GENDER EFFECTS IN THE STEREOTYPING OF THOSE WITH DIFFERENT KINDS OF COMPUTING EXPERIENCE

Stereotypes of male and female target figures who had experience of ei ther computer programming, word processing or computer games were inve stigated. Male and female undergraduate respondents were asked to rate them as portrayed in brief descriptions, on the sixteen personality a ttributes previously used by Siann, Durndell, Macleod, and Glissov in an investigation of stereotypes of male and female computer science st udents [1]. As found previously, there was no evidence of negative ste reotyping: few differences were found between the male and female targ et figures, and the pattern of ratings was similar for the three compu ter uses. The results indicated however, that irrespective of the sex of the target figure, stereotyping of the three uses differed accordin g to the sex of the respondent. Females gave higher ratings on attribu tes reflecting autonomy and congeniality to the figures with programmi ng experience, while males gave these the lowest ratings on the same a ttributes. The relationship between this finding, the previous computi ng experience of the males and possible future implications is discuss ed.