fall under the rubric of
disparate treatment. Women who behave in an autocratic manner or who occupy
traditionally male occupations are particularly likely to be negatively sanctioned.
In addition, certain types of individuals may negatively evaluate women who
deviate from the traditional female role of homemaker, particularly when such
women are considered "feminists" or "career women." Moreover, these negative
evaluations are likely to be on the communal or interpersonal dimension rather
than the competency dimension. Additionally, women may also experience sex
discrimination, in the form of sexual harassment, when they violate prescriptions
to be sexually attractive and receptive to male sexual advances.
The Relation Between the Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

Gender Stereotypes
The extent to which the descriptive and prescriptive components of gender
stereotypes overlap is difficult to ascertain precisely and has been the topic of
some discussion (e.g., Archer, 1980, 1984; Broverman, Vogel, Broverman, Clark-
son, & Rosenkrantz, 1972; Stoppard & Kalin, 1978; Strieker, 1977). On one level,
attributes and behaviors that characterize prescriptive gender stereotypes, such as
being a homemaker rather than a career woman, staying out of male-dominated
occupations, and being a sex object, are consistent with descriptive gender
stereotypes of women. Notably, the prescriptive component of gender stereotypes
reinforces gender differentiation, in that it is composed of "feminine" attributes
characterizing the sexy and traditional subgroups of women, but not of "mascu-
line" attributes characterizing the nontraditional and feminist subgroups (Fiske,
1998). Additionally, although prescriptive beliefs appear to be congruent with
descriptive stereotypes of certain types of women (e.g., Stoppard & Kalin, 1978),
the former appears to be a select subset of the latter. For example, women are
believed to be shorter, on average, than men, yet few people probably hold
prescriptions against tall women. Prescriptive beliefs about gender appear to be
stronger on the dimension of interpersonal behaviors (Fiske & Ruscher, 1993) and
in the domain of gender-appropriate work roles.
Empirically, the relation between the descriptive and prescriptive components
of gender stereotypes depends, in part, on the ways in which the two components
are assessed. Even then there is inconsistency between studies. For example,
individuals' explicit endorsement of gender role prescriptions, as assessed by their
scores on the AWS, was found to be completely unrelated to their descriptive
stereotypes of women, as assessed by their beliefs and evaluations of character-
istics that were typical of women (Eagly & Mladinic, 1989).* However, subse-
quent researchers (J. K. Swim & Cohen, 1997) found that individuals with AWS
scores indicating traditional gender role prescriptions tended to evaluate women
'Specifically, descriptive stereotypes were assessed by having individuals write down five
characteristics that were typical of women, estimating the percentage of women who have each
characteristic, and evaluating each particular trait. The proportion of women estimated to possess
each characteristic was multiplied by the evaluative rating, and an average was taken of these
products.
negatively (although there was no relation between AWS scores and evaluations
of traditional women).
By contrast, research operationalizing the descriptive component of gender
stereotypes as the difference between traits attributed to the typical man versus the
typical woman has consistently found a positive relation between the tendency to
perceive the sexes differently (i.e., descriptive gender stereotypes) and prescrip-
tive gender role beliefs. For example, Cota et al. (1991) found the descriptive and
prescriptive components of stereotypes to be moderately correlated, r(54) = .26,
among a sample of women, as did Tilby and Kalin (1980), who found a similar
correlation, r = .27, among a sample of men and women. Moreover, Spence and
Hermreich (1978) reported a moderately high correlation between AWS scores
and stereotypes (using difference measures), and indeed other studies (Gerdes &
Kelman, 1981) have found correlations as high as .68 between the two.
On the one hand, the consistency between traditional gender role prescriptions
and gender differentiation may reflect an organized gender belief system (e.g.,
Deaux & Major, 1987) in which those who hold egalitarian views about gender
roles are more likely to believe that men and women are relatively similar. On the
other hand, such gender differentiation may be used to justify traditional sex-role
beliefs; hence, accounting for the relationship between traits believed to be
possessed by the genders (i.e., the descriptive component of gender stereotypes)
and prescriptive beliefs about gender roles (Spence & Helmreich, 1978). Simi-
larly, it may be the case that individuals who hold egalitarian gender role beliefs
are motivated to state that the typical man and the typical woman are similar on
various dimensions. According to this argument, consistency between descriptive
and prescriptive gender stereotypes would be a function of individuals' motiva-
tion (or the lack thereof) to present oneself as nonsexist. Hence, to a certain extent
the demonstrated consistency between these two components would be due to
problems resulting from self-report measures of stereotyping.
To circumvent such potential problems inherent in self-report measures of
stereotyping, researchers have devised implicit measures that are less susceptible
to individuals' efforts to portray themselves as nonprejudiced. Notably, studies
using implicit or indirect measures of gender stereotyping provide compelling
evidence for the relative independence of descriptive and prescriptive components
of gender stereotypes (Banaji & Greenwald, 1995; Banaji & Hardin, 1996).
Implicit measures of gender stereotypes do not directly ask individuals to rate men
and women on certain stereotypic dimensions. Rather, such studies use a variety
of experimental paradigms to assess the presence of gender stereotypes indirectly.
One such paradigm is the semantic priming paradigm in which the strength of
association between gender-stereotypic attributes and gendered pronouns or
proper nouns is considered to be an indirect measure of gender stereotypes. In this
paradigm, individuals are first presented with gender-stereotypic "primes," such
as gendered occupational roles, traits, and physical attributes, and are then
immediately asked to make judgments about "target words" that are either gender
pronouns (Banaji & Hardin, 1996) or male or female names (Blair & Banaji,
1996). Strength of association between the prime and the target words is measured
by response facilitation: the ability to respond faster to a target word when it is
preceded by a prime that is cognitively associated with it. Response facilitation
under conditions of congruency between the gender prime and gender category
constitutes an implicit measure of gender stereotyping. Indeed, response facilita-

tion was found to be greater for gender-congruent primes. These implicit gender
stereotypes have been demonstrated to be completely unrelated to beliefs about
gender roles as well as unrelated to the explicit endorsement of descriptive gender
stereotypes (Banaji & Hardin, 1996). Such a dissociation between prescriptive
gender beliefs and descriptive gender stereotypes has also been demonstrated with
a different experimental paradigm for assessing implicit stereotypes (i.e., the
"false fame effect"; Banaji & Greenwald, 1995).
Finally, prescriptive gender stereotypes have been found to be unrelated to the
extent to which men and women are differentially likely to be hired for masculine
and feminine occupations. Specifically, Gerdes and Kelman (1981) found that,
although men were deemed more appropriate candidates for masculine occupa-
tions and women were deemed more appropriate for feminine occupations, this
"gender-matching" effect was unrelated to prescriptive gender role beliefs. Sim-
ilarly, the selective hiring of women into occupations that attenuate rather than
perpetuate intergroup hierarchy (i.e., a form of gender matching) was unrelated to
differences in social dominance orientation, a preference for unequal intergroup
relations (Pratto et al., 1997).
The extent to which prescriptive and descriptive components of gender
stereotypes are related depends on the way in which these constructs are assessed.
When the descriptive component of stereotypes is assessed explicitly, it tends to
be moderately related to the prescriptive component. Individuals who hold tradi-
tional gender role prescriptions exhibit a greater tendency to differentiate between
the genders. By contrast, descriptive stereotypes that are assessed implicitly or
indirectly are unlikely to be associated with prescriptive gender beliefs, perhaps
because the former constitute cultural beliefs, and the latter constitute personal
beliefs (e.g., Devine, 1989; Stangor, Sullivan, & Ford, 1991). Underlying these
results is the notion that even at the level of the individual, stereotypes are learned
sociocultural representations that may continue to be held even when individuals
do not personally endorse them (e.g., Stangor & lost, 1997). Even a person who
holds egalitarian beliefs about what is appropriate for men and women possesses
descriptive knowledge of the characteristics, roles, and behaviors that constitute
gender stereotypes. As Deaux and Kite (1993) concluded, "Even for those who
claim to endorse equal rights, liberalization of (gender) roles and the like,
stereotypic associations to gender are virtually automatic, emerging without any
obvious conscious processing when a person is confronted with a member of the
category" (p. 128).
III. Functional Bases of Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

Gender Stereotypes
So far, we have presented evidence that the descriptive and prescriptive
components of gender stereotypes are related but distinct constructs and that these
two components may lead to discrimination through different processes. In this
section, we further expand on this distinction and suggest that these two compo-
nents may have different functional bases that result in different forms of dis-
crimination. Specifically, we suggest that the descriptive component of gender
stereotypes serves a cognitive function, organizing and structuring the flow of
information about men and women with which people in everyday life are
confronted. This is congruent with cognitive accounts of stereotyping, in which
stereotyping is a routine cognitive process that is engaged in by all individuals
rather than the province of a "sick" few (e.g., Eberhardt & Fiske, 1996). By
contrast, we suggest that the prescriptive component may be rooted in more than
just ordinary cognitive processing. Instead, prescriptive stereotyping may be
linked to motivational concerns. Specifically, the prescriptive component of
gender stereotypes may function to bolster or maintain the existing social struc-
ture by rewarding women who conform to traditional gender roles and sanctioning
women (and men) who violate those prescriptions (e.g., Franke, 1997).
In the next section we provide evidence for this functional distinction. We
first compare the descriptive and prescriptive gender stereotypes held by men and
women. It is argued that the absence of gender and ideological differences on the
descriptive component, and the presence of gender and ideological differences on
the prescriptive component, provides evidence that prescriptive stereotypes may
have a stronger motivational component. Next, we discuss the manifestations of
discrimination that emanate from these two components. Although the literature
acknowledges that it is often difficult in practice to distinguish between descrip-
tive and prescriptive gender stereotyping, it suggests different manifestations of
discrimination based on these two components. We suggest that, compared to the
prescriptive component, the descriptive component of gender stereotypes is more
likely to result in discrimination that is manifested along the dimension of
competency-related attributes. Moreover, we suggest that discrimination based on
the descriptive component should be more likely to be unconscious and should be
less apt to be based on negative affect directed toward particular women. Because
this type of discrimination tends to be unintentional rather than a deliberate
attempt to hurt women, it would fall under the category of disparate impact rather
than disparate treatment.
By contrast, we suggest that the prescriptive component results in discrimi-
nation along the interpersonal dimension. Discrimination based on the prescrip-
tive component is most likely to derive from gender prejudice, negative affect
directed toward women who violate gender role prescriptions (e.g., Eagly &
Mladinic, 1994). As such, we would argue, this type of discrimination may be
more likely to result in litigation involving hostile workplace or other claims of
sex discrimination that involve disparate treatment.
Gender Differences in Descriptive Versus Prescriptive

Gender Stereotypes
Indirect evidence on the functional bases of descriptive and prescriptive
gender stereotypes lies in the fact that men and women differ in terms of their
prescriptive but not descriptive gender stereotypes. For example, a variety of
literature reviews (e.g., Deaux & Kite, 1993; Heilman, 1995) have remarked on
the extent to which the content of men's and women's gender stereotypes is
similar (e.g., Deaux & Lewis, 1984; Eagly & Kite, 1987; Eagly & Mladinic, 1989;
Eagly & Mladinic, 1994; Eagly et al., 1991; Eagly & Steffen, 1984). Studies of
implicit gender stereotyping have also found this absence of gender differences in
stereotypic content. In a series of studies using a variety of paradigms for
assessing implicit stereotypes, women engaged in gender stereotyping to as great

an extent as men (Banaji & Greenwald, 1995; Banaji & Hardin, 1996 (Study 1);
Banaji, Hardin, & Rothman, 1993; Blair & Banaji, 1996). This lack of gender
differences is also evidenced when gender stereotypes are assessed indirectly. In
a meta-analysis of the classic Goldberg paradigm in which individuals rated the
work attributed to a woman as lower quality than the work attributed to a man,
there was no effect of evaluator gender (J. Swim et al., 1989). Similarly, a
meta-analysis of attributions that people make for men's and women's perfor-
mances on stereotypically masculine and feminine tasks (J. K. Swim & Sanna,
1996) reveals that men and women do not differ in their attributions. Moreover,
both men and women have been shown to use gender stereotypes when making
hiring decisions, showing a greater tendency to hire male applicants for higher
status, traditionally male occupations (Gerdes & Kelman, 1981; Glick, 1991;
Pratto et al., 1997).
By contrast, there are a number of empirical demonstrations showing gender
differences on the prescriptive component. Among a variety of social and demo-
graphic variables including religion, social class, and age, gender has been found
to be the strongest predictor of gender role attitudes, with men manifesting more
traditional gender role beliefs than women (Martin, Osmond, Hesselbart, &
Wood, 1980). Moreover, a survey of 625 women and 512 men in a large
organization also found strong gender differences in prescriptive gender stereo-
types and beliefs about women's abilities (Snizek & Neil, 1992). Again, men were
more likely to endorse traditional gender role beliefs and were more likely to
believe that women lacked a "flair" for logical reasoning, research, mathematics,
and handling authority. (These two scales were administered together and were
highly correlated, r = .81.) Additionally, a meta-analysis (Twenge, 1997) of
perhaps the most widely used measure of prescriptive gender stereotypes, the
AWS, showed consistent gender differences, with men holding more traditional
gender role beliefs, although there is evidence that those beliefs have been
converging over time.
Theorists have suggested various explanations for men's greater tendency to
hold traditional prescriptive gender stereotypes. From a vested-interest perspec-
tive, men should be more likely to endorse traditional (i.e., powerless) roles for
women, in order to protect their own privileged status (e.g., Pratto et al., 1997).
In accordance with this perspective, theories of socialization suggest that fathers
are more concerned with instilling traditional gender roles in boys than either
parent is in instilling traditional gender roles in girls in order to preserve male
power (e.g., Brittain, 1977; Laws, 1979). In the workplace, the perpetuation of
prescriptive gender stereotypes in which women belong in the domestic sphere is
one way by which men can protect their privileged status (e.g., Snizek & Neil,
1992). According to this logic, prescriptive stereotypes would serve as a deterrent
to women who pose the greatest competition to men (e.g., those in male-
dominated occupations). Consistent with this analysis, a meta-analysis of the
evaluation of female leaders (Eagly et al., 1992) demonstrated that men were
more likely than women to negatively evaluate female leaders, presumably
because the intrusion of women into leadership roles is especially threatening to
men who have traditionally occupied these types of roles.
Additional evidence that prescriptive stereotypes are in part based on men's
vested interest in maintaining the status quo comes from a large-scale survey of
men and women employees in a government organization (Snizek & Neil, 1992).
The survey revealed that women perceived more promotional discrimination to
the extent that the men in their work group endorsed traditional prescriptive
gender stereotypes. In other words, women experienced more discrimination
when they worked with men who believed that a woman's place was in the home.
This study is important because it demonstrates an empirical relation between
prescriptive gender stereotypes and discrimination in the organizational context.
Significantly, in that study, the endorsement of employees' gender role prescrip-
tions was assessed explicitly, indicating that these stereotypes were held at the
level of conscious awareness. This lends support to the notion that prescriptive
stereotypes may be used by certain men to justify the exclusion of women from
their work spheres.
Manifestations of Discrimination Based on Descriptive Versus

Prescriptive Components
One way by which discrimination resulting from descriptive and prescriptive
components can be distinguished is by the dimensions on which they occur. The
evidence suggests that being perceived as having violated prescriptive gender
stereotypes may result in lower evaluations on interpersonally related attributes
(e.g., Fiske et al., 1993; Fiske & Stevens, 1993; Yoder, 1994). Similarly, discrim-
ination of women who violate prescriptive stereotypes has been demonstrated to
take the form of negative global evaluations rather than more objective descrip-
tions of specific skills or behaviors (Eagly et al., 1992). By contrast, being
perceived in terms of descriptive gender stereotypes has been demonstrated to
lead to lower evaluations on competency-related attributes (e.g., Heilman et al.,
1989, 1995) and job-related evaluations (e.g., Olian et al., 1988; J. K. Swim et al.,
1989).
This implies that women who violate gender role prescriptions may experi-
ence discrimination related either to lowered evaluations on interpersonal criteria
or to global negative evaluations that are based on a general feeling of dislike. For
this reason it is important to consider the two dimensions on which women may
be evaluated: the competency-cluster and the interpersonal cluster. To the extent
that women in male-typed occupations receive more negative evaluations on the
competency dimension than their male peers, it is more likely that if discrimina-
tion has occurred it would be a function of the descriptive component. However,
to the extent that discrimination is based less on the assessment of the female
employee's job-related qualifications, but more on global affective reactions to the
employee or to negative evaluations of her interpersonal skills, it is more likely to
be a function of the prescriptive component. Unfortunately, the absence of explicit
performance criteria is a hallmark of more prestigious, upper management posi-
tions (Heilman, 1995), suggesting that prescriptive stereotypes may have more of
an influence on discrimination as women move up in the organizational hierarchy.
Furthermore, this suggests that the prescriptive and descriptive components
may be differentially based on affective (i.e., gender prejudice) versus cognitive
processes, respectively, and may differentially lead to what Fiske (1998) referred
to as hot discrimination (i.e., discriminatory actions based on hostility or resent-
ment) as opposed to cold discrimination (i.e., discriminatory actions based on

"calm, cool, collective stereotypes"; see Fiske, 1998, pp. 374-375 for a discus-
sion). The fact that the devaluation of female leaders was manifested in terms of
global evaluations rather than in terms of specific perceptions (e.g., Eagly et al.,
1992) suggests that affective processes are implicated. Arguably, the tendency to
"admire" but "personally dislike" women who violate gender role prescriptions
(MacDonald & Zanna, 1996) suggests that such violations result in discrimination
that is primarily based on emotional responses to such women. Research on
ambivalent sexist individuals provides further evidence that men who strongly
hold prescriptive gender stereotypes manifest emotion in the presence of women
who violate or fulfill those stereotypes. "Career women evoked feelings of envy,
competitiveness, and intimidation in sexist men, which suggest dislike for women
having power. Homemakers, in contrast, evoked a host of strongly positive
feelings and symbolic beliefs in sexist men that centered on the complementary
roles men and women have in marriage" (Click et al., 1997, p. 1331).
Finally, evidence suggests that gender stereotyping based on the descriptive
component may be more likely to involve unconscious processes. Several studies
have demonstrated that descriptive stereotyping occurs outside of conscious
awareness and among individuals who do not explicitly endorse gender stereo-
types (see Greenwald & Banaji, 1995, for a review). One reason that discrimi-
nation based on the descriptive component may be difficult to guard against may
be the lack of cues indicating that discrimination has occurred. Research has
shown that perpetrators of gender discrimination may be members of the target's
ingroup (i.e., another woman), may hold relatively egalitarian gender roles, and in
short, may not resemble a typical perpetrator (e.g., Inman & Baron, 1996) nor
appear to have any motivation for engaging in discrimination. Moreover, because
the discrimination occurs on the seemingly objective component of skills rather
than the more subjective realm of interpersonal judgments, it may be difficult for
the perceiver to monitor his or her own biases. This failure to detect discrimina-
tion based on descriptive gender stereotypes may plague the target and the actor
alike. That is, perpetrators of such discrimination may be as unaware of the
discrimination as the target. By contrast, there is evidence that targets are aware
of the discrimination when it is based on the prescriptive component of gender
stereotypes and that the perpetrators also are consciously aware of the stereotypes
they hold (e.g., Snizek & Neil, 1992). Certainly, it is difficult to argue that blatant
endorsement of gender stereotypic prescriptions such as "women do not belong in
the workplace" occur outside of conscious awareness. However, the extent to
which individuals may harbor negative evaluations of nontraditional women,
outside of awareness, is an empirical question that awaits further investigation.
The descriptive and prescriptive components of gender stereotypes are posited
to have different functional bases. The descriptive component of gender stereo-
types appears to serve a cognitive function and may lead to a "cold" form of
discrimination that is less likely to be based on gender prejudice. Men and women
do not tend to differ in their descriptive gender stereotypes and have both been
shown to discriminate against women as a result of such stereotypes. This
suggests that, compared to the prescriptive component, the descriptive component
does not primarily serve to protect higher group status, but may more likely serve
to organize and structure the flow of social information that people process in their
daily lives. By contrast, the fact that men hold stronger gender role prescriptions
suggests that this component may serve the function of justifying the existing
power structure that favors men over women. This type-of "hot discrimination"
may be linked to men's perceived group threat and is likely to be highly
affect-laden (Fiske, 1998). Moreover, this type of discrimination may be more
easily detected than "cold discrimination," which is based on the descriptive
component.
IV. Conclusions and Legal Implications

In this article we have reviewed theory and research on gender stereotyping
since Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins (1989) with a particular focus on the distinc-
tion between the descriptive and prescriptive components of gender stereotypes.
In addition, we have discussed the function each component may serve and the
process by which each component is expected to result in gender discrimination.
Descriptive aspects of gender stereotypes may primarily serve to filter the flow of
social information in everyday life and may lead to a "cold" form of discrimina-
tion that is less likely based on gender prejudice than discrimination based on the
prescriptive aspects. Such stereotypes may result in women being perceived as
lacking fit for male-typed tasks and occupations, which may lead to biases in
hiring and performance evaluations. This type of discrimination is more likely to
be viewed as disparate impact than disparate treatment, because it often occurs in
the absence of hostility or outright intent to discriminate. Descriptive aspects of
gender stereotypes may also result in the failure to perceive certain types of
women as having been the victims of certain types of sexual harassment. By
contrast, the prescriptive aspect of gender- stereotypes may serve the function of
justifying the existing power structure that favors men over women, resulting in
intentional discrimination of women who violate gender role prescriptions. This
type of "hot discrimination" may be linked to men's perceived group threat and
is likely to be highly affect-laden (Fiske, 1998), taking the form of negative
interpersonal evaluations or even sexual harassment. Hence, discrimination based
on the prescriptive component of gender stereotypes is most likely to be viewed
in terms of disparate treatment.
In the remainder of this final section, we point out the implications of this
prescriptive-descriptive distinction for understanding the role of stereotyping in
sexual harassment. The prescriptive component of gender stereotypes plays a
central role in Franke's (1997) broader theoretical framework of sexual harass-
ment as sex discrimination. Franke critiqued existing theoretical accounts of why
sexual harassment should constitute sex discrimination under Title VII of the
Civil Rights Act of 1964. This critique was motivated, in part, by the inability of
existing accounts to sufficiently address the growing number of cases of same-sex
sexual harassment (see Waldo, Berdahl, & Fitzgerald, 1998). Franke contended
that sexual harassment is a form of discrimination because it is a means by which
prescriptive beliefs about the role of men and women are maintained and en-
forced. This framework explicitly links sexual harassment to prescriptive gender
stereotyping. Sexual harassment of both men and women of a sexual or nonsexual
nature "operates as a means of enforcing gender norms" (Franke, 1997, p. 734).
Indeed, sexual harassment can be a "very effective means of accomplishing these
heteropatriarchal objectives, whether by enacting these norms—as in the case of

men harassing female subordinates in the workplace—or by punishing gender
nonconformists" (Franke, 1997, p. 763). Thus, the enforcement of prescriptive
gender stereotypes and the punishment of men and women who violate those
prescriptions are considered to underlie sexual harassment, according to Franke.
Franke (1997) identified three ways in which sexual harassment may enforce
and maintain prescriptive gender stereotypes. Sexual harassment may be used (a)
to punish a man ("the effeminate man") who is perceived as violating norms of
masculinity, (b) to punish a woman ("the masculine woman") who is perceived as
violating norms of femininity, or (c) to force a woman ("the feminine woman")
to conform to the role of sexual object. Central to Franke's framework is the
causal relationship between sexual harassment and each of these forms of pre-
scriptive gender stereotyping. However, what is the psychological evidence for
these relations?
In our general review of the literature, we have not touched on the issue of
prescriptive gender stereotypes for men. In regards to prescriptive gender stereo-
types of women, however, our review located little direct evidence to support the
notion of sexual harassment as a way by which women are forced into the role of
sexual object.
The evidence we presented has, for the most part, focused on the negative
consequences for women who do not conform to norms of femininity, which is
consistent with Franke's (1997) analysis on sexual harassment as a form of
punishment for gender norm violations. The research literature suggests that
sexual harassment does not need to occur to all women or all men as a class to
constitute sex discrimination. Instead, women in certain circumstances are more
vulnerable to sex discrimination. Women are negatively sanctioned when they
violate specific gender norms. In addition, men who possess certain belief systems
(e.g., right-wing authoritarians, ambivalent sexist individuals, those who hold
especially strong prescriptive gender stereotypes) are especially likely to engage
in such sanctioning. However, the dependent variable in these studies tended to be
stereotypes, attitudes, and biased evaluations rather than explicitly hostile or
harassing behavior. In addition, most of this research, with the exception of
certain studies contained in the meta-analyses by Eagly and her colleagues (Eagly
et al., 1992; Eagly et al., 1995; Eagly & Johnson, 1990), and the field survey by
Snizek and Neil (1992), are laboratory studies, although Heilman and her col-
leagues (Heilman et al., 1995; Heilman et al., 1989) use business students rather
than the ubiquitous college sophomore. Notably, Snizek and Neil provided a
demonstration of the way in which prescriptive gender stereotypes can be as-
sessed in a workplace environment. Although some might argue that such mea-
sures are too reactive to be useful, Snizek and Neil have succeeded in demon-
strating an empirical relation between prescriptive gender stereotypes held by men
and perceived discrimination on the part of the women with whom they work.
Such a technique could potentially be used to assess the relation between pre-
scriptive gender stereotyping and a wider variety of discriminatory experiences
(i.e., sexual harassment) on the part of male and female employees (see Barrett &
Lees, 1994).
This hypothesized relation between prescriptive gender stereotyping and
sexual harassment is quite different than the process by which the descriptive
aspect of gender stereotypes would be expected to result in discrimination. Again,

the descriptive aspect of gender stereotypes is expected to function as a type of
"mental filter" that influences the way in which female employees are perceived,
the way in which their behaviors are interpreted, and the way in which their skills
and their performances are evaluated (e.g., Fiske et al., 1993). In this case, gender
discrimination is simply a product of gender stereotyping based on the misper-
ception and erroneous interpretation of the evidence, rather than a means of
enforcing certain gender role beliefs.
The argument that sexual harassment is not primarily based on descriptive
gender stereotypes is also consistent with research and theory on the role of
misperception in sexual harassment (Saal, 1996). According to misperception
theory (Stockdale, 1993), some incidents of sexual harassment may be mediated
by men's misperceptions of the female employee's behavior. Specifically, female
employees' overtures of friendliness and collegiality may be misinterpreted as
sexual which, in turn, may lead men to direct unwanted, sexual attention toward
female colleagues (e.g., Abbey, 1982; Pryor & Whalen, 1996; Stockdale, 1993).
Our review of the literature suggests that this type of sexual harassment would be
more a function of descriptive aspects of gender stereotypes (i.e., women as sex
objects) and would constitute a misinterpretation or misunderstanding of the
situation. Importantly, results of a program of research designed to test the
misperception as mediator hypothesis (Saal, 1996) did not provide- convincing
evidence for this model, with the tendency to perceive female behavior in sexual
terms showing little relation to the endorsement of sexually harassing behaviors.
This implies that sexual harassment is not simply the result of a misunderstanding
and supports our argument that sexual harassment is not primarily the product of
descriptive gender stereotypes.
Regarding the prescriptive aspect of gender stereotypes as more central to
sexual harassment than the descriptive aspect has implications for the type of
evidence necessary to demonstrate that gender stereotyping played a role in sex
discrimination. One key issue in the stereotyping literature is the role of individ-
uating information in undermining the effects of stereotyping (Borgida, Rudman,
& Manteufel, 1995). In other words, if a perceiver is privy to information about
a particular woman (e.g., she was editor of the Harvard Law Review, she is a
successful manager, she scored in the top 10% of her class), then does she
continue to be stereotyped according to her gender? Under certain conditions—
when the individuating information is concrete, unambiguous, and explicitly
relevant to the judgment at hand—such information has been demonstrated to
decrease stereotyping and to increase the reliance on the specific attributes of the
target (e.g., Borgida et al., 1995; Click et al., 1988; Heilman, 1983). Indeed, the
use of individuating information that is explicitly relevant to hiring and promotion
decisions should reduce the likelihood that employment decisions have a disparate
impact on women, because such information undercuts the tendency for women
to be perceived in terms of descriptive aspects of the female stereotype.
However, when sex discrimination is based on the prescriptive rather than the
descriptive component of gender stereotypes, the effect of individuating informa-
tion on discrimination, we would argue, is less clearcut. For'situations in which
sex discrimination serves to maintain or enforce prescriptive gender stereotypes,
the relevant issue is not the way in which target-relevant information is inter-
preted, or whether the target is perceived accurately or inaccurately. It is an

empirical question as to whether information that a female worker in a male-
dominated field is supremely competent mitigates the possibility of sex discrim-
ination, if those around her hold the belief that women should not (rather than
cannot) do the job. If sex discrimination is a means by which to punish a woman
for violating a prescriptive gender stereotype, then demonstrable competence on
her part is likely to have little bearing on whether she is sexually harassed.
Similarly, a woman's unambiguous declaration that her friendly behaviors were
not meant to imply sexual interest may be ineffective in curtailing sexual harass-
ment that was undertaken to enforce her role as a sexual object. Thus, for the
prescriptive component of stereotypes, the case of Price Waterhouse v. Hopkins
(1989) remains instructive:
The issue no longer is acknowledgment of competence. Rather, this aspect of the
stereotyping process explains the penalties that result from perceived violation of
acceptable sex-role appropriate behaviors. Because many behaviors considered
inappropriate for women are the very ones deemed necessary to be "competent" in
a traditionally male job, sex stereotypes create a double bind for women. Their
competence is undervalued if they behave in traditionally feminine ways, while
their interpersonal skills are derogated and their mental health is questioned if they
behave in traditionally masculine ways. (Fiske et al., 1993, p. 218)
In this review we have tried to demonstrate the importance of the distinction

between the prescriptive and descriptive components of gender stereotypes for
understanding the way in which gender stereotypes may result in different types
of sex discrimination. To a large extent, our review of the literature supports
Franke's (1997) theory that sexual harassment is a way of enforcing prescriptive
gender stereotypes and punishing gender nonconformists. If courts begin to accept
this framework, then examining more precisely the link between prescriptive
gender stereotypic beliefs about men and women and various forms of sex
discrimination and sexual harassment of both sexes, and identifying the organi-
zational conditions under which such beliefs are activated and manifested in the
workplace, is an even more important research agenda in the years ahead.
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Psychology, Public Policy, and Law Copyright 1999 by the American Psychological Association, Inc.

1999, Vol. 5, No. 3, 665-692 1076-8971/99/S3.00 DOI: 10.1037//1076-8971.5.3.665

WHO WOMEN ARE, WHO WOMEN SHOULD BE

Almost a decade after psychological research on gender stereotyping first was

prescriptive component consists of beliefs about the characteristics that women

how women should behave. Moreover, as may be seen in Table 1, discrimination

I. The Distinction Between Descriptive and Prescriptive Components

II. Evidence on the Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

appearance appear to be especially powerful in activating gender stereotypes

stereotypes also influence attributions of performance, with women's successes on

Prescriptive Component of Gender Stereotypes

sional." However, sexist men attributed negative interpersonal traits such as

The Relation Between the Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

constitutes an implicit measure of gender stereotyping. Indeed, response facilita-

III. Functional Bases of Descriptive and Prescriptive Components of

Gender Differences in Descriptive Versus Prescriptive

assessing implicit stereotypes, women engaged in gender stereotyping to as great

Manifestations of Discrimination Based on Descriptive Versus

ment) as opposed to cold discrimination (i.e., discriminatory actions based on

IV. Conclusions and Legal Implications

heteropatriarchal objectives, whether by enacting these norms—as in the case of

aspect of gender stereotypes would be expected to result in discrimination. Again,

preted, or whether the target is perceived accurately or inaccurately. It is an

In this review we have tried to demonstrate the importance of the distinction

Banaji, M. R., & Greenwald, A. G. (1995). Implicit gender stereotyping in judgments of

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