Sexism Goes Underground: The Development of a Neosexism Scale Catered to College Student Populations

摘要

Cultural and political changes in the last century have made it largely socially unacceptable to overtly discriminate against women. Such pressures may have forced sexist beliefs to be expressed in more covert forms. This study aimed to develop a psychometric scale that assesses such covert, or neosexist, beliefs in college student populations and to analyze the relationship between neosexism and gender egalitarian beliefs, feminist awareness, social desirability, and an existing scale of neosexism. Similar to previous research, a series of exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses yielded a one-factor model of neosexism. This model was invariant across gender and race. Scores on the old neosexism scale, gender egalitarianism, and feminist revelation were all significant predictors of scores on the new neosexism scale. This new scale may prove useful in assessing the anatomical and neurological correlates of contemporary attitudes toward women.