A study by Briere and Lanktree was described in Chapter 2 . This study compared students' reactions to either a neutral or a masculine generic version of a description about psychologists. This study demonstrated that
a. psychology was viewed as being a less attractive career for women when the masculine generic was used.
b. men judged psychology as being less attractive for themselves when the gender neutral version was used.
c. few people were influenced by the nature of the description.
d. most women remarked that they were offended by the use of the masculine generic.
Question 2Your text describes in some detail a study by Gastil in which participants reported the mental images evoked by sentences. This research found that
a. males reported more male images than female images when responding to sentences containing he, but females showed no pronoun effect.
b. females reported more male images for the he sentences than males did.
c. both males and females reported an equal number of male and female images when responding to sentences containing they.
d. masculine generic terms produced more thoughts about males than did gender-neutral terms.
Question 3Suppose that an English teacher tells you that she thinks it is ridiculous to try to avoid using forms like man to refer to both males and females. Your most informed response would be:
a. You're right, because people now understand that man actually includes both men and women..
b. You're right, because people don't even notice the difference between a term like man and a gender-neutral term like person..
c. You're right, because research has shown that it is extremely difficult to teach people to use gender-neutral terms..
d. You're wrong, because masculine-generic terms actually encourage people to think about males, rather than females..
Question 4Studies on the masculine generic show that
a. people usually understand that the term he can refer to both males and females.
b. men believe that he refers to both males and females, whereas women believe that he refers only to males.
c. most undergraduates understand that a phrase such as prehistoric man really refers to both men and women.
d. in general, people understand that the term he refers to males, rather than to both males and females.
Question 5What is a major problem with masculine generic terms?
a. They are not really gender neutral.
b. They encourage people to think of men as secondary.
c. These terms are longer and more awkward to use in both speaking and writing.
d. They tend to downgrade men, relative to women.
Question 6Terms used for women and men differ in which of the following respect(s)?
a. The two kinds of terms are often not parallel because the male term may be prefaced by the word man or the word male.
b. The male member of a pair of items is typically more negative than the female member.
c. Terms for women are more likely to be negative, compared to terms for men.
d. Terms for women are more general and inclusive, compared to terms for men.
Quick Reply
