In the past decades, the social status of women has rapidly advanced. Nevertheless, the obstacles that hinder women to progress their careers still remain (Blau & DeVaro, 2007; Stamarski et al., 2015). However, Stephens & Levine (2011) shows that many people fail to notice those obstacles due to the misperception that women leave their job due to their own choice, which illustrates how the choice framework hinders the advancement of women in American society. The data for their study are collected though two experiments. In the first experiment, they recruited stay-at-home mothers and asked them about their working experience in the workplace and how they recognize the discrimination in certain fields. The second experiment surveyed U.S.-born undergraduates about their belief of gender equality in the workforce. In this experiment, the authors split the participants into two groups, one displays a book cover poster which emphasizes on independent choice account for women’s leave and one displays only a normal poster as control group during the experiment, to test how choice framework influence their perception.
According to Stephens & Levine (2011) study, I came up with an idea of how we might be able to reduce gender inequality in the workforce. That is, through correcting the misbelief towards gender inequality in the workforce, the gender promotion gap might be able to reduced. My proposed topic would be “Misperception towards Gender Inequality in the Workforce: Female Promotion Opportunities in Chicago”. First, I would introduce Stephens & Levine’s research and other studies, and elaborate on how misperception on gender inequality in the workforce can harm women’s promotion opportunities. The method I would use is conducting an experiment. The participants in the experiment would be the managers and executives in 50 companies that are randomly chosen in the Chicago metropolitan area.
The experiment is comprised of three stages. First, Participants will receive an email including an online survey link that would ask their opinions about whether they would like to promote a female candidate when one male and one female candidate are given. The statements in the survey would consider several situations such as given the same abilities, the same working hours, or even the same period that they have devoted to the company. Then, I will collect the responses and calculate the rate of willingness to promote a female in each companies.
Second, after each company complete their promotion, I will compute the actual female promotion rate for each company from the actual promotion data, and obtain a comparison chart based on the calculated rate to compare willingness to promote a female and the actual promotion rate in that company, and the average of the rate of willingness to promote a female and the average actual promotion rate of all the participated companies. The experiment will randomly divide the chosen companies into two groups with evenly size, the treatment group and the control group: the treatment group would receive the comparison chart, and the control group will receive nothing.
Finally, when next promotion happens in those chosen companies, I will gather the data and calculate the female promotion rate. Then, I will compare the results of the treatment and the control groups to test whether the correction of the misperception towards the gender inequality through the comparison chart can help improve the opportunities for female in promotion.
References
Blau, F. D., & DeVaro, J. (2007). New evidence on gender differences in promotion rates: An empirical analysis of a sample of new hires. Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, 46(3), 511-550.
Stephens, N. M., & Levine, C. S. (2011). Opting out or denying discrimination? How the framework of free choice in American society influences perceptions of gender inequality. Psychological Science, 22(10), 1231-1236.
In the past decades, the social status of women has rapidly advanced. Nevertheless, the obstacles that hinder women to progress their careers still remain (Blau & DeVaro, 2007; Stamarski et al., 2015). However, Stephens & Levine (2011) shows that many people fail to notice those obstacles due to the misperception that women leave their job due to their own choice, which illustrates how the choice framework hinders the advancement of women in American society. The data for their study are collected though two experiments. In the first experiment, they recruited stay-at-home mothers and asked them about their working experience in the workplace and how they recognize the discrimination in certain fields. The second experiment surveyed U.S.-born undergraduates about their belief of gender equality in the workforce. In this experiment, the authors split the participants into two groups, one displays a book cover poster which emphasizes on independent choice account for women’s leave and one displays only a normal poster as control group during the experiment, to test how choice framework influence their perception.
According to Stephens & Levine (2011) study, I came up with an idea of how we might be able to reduce gender inequality in the workforce. That is, through correcting the misbelief towards gender inequality in the workforce, the gender promotion gap might be able to reduced. My proposed topic would be “Misperception towards Gender Inequality in the Workforce: Female Promotion Opportunities in Chicago”. First, I would introduce Stephens & Levine’s research and other studies, and elaborate on how misperception on gender inequality in the workforce can harm women’s promotion opportunities. The method I would use is conducting an experiment. The participants in the experiment would be the managers and executives in 50 companies that are randomly chosen in the Chicago metropolitan area.
The experiment is comprised of three stages. First, Participants will receive an email including an online survey link that would ask their opinions about whether they would like to promote a female candidate when one male and one female candidate are given. The statements in the survey would consider several situations such as given the same abilities, the same working hours, or even the same period that they have devoted to the company. Then, I will collect the responses and calculate the rate of willingness to promote a female in each companies.
Second, after each company complete their promotion, I will compute the actual female promotion rate for each company from the actual promotion data, and obtain a comparison chart based on the calculated rate to compare willingness to promote a female and the actual promotion rate in that company, and the average of the rate of willingness to promote a female and the average actual promotion rate of all the participated companies. The experiment will randomly divide the chosen companies into two groups with evenly size, the treatment group and the control group: the treatment group would receive the comparison chart, and the control group will receive nothing.
Finally, when next promotion happens in those chosen companies, I will gather the data and calculate the female promotion rate. Then, I will compare the results of the treatment and the control groups to test whether the correction of the misperception towards the gender inequality through the comparison chart can help improve the opportunities for female in promotion.
References
Blau, F. D., & DeVaro, J. (2007). New evidence on gender differences in promotion rates: An empirical analysis of a sample of new hires. Industrial Relations: A Journal of Economy and Society, 46(3), 511-550.
Stephens, N. M., & Levine, C. S. (2011). Opting out or denying discrimination? How the framework of free choice in American society influences perceptions of gender inequality. Psychological Science, 22(10), 1231-1236.