The cognitive organization of sex and occupation stereotypes

Two experiments were conducted to explore whether activating occupation stereotypes primes sex stereotypes or whether the reverse is more likely. A reaction time paradigm was used to distinguish between four alternative hypotheses about this issue. More specifically, subjects were exposed to sex-occupation or occupation-sex word pairs and asked to press one of two buttons depending upon their perceptions of the compatibility of the two words. Although consistent word pairs were responded to more quickly than inconsistent ones, varying the order in which the words were presented (sex first or occupation first) did not interact with this factor. This pattern of findings contradicts the widely held notion that there is an asymmetrical relationship between the two kinds of stereotypes.