The meaning of difference: Gender theory, postmodernism, and psychology.

Abstract

Two recent postmodern movements, constructivism and deconstruction, challenge the idea of a single meaning of reality and suggest that meanings result from social experience. We show how these postmodern approaches can be applied to the psychology of gender. Examining gender theories from a constructivist standpoint, we note that the primary meaning of gender in psychology has been difference. The exaggeration of differences, which we call alpha bias, can be seen in approaches that focus on the contrasting experiences of men and women. The minimizing of differences, beta bias, can be seen in approaches that stress the similarity or equality of men and women. From a deconstructivist position, we examine previously hidden meanings in the discourse of therapy that reveal cultural assumptions about gender relations. Paradoxes in contemporary constructions of gender impel us to go beyond these constructions. The Construction of RealityConstructivism asserts that we do not discover reality, we invent it (Watzlawick, 1984). Our experience does not directly reflect what is "out there" but is an ordering and organizing of it. Knowing is a search for "fitting" ways of behaving and thinking (Von Glaserfeld, 1984). Rather than passively observing reality, we actively construct the meanings that frame and organize our perceptions and experience. Thus, our understanding of reality is a representation, that is, a "re-presentation," not a replica, of

A Feminist Phenomenological Description of Depression in Low-income South African Women

“…Ussher (2010) labels such research "reductionistic" because it positions women as victims of their biology and detaches them from other possible political, economic or social explanations for their illnesses (Hare-Mustin & Marecek, 1990;Inhorn & Whittle, 2001). Similarly, Greenspan (1993) argues that the traditional medical model tends to encourage women to seek individual solutions to many health problems that might be better solved by social or collective means, and in that way, subtly maintains their socially disempowered status.…”

Androcentric Reporting of Gender Differences in APA Journals: 1965–2004

“…The androcentric practices described here provide a new vantage point from which to view debates about the science and politics of comparing women and men. In the past, psychologists have been enjoined to avoid exaggerating gender differences (Baumeister, 1988;Favreau, 1997;McHugh, Koeske, & Frieze, 1986;Hare-Mustin & Marecek, 1990), to report similarities and small differences (Rothblum, 1988), to report empirical differences as accurately as possible (Eagly, 1995), and to trust in the value neutrality of a 'free marketplace of ideas' (Scarr, 1988).…”

“…Within and beyond psychology there has been repeated concern that such lenses impact the ways that psychological differences between females and males are reported and interpreted. Debates have focused on gender polarization; the exaggeration of gender differences (Baumeister, 1988;Favreau, 1997;Hare-Mustin & Marecek, 1990;Hyde, 2005;Kitzinger, 1994;McHugh, Koeske, & Frieze, 1986;Mednick, 1989), and on biological essentialism; the premature attribution of gender differences to immutable biological factors (e.g., Brescoll & LaFrance, 2004;Mahalingam, 2003;Martin & Parker, 1995;McHugh, Koeske, & Frieze, 1986). The current article aims to call attention to the third lens of androcentrism.…”

Undoing Androcentric Explanations of Gender Differences: Explaining ‘The Effect to be Predicted’

“…differences are not mentioned, men are assumed to be the norm for the species, but where gender differences are evident, such differences are assumed to inhere in women (see also Hare-Mustin & Marecek, 1990). Evidence of androcentric thinking abounds in psychology.…”