Author ORCID Identifier(s)

Jared M Cutler (0009-0002-3407-1942)

Published In

Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

11-11-2026

Subjects

Implicit stereotypes, Gender-career stereotypes, region, sexism, stereotypicality

Abstract

This study adopts a multidimensional approach to assess whether geographic areas with greater gender representation and integration (even distribution of employed men and women) have less traditional implicit gender-career stereotyping (IGS). Contact with and exposure to working women (counterstereotypic exemplars) may reduce regional IGS. However, this may depend on the type of career positions, as stereotypic (feminine careers) gender-career representation may exacerbate IGS. Researchers analyzed data from the U.S. Census' 2010 to 2019 American Community Survey (metropolitan statistical areas: = 338) and Project Implicit ( = 689,455). Using multilevel modeling, representation and integration negatively predicted traditional IGS in that region. Furthermore, the proportion of working women in stereotypically masculine careers negatively predicted IGS, whereas employed women in feminine careers positively predicted IGS. Findings support environmental models of implicit associations and imply that enhancing the proportion of working women in masculine careers may be a method to addressing implicit gender bias.

Rights

Copyright (c) 2026 The Authors Creative Commons License This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

DOI

10.1177/01461672261493666

Persistent Identifier

https://archives.pdx.edu/ds/psu/45339

Publisher

SAGE Publications

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Included in

Psychology Commons

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