'Are Women Supposed to Do That?'

After the hack of Sony Picture’s internal emails, the world learned that American Hustle actress Jennifer Lawrence had gotten fewer back-end points than her male counterparts in the movie. Equal jobs, and slightly less pay.

Lawrence largely blamed herself when she wrote about this experience on her website: “I failed as a negotiator because I gave up early. I didn’t want to keep fighting over millions of dollars that, frankly, due to two franchises, I don’t need,” she wrote. “But if I’m honest with myself, I would be lying if I didn’t say there was an element of wanting to be liked that influenced my decision to close the deal without a real fight.”

The actress’s experience is not unfamiliar to researchers. Studies tell us that, in many situations, women face a higher social risk than men if they initiate negotiations. This can help explain why women are more likely to avoid transactional behavior.

Choosing battles

In an experiment, participants evaluated candidates who either accepted compensation offers without comment or attempted to negotiate higher compensation. Men only penalized female candidates for attempting to negotiate whereas women penalized both male and female candidates. Another experiment showed that women were less likely to negotiate when the evaluator was male, but not when the evaluator was female.

Women report greater anxiety about negotiation and are less likely to perceive situations as negotiable. It’s easy to see how this is bad news for women; proverbs such as “You’ll never get what you don’t ask for” exist for a reason. If even a small percentage of uninvited negotiations are successful, according to the rule of compounding interests, those differences in starting salaries can lead to substantial compensation gaps over time.

Notice how some participating men and women acted the same, but their outcome was different. The difference was in how people perceived that exact same behavior. The good news that thoughts can be reshaped rather quickly.

Equal ways to ruin our health

Women didn’t smoke before World War I for a simple reason: the vice wasn’t publicly acceptable for them. Some women began to smoke publicly once they took over a number of “male jobs” after World War II, but what it really took was a bit of greed and the invention of PR, or public relations, to get women to buy cigarettes.

It really was the American Tobacco Company that found the key to unlock a brand new market. They hired Edward Bernays, Sigmund Freud’s nephew and the “father of public relations”, to get women smoking. Bearneys then famously told the press to expect New York City’s suffragists to light up their “torches of freedom” during the Easter Day Parade. And, in 1929, the world watched as women marched, smoked, and showed that they were equal to men.

Marketing didn’t change anything about the cigarettes, the women, or smoking itself. The only thing that changed was how people perceived all of these things. The same tricks could work to spread more noble ideas as well—say, gender equality.

Changing minds

Gender bias might be all in the mind, but we’re all guilty of it. Implicit biases influence our every decision, even when we make them unconsciously.

But how do you change your own thoughts?

1. Fix language. Language shapes the way we think. It can perpetuate gender stereotypes, but choosing your words carefully is a constructive tool for reinforcing equality. In one study, students called female instructors “teachers” more often but referred to male instructors as “professors.” It’s high time to change that. Even small differences matter; researchers found that using gender-inclusive terms such as “he or she” or “humankind” helps people associate a topic with all genders, rather than with just the one.
2. Fix the media. Media won’t tell you what to think; it will only tell you what to think about. A study looked at media coverage on vice presidential candidates between 1984 and 2008 and found that reporters focused more on the personal lives, dress, and appearance of female candidates, while male candidates got more professional, issue-related coverage. What’s worse is that this type of sexist coverage was particularly pronounced in blogs and new media over the internet. Shady sources certainly didn’t help female candidates gain legitimacy.
3. Fix what’s on TV. The original Little Mermaid, written by Hans Christian Andersen in 19th-century Denmark, was problematic on the gender front. Ariel, in order to pursue romance, has to give up her most magical and distinctive quality—her voice. This is not the kind of TV that I'd expect to see in the 2021 version of the movie.
4. Fix it young. For a more lasting change in attitudes, we need to see how stereotypical gender roles are established in children. Tackle the problem at its core by melding both feminine and masculine attributes within the same individual.
5. Fix quotas. One of the more systemic issues hiring managers have is that they can’t find experienced talent for certain positions. It’s a Catch-22 situation because to get more experience, one needs to be hired in the first place. To get around this, many companies and institutions set quotas to make opportunities more just.

Gender inequality lowers the quality of life for both men and women. Women suffer the largest and most direct cost of these inequalities, but the costs span across society and families. It’s not a women’s issue nor is it only a men’s; it’s a problem that needs everyone’s attention and participation.