Gendered stereotypes and norms: A systematic review of interventions designed to shift attitudes and behaviour

Abstract

In the face of ongoing attempts to achieve gender equality, there is increasing focus on the need to address outdated and detrimental gendered stereotypes and norms, to support societal and cultural change through individual attitudinal and behaviour change. This article systematically reviews interventions aiming to address gendered stereotypes and norms across several outcomes of gender inequality such as violence against women and sexual and reproductive health, to draw out common theory and practice and identify success factors. Three databases were searched; ProQuest Central, PsycINFO and Web of Science. Articles were included if they used established public health interventions types (direct participation programs, community mobilisation or strengthening, organisational or workforce development, communications, social marketing and social media, advocacy, legislative or policy reform) to shift attitudes and/or behaviour in relation to rigid gender stereotypes and norms. A total of 71 studies were included addressing norms and/or stereotypes across a range of intervention types and gender inequality outcomes, 55 of which reported statistically significant or mixed outcomes. The implicit theory of change in most studies was to change participants' attitudes by increasing their knowledge/ awareness of gendered stereotypes or norms. Five additional strategies were identified that appear to strengthen intervention impact; peer engagement, addressing multiple levels of the ecological framework, developing agents of change, modelling/role models and co-design of interventions with participants or target populations. Consideration of cohort sex, length of intervention (multi-session vs single-session) and need for follow up data collection were all identified as factors influencing success. When it comes to engaging men and boys in particular, interventions with greater success include interactive learning, co-design and peer leadership. Several recommendations are made for program design, including that practitioners need to be cognisant of breaking down stereotypes amongst men (not just between genders) and the avoidance of reinforcing outdated stereotypes and norms inadvertently.

Opportunities and challenges in preventing violence against adolescent girls through gender transformative, whole-family support programming in Northeast Nigeria

“…Overemphasizing gender-norms change at the individual or relational level may limit opportunities for violence prevention, as it can unduly centre the agency of the individual in GBV prevention strategies. While gender norms-change programming can impact the beliefs, attitudes, and behaviours of individual perpetrators [ 69 ], it is perhaps equally urgent to design programming attentive to the overarching structural factors which shape individual agency and pattern community-level norms [ 70 , 71 ]. Feedback from SSAGE participants and mentors suggests that the program impacted attitudes and behaviours related to gender equity and violence within families, but did not address broader community or structural-level factors that underpin the perpetration of GBV against adolescent girls in northeast Nigeria.…”

PROTOCOL: Gender transformative approaches in agriculture for women's empowerment: A systematic review

“…In the year 1983, the State of The genesis of GTAs traces back to the health sector, and sexual and reproductive health, in particular. A systematic review exists on interventions to shift gender norms (Stewart et al, 2021). A systematic review on farmer field schools incorporated evidence about the effectiveness of approaches to target women farmers (Phillips et al, 2014).…”

Mechanisms for the prevention of adolescent intimate partner violence: a realist review of interventions in low- and middle-income countries

“…Interventions are "gender transformative" when they actively seek to reshape gender relations to be more equitable for the improvement of human health (40,69). This approach implicitly assumes that reductions in support for the social norms and attitudes that legitimate and perpetuate VAW will indeed lead to a reduction in the perpetration and experience of VAW (70,71). This pathway of norm/attitude change leading to behaviour change can be traced back to the work of social psychologists who argued that behaviours are predicted by behavioural intentions, which are in turn a function of individuals' attitudes and social norms (59,72,73).…”