Re-assessing the Role of Gender-Related Cognitions for Self-Esteem: The Importance of Gender Typicality for Cisgender Adults

Abstract Gender-related cognitions have been central to accounts of well-being in children and adults in the United States. Yet, the child and adult literatures are currently not aligned in how they measure these experiences, creating an asymmetry in scientific understanding. The current investigation aligns these literatures by using the short-form of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI; Bem 1981) (adult literature) and a modified version of Egan and Perry’s (2001) Gender Typicality Scale (child literature) with cisgender (i.e., those whose current gender identity is the same label as their birth-assigned category) adult participants. These measures were used to determine the relative contributions of each to self-esteem using nonprobability samples of heterosexual and queer (i.e., lesbian, gay, bisexual, pansexual, and asexual) women and men in the United States. The analyzed groups consisted of cisgender individuals: heterosexual women (N = 97), heterosexual men (N = 90), queer women (N = 83), and queer men (N = 51). All groups showed significant contributions of adult gender typicality to self-esteem, over and above the BSRI dimensions. Thus, both self-reported gender typicality and self-reported endorsement of certain BSRI dimensions are important indicators of well-being in cisgender adults in the United States.
Source: Sex Roles - Category: Global & Universal Source Type: research