Hostile and benevolent sexism: The role of conservatism and intergroup hierarchy

Abstract

Sexist prejudice in Argentina is a current problem given that during 2017 more than 16,000 calls for gender violence were made. From a psychological perspective, ambivalent sexism is composed of hostile and benevolent sexism. The first describes the hostility towards women who do not conform to traditional gender roles and the second defines subjectively benevolent attitudes that consider women as wonderful but fragile. In addition, social dominance orientation and authoritarianism have been the most studied psychological bases that favor the emergence of sexist prejudice. However, the influence of both variables in the hostile and benevolent expressions of sexist prejudice from the ambivalent sexism theory has not yet been studied in Argentina. The aim of the study was to analyze the differential contribution of authoritarianism and social dominance in benevolent and hostile expressions of prejudice towards women. For this purpose, an ex-post facto prospective study was carried out with a total of 325 adults living in Buenos Aires. The main results demonstrated that authoritarianism influences the emergence of benevolent prejudice towards women, while social dominance turned out to be a predictor of hostile expressions. From these findings, it is necessary to rethink the contribution of authoritarianism and dominance to the different expressions of prejudice in the scientific literature when their subtle and blatant forms are not considered.