Women receive positive evaluations yet remain targets of discrimination

Evidence

The clearest challenge to the traditional analysis of prejudice derives from research on sexism, a topic that Allport neglected. Sexism researchers have since documented that women elicit predominantly positive sentiments but are often targets of prejudice. Initial explanations for sex discrimination rested upon the belief that attitudes toward women were negative (see Rudman, ch. 7 this volume), but empirical examination of evaluations of women and men as social groups showed positive attitudes toward women (see review by Eagly & Mladinic, 1994), deriving especially from the communal qualities that people associate with women (e.g., warm, friendly, sensitive). The evaluative edge of women over men appears on standard attitude measures, such as evaluative thermometer ratings or semantic differential ratings of women as a social group, and has been dubbed the women-are-wonderful effect (Eagly & Mladinic, 1994). — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 183

Categorization

• SEED: The women-are-wonderful effect shows prejudice surviving positive sentiment, which complicates any contact/affection theory of reduced discrimination — a usable essay thread.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — , Rudman, Laurie A - On the Nature of…, 183