Allies Against Sexism: The Impact of Men’s Egalitarian Versus Paternalistic Confrontation on Women’s Empowerment and Well-Being

Abstract

Data and Materials Availability: Preregistration of Studies 2 and 3 as well as supplementary materials of Studies 1−3, the data sets generated for pooled analyses of Studies 1−3 and an English translation of the main measures used in the three studies can be found in the https://osf.io/uh27n/. The raw data supporting the conclusions of Studies 1−3 and the original version of measures used in Studies 1−3 will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation, to any qualified researcher.

Supporting men or male privilege? Women's progressive and reactionary collective action for men

“…To our knowledge, action for the advantaged is an unexplored area of collective action research, which has almost solely focused on action for disadvantaged groups. We also extend the recent literature on, mostly ingroup-focused, conservative and reactionary collective action (e.g., Jost et al, 2017;Osborne et al, 2019;Thomas et al, 2020), by examining reactionary motives in collective action for other groups (see e.g., Estevan-Reina et al, 2021;Radke et al, 2018 for similar approaches). Our findings so far point to some similarities in predictors of action for the advantaged and for the disadvantaged.…”

“…Such paternalistic action is more likely to induce anger and less likely to increase the well-being of the women they are supposed to benefit, than the egalitarian forms of collective action ( Estevan-Reina et al, 2021). While men's collective action for women has been relatively well researched in social psychological literature, to our knowledge only a handful of studies have explored the motivations of women engaging in action for men.…”

“…For example, Radke et al (2018) differentiate between 'feminist action' challenging gender inequality and 'protective action' aiming to protect women from men's violence, but not addressing gender inequality directly. Such paternalistic action is more likely to induce anger, and less likely to increase the well-being of the women it is supposed to benefit, than the egalitarian forms of collective action (Estevan-Reina et al, 2021). While men's collective action for women has been relatively well researched in social psychological literature, only a handful of studies have explored the motivations of women engaging in action for men.…”

“…(2018) differentiate between ‘feminist action’ challenging gender inequality and ‘protective action’ aiming to protect women from men's violence, but not addressing gender inequality directly. Such paternalistic action is more likely to induce anger, and less likely to increase the well‐being of the women it is supposed to benefit, than the egalitarian forms of collective action (Estevan‐Reina et al., 2021).…”

“Act like a real man!” a novel examination of how socializing others to masculine honor-based norms bolsters men’s reputations.

“…Finally, it would be interesting to examine the type of confrontation that men exhibit, both in terms of the protagonist and the bystander—examining whether they are doing it to bolster their own reputations or to provide allyship and support to the woman, and if they even care about the effects of the sexism and insult on the woman versus their own self-image. These questions are important because women internalize the reasons and ways that men confront and the motivations of men higher in masculine honor beliefs may simultaneously reinforce his reputation while diminishing his female partner’s own self-worth, image, and even motivations to confront sexism (see, e.g., Estevan-Reina et al, 2021; Saucier et al, 2021).…”