Doctoral Dissertation Research: Economic Resources, Parental Status and Changing Gender Norms: The Case of Marital Name Choice

在20世纪90年代中期，与工作有关的性别态度变得更加平等，但与家庭有关的性别态度，如婚姻名称选择态度，变化较慢。许多人认为，取伴侣名字的女性是无私的，而保留自己出生的名字的女性是个人主义的。这个项目将通过确定在哪些条件下对违反规范的人给予更多宽大处理来审查婚姻名称规范可能如何演变。该项目审查了妇女和中产阶级或工人阶级的妇女和男子、主要养家糊口或次要养家糊口的妇女和男子以及已经或不打算生育的妇女和男子在做出非传统的婚姻姓氏决定时，例如妇女保留自己的名字或男子用连字符连接他们的名字时，是否受到不同的看待。这些发现将显示公众如何看待非传统行为，女性和男性的特征如何决定他们面临的后果，以及名字选择的观点如何与更广泛的关于性别平等的公共话语对话，从而为公众对婚姻平等的讨论增添细微差别。该项目包括三个调查实验，以考察经济资源和父母地位是否以及如何改变婚姻名称选择对女性和男性观点的影响。受访者将评估女性和男性的可爱性、支配性、人际敌意、女性气质和男性气质、感知的育儿能力，并回答评估他们对婚姻名称决定的认可程度的开放式问题。Qualtrics是一家招募受访者的在线调查平台，将为每项实验收集数据。第一项研究将考察违规者的观点是否会因性别和社会阶层的不同而不同，如果是这样的话。假设表明，中产阶级女性和男性可能拥有更多打破常态的自由，因为人们对中产阶级美国人的看法比工人阶级美国人更积极。第二项研究将考察除了性别和阶层外，人们对违规者的看法如何根据相对收入的不同而不同。假设表明，在人际关系中主要挣钱的人可能有更多的讨价还价能力和打破规范的筹码。第三项研究考察了不同父母身份对违规者的看法有何不同，以及这种关系可能会因性别和阶层而异。假设表明，当一对夫妇有孩子时，性别规范将更加僵化，因此如果女性表达了生孩子的计划，她们打破名字规范的灵活性可能会较小。这三项实验中的每一项都随机将受访者分配到不同的条件下，这些条件系统地改变了受访者的婚姻姓名选择(女性使用丈夫的名字，两个都使用连字符)，性别(女性，男性)，以及阶层(工作/中产阶级；研究1)，相对收入(女性/男性主要收入者；研究2)和父母地位(计划/不打算要孩子；研究3)。调查结果将为与性别、家庭和美国社会中不断变化的性别规范相关的理论提供信息。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Through the mid-1990s, gender attitudes related to work became more egalitarian, but gender attitudes related to family, such as marital name choice attitudes, have been slower to change. Many people perceive women who take partner names as selfless, and women who keep their birth names as individualistic. This project will examine how marital name norms may evolve by identifying the conditions under which norm-breakers are given more leniency. The project examines whether women and men who are middle-class or working-class, women and men who are primary breadwinners or secondary breadwinners, and women and men who do or do not plan to have children are viewed differently when they make unconventional marital name decisions, e.g., when women keep their names or when men hyphenate their names. Findings will add nuance to public discourse about marriage equality by showing how the public views unconventional actions, how female and male characteristics shape the consequences they face, and how views of name choice speak to larger public discourses about gender equality. The project includes three survey experiments to examine whether and how economic resources and parental status change the effect that marital name choice has on views of women and men. Respondents will evaluate the female and male likability, dominance, interpersonal hostility, femininity and masculinity, perceived parenting ability and answer open-ended questions assessing their approval of marital name decisions. Qualtrics, an online survey platform that recruits respondents, will collect data for each experiment. The first study will examine whether and, if so, how views of norm-breakers differ based on gender and social class. Hypotheses suggest that middle-class women and men may have more freedom to break the norm because middle-class Americans are viewed more positively than working-class Americans. The second study will examine how perceptions of norm-breakers differ based on relative income, in addition to gender and class. Hypotheses suggest that individuals who are primary earners in their relationships may have more bargaining power and leverage to break norms. The third study examines how views of norm-breakers differ based on parental status, and how this relationship may vary by gender and class. Hypotheses suggest that gender norms will be more rigid when a couple has children, so women may have less flexibility to break name norms if they express plans to have children. Each of the three experiments randomly assigns respondents to conditions that systematically vary the respondent marital name choice (woman takes name of husband, both keep names, both hyphenate), gender (woman, man), as well as class (working/middle-class; Study 1), relative income (woman/man primary earner; Study 2) and parental status (plan/do not plan to have children; Study 3). Findings will inform theories related to gender, family, and changing gender norms in U.S. society.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.