Fredrickson and colleagues’ (1998) research found that only women were affected by the stereotype threat of trying on swimsuits versus sweaters. In fact, overall male performance was slightly better on the math test when wearing a swimsuit versus a sweater. This finding and other research findings suggest that women are more affected by gender stereotype threats than men. However, men can also fall victim to gender stereotype threats, depending on the instructions given and the task required. Pavlova, Weber, Simones, and Sokolov (2014) randomly assigned college students from a German university to one of three conditions: a control group that did not receive any prior sex-related message or instructions, a second group that was told that males usually perform worse on the task, and a third group that was told that females usually perform worse on this task. All participants completed a task from the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III, adapted to the German population, that asked them to arrange a set of cards in an event sequence.
Pavlova and colleagues found that when no gender message was given, no difference occurred in females’ and males’ performance; however, unexpected findings occurred when the gender-specific instructions were given. When participants were told that males usually perform worse, there was a decline in both male and female performance. When instructions suggested that females usually perform worse on the task, as expected, females’ performance declined and males’ performance was enhanced. These authors argued that when giving an explicit message about one sex’s performance, implicit messages are given to the other sex. So it did not matter whether the stereotype was directed at women or men; both were affected. Thus, gender-related stereotype messages do indeed affect both males and females, but this research suggests that females may be more affected by implicit messages than males.