Deck 5: Gender and Communication

Question 1

Mulac (2006) conducted a series of studies in which the speech of men and women is transcribed, masked as the identity of the speaker, and then presented to college students to see whether they can tell whether the speaker was male or female. If Tannen's hypothesis is correct, the task should be ______.

A) easy
B) moderately difficult
C) very difficult
D) impossible

Answer 1

easy

Question 2

Charlotte is a transwoman. Someone refers to her as "he." This is an instance of ______.

A) sexism
B) misgendering
C) stereotyping
D) discrimination

Answer 2

misgendering

Question 3

"I've felt that way, too," is an example of what type of speech?

A) assertive speech
B) tentative speech
C) relational speech
D) affiliative speech

Answer 3

affiliative speech

Question 4

Research on interpersonal distance indicates that there is the smallest distance between ______.

A) male-male pairs
B) female-female pairs
C) homosexual pairs
D) female-male pairs

Question 5

"Power posing" refers to ______.

A) men posing
B) expansive posture
C) women posing
D) contractive posture

Question 6

Robin Lakoff theorized that gender differences in communication stem from ______.

A) women and men's innately different biology
B) the differences in women and men's abilities to communicate
C) gender roles and the relative power those roles have
D) the differences in the values they hold

Question 7

Which of the following is a pattern of tentative speech, according to Lakoff?

A) hedges
B) interruptions
C) evading
D) passiveness

Question 8

In a study done by Thomson et al. (2001) in which participants corresponded with a fictitious netpal, researchers found that ______.

A) women expressed more emotion than men, regardless of the netpal's responses
B) men responded with fewer emotions than women when the netpal was female
C) respondents shifted their e-talk to be similar to that of their netpal
D) women disclosed more personal information than men when the netpal was female

Question 9

Ogletree et al. (2014) found that ______ was more strongly linked to emoticon usage than ______.

A) gender; femininity
B) androgyny; gender
C) femininity; gender
D) gender; masculinity

Question 10

What do researchers' interpretations of interpersonal distance suggest?

A) Gender differences in interpersonal distance have more to do with gender than gender roles.
B) There are few gender differences in interpersonal distance.
C) Gender differences in interpersonal distance have more to do with gender roles than gender.
D) Our interpersonal distance depends on our gender more than the gender of the other person.

Question 11

What can you infer about people using more euphemisms for the word "woman" than for the word "man"?

A) The word "woman" is used less frequently and causes some discomfort.
B) The word "woman" implies low status and power, so it is used less frequently.
C) The word "woman" is intimidating to people.
D) The word "woman" is often associated with negative connotations.

Question 12

What can you infer about Dovidio's research on visual dominance?

A) When women are put in a powerful role in a mixed-gender dyad, men continue to show typical male patterns of visual dominance.
B) When women are put in a powerful role in a mixed-gender dyad, they tend to avert their eyes while speaking.
C) Dominant primates from many species, including humans, "stare down" subordinates.
D) When women are put in a powerful role in a mixed-gender dyad, they show the pattern of visual dominance usually characteristic of men.

Question 13

Meta-analysis tells us that women convey nonverbal messages or cues ______ men do.

A) less accurately than
B) more accurately than
C) the same as
D) more frequently than

Question 14

Based on the research regarding interruption, a feminist would infer that interruption in communication is related to ______.

A) androcentric culture
B) power and status
C) intersectionality
D) the persistence of traditional gender roles

Question 15

The words "chick," "shorty," "honey," and "ho" are examples of ______.

A) euphemisms for transgender women
B) sexualizing women
C) euphemisms for the word "woman"
D) sexism and discrimination

Question 16

In an experiment by Deutsch et al. (1987), women who did not smile were rated ______ than women who did smile.

A) more negatively
B) as more competent
C) as more professional
D) as more serious

Question 17

Dovidio's experiment on gender differences in eye contact used various conditions that led to interesting results. In the control condition, men were more visually dominant, which meant ______.

A) women looked more while listening
B) men looked at their partners less while speaking
C) men looked more while listening
D) women look at their partners more while speaking

Question 18

Tannen claimed that gender differences in communication stem from the different goals that men and women have when they communicate. Her position is called the ______.

A) gender cultures theory
B) difference in communication hypothesis
C) different cultures hypothesis
D) gender difference in conversation theory

Question 19

Inferring that women using more tentative speech in communication is a negative quality rather than inferring that tentative speech reflects better interpersonal communication is an example of ______.

A) an underappreciation of women's qualities
B) a female deficit interpretation
C) a male as the norm interpretation
D) an affiliative speech interpretation

Question 20

Men are more likely to use a(n) ______ posture and women are more likely to us a(n) ______ posture.

A) elongated; shortened
B) contractive; expansive
C) expansive; contractive
D) endogamous; exogamous

Question 21

Countries with grammatical gender languages tend to have more gender equality relative to countries with natural gender languages or genderless languages.

Question 22

The phrase "he or she" is considered to be gender-neutral language.

Question 23

Using the word "police officer" rather than "policeman" is an example of ______.

A) sexist language
B) nonsexist language
C) gendered language
D) male-as-the-normative language

Question 24

Federal officials referring to the governor of Louisiana, Kathleen Blanco, as the "female governor," while referring to a male governor as "governor" is an example of ______.

A) euphemisms
B) female-as-the-exception
C) misgendering
D) ethnocentrism

Question 25

In language, compared with men, women typically ______.

A) use fewer intensifiers
B) are infantilized
C) interrupt more
D) are misgendered

Question 26

Misgendering a transgender person can threaten their sense of identity.

Question 27

What are the implications of genderless languages?

A) less gender equality
B) less limits on language
C) more gender equality
D) more confusion

Question 28

Gender is constructed in social interactions and gender patterns depend heavily on social context.

Question 29

Campbell and Robnett (2011) conducted a meta-analysis to examine the evidence for gender differences in the four forms of tentative speech. Overall, they found large gender differences in three out of the four forms of tentative speech, with women using more tentative language than men.

Question 30

In Hyde's research on children's responses to the gender-neutral occupation, "wudgemaker," the results indicated that ______.

A) males preferred to be a wudgemaker when they grew up, but females preferred not to be
B) girls said they would like to be wudgemakers but felt incompetent to do so
C) children assumed wudgemakers were male
D) women were rated as significantly more competent at being wudgemakers when the wudgemaker was referred to as "she," rather than "he"

Question 31

The infant typically begins to sit up around 6 months of age; he may begin crawling at about that same time. This sentence is an example of ______.

A) feminism
B) euphemisms
C) infantilizing
D) androcentrism

Question 32

Sexist language and sexist attitudes go hand in hand.

Question 33

Men are slightly more likely than women to use affiliative speech.

Question 34

Research indicates that when a woman is speaking, ______ speech seems to work best when the audience is male and ______ speech seems to work best when the audience is female.

A) tentative; assertive
B) assertive; tentative
C) institutional; utilitarian
D) utilitarian; institutional

Question 35

Research shows that when women use expansive posture, they feel more powerful.

Question 36

According to a nonsexist language perspective, even if a person's transgender or cisgender status is not relevant, it should be identified.

Question 37

Use of terms such as "girl" or "baby" to refer to women is an example of ______.

A) androcentrism
B) the different language used by women
C) infantilizing
D) female deficit

Question 38

Using masculine nouns and pronouns to refer to all people in a gender-neutral sense is called ______.

A) masculine generics
B) ethnocentrism
C) chauvinistic language
D) overgeneralization

Question 39

The gender difference in smiling is small, d = −.10.

Question 40

Having a preference for social hierarchy and inequality of equality is known as ______.

A) system-justifying beliefs
B) social hierarchy orientation
C) social dominance orientation
D) systemic hierarchy beliefs

Question 41

Explain Mulac's gender-linked language effect. What do Mulac's findings demonstrate regarding his theory? (i.e., is the theory supported?)

Question 42

Define the Whorfian hypothesis. What are the implications if this hypothesis is true? What would the Whorfian hypothesis predict about practices like the use of masculine generics on bias and inequality? Based on Hyde's research, does this apply to adults only or does it apply to children as well? What does this say about the importance of the language we use? What is one way we can deal with this issue?

Question 43

Explain why Dr. Karl Menninger's book titled Man Against Himself is an example of masculine generics. What are the implications of using masculine generics in language?

Question 44

Feminists have objected to a number of features of the English language. Explain what these features are and why feminists object to them. Then describe any empirical psychological studies that have been done that could be used as evidence to back the feminist position.

Question 45

Differentiate between intrusive interruptions and supportive interruptions. Then, explain why it is not entirely accurate to say that men interrupt more than women do and that this indicates men's expression of dominance.

Question 46

Differentiate between natural gender languages, grammatical gender languages, and genderless languages. What does the research say about the connection between the type of gendered language and countries' societal gender equality?

Question 47

Explain why titles such as Mr., Miss, Mrs., and Ms. can be problematic.

Question 48

Explain the clinical implications of gender differences in language. In other words, how are the gender-linked language effect and other gender differences in verbal communication relevant?

Question 49

What does the research say regarding sexist language in job descriptions? What implications does this create for a company that is wanting to become more diverse?

Question 50

Rewrite the following sentences in order to eliminate the bias and sexist language:
a. Faculty and wives are invited to a reception at the President's house.
b. Each student should turn off his cell phone before class begins.
c. Dr. Abramson is the chairman of the department.
d. The girls on the University volleyball team are really athletic.