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Women and Work: Supporting Female Colleagues in Psychology

2009; Christian Association for Psychological Studies; Volume: 28; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

0733-4273

Lauren E. Maltby, M. Elizabeth Lewis Hall, Tamara L. Anderson,

Gender Diversity and Inequality

In 2007, most recent year which data are available, women comprised 64.4 percent of 185,000 psychologists nationwide. Sixty-six percent of mental health counselors and a striking 82 percent of social workers were also women (United States Department of Labor, 2008). Despite women's strong presence in social sciences and mental health fields, women still face unique challenges as they advance through their career. For instance, APA's study of salaries in psychology showed that in 2007, women earned less than men, with disparities becoming more pronounced with more years of work experience (American Psychological Association Center Workforce Studies, 2009). Sexual harassment and sexism are still pervasive in many work places, as well as often-overlooked tensions of balancing multiple roles working mothers (Oates, Hall, Anderson & Willingham, 2008). Many of problems women face, as well as their solutions to these problems, are closely intertwined with their religious faith (Hall, Anderson & Willingham, 2004; Hall, Christerson & Cunningham, 2009). This article seeks to identify common issues faced by Christian women working in psychology-related fields, as well as highlight avenues supporting these women in workplace. To this end, we will first review some issues faced by working women in general, and then discuss those issues that pertain more specifically to working mothers. Issues Facing Working Women Women who work face certain unique challenges, including encounters with sexism, as well as structural obstacles in workplace (such as discriminatory policies), which can serve to place them at a disadvantage. These negative encounters and structural obstacles may take form of small, almost imperceptible slights which, when considered individually, do not amount to much; in other words, they are molehills. But molehills can accumulate over time to create mountains in form of unsupportive or even hostile environments women. Valian (1998) refers to this phenomenon as accumulation of disadvantage, and makes case that this is an important and frequently overlooked issue in workplace. We turn now to specific negative experiences women face in workplace. Gender discrimination. Gender discrimination occurs whenever a person or persons are put at a disadvantage compared to other groups because of their gender. Gender discrimination includes many forms of disadvantageous treatment, including discriminatory decisions (such as hiring or firing), sexual and gender harassment. Sexual harassment is the sexualization of a work relationship (Settles, Cortina, Malley, & Stewart, 2006), and includes a range of behaviors including sexual assault, sexual coercion and unwanted sexual attention. Elena works as a therapist in a prison setting. Although she finds her work meaningful, she sometimes dreads going to work because of catcalls and sexualized comments directed at her by inmates. Although she usually wears her long hair in a bun, Elena once wore it down, as she was going directly to a social event after work. One of her colleagues, a therapist, told her that she was asking for sexual attention by wearing her hair down. Gender harassment, on other hand, conveys degrading and sexist attitudes without intention of eliciting sexual cooperation with perpetrator. In a qualitative study on gender harassment, Swim, Hyers, Cohen and Ferguson (2001) concluded that it is composed of three unique types of incidents: demeaning and derogatory comments and behaviors, sexual objectification, and traditional gender role prejudice and stereotyping. For example, stereotypes may lead to devaluing or ignoring contributions of women. Jane is one of only two women on board of an organization that provides psychological services to community. At a board meeting, she suggests an amendment to a motion, but her comment is ignored. …