The prediction of false rape-related beliefs (rape myth acceptance [RMA]) was examined using the Illinois Rape Myth Acceptance Scale (Payne, Lonsway, & Fitzgerald, 1999) among a nonclinical sample of 258 male and female college students. Predictor variables included measures of attitudes toward women, gender role identity (GRI), sexual trauma…

The last few decades in America were marked with perceptible changes in educational and occupational opportunities for women, particularly with the passage of Title IX and a growing consensus towards more egalitarian values in our culture. A pro-male backlash, or recuperative masculinity, emerged in more recent years as an outgrowth of feminist…

One of the most dreaded insults in sports is, "You throw like a girl," because it epitomizes society's gender logic about physiological differences between men and women. Although physiological differences between the sexes exist, people label these abilities and behaviors as masculine or feminine as a result of social and cultural expectations.…

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the gender stereotypes endorsed by elementary and high school students regarding mathematics and language. We developed a questionnaire allowing students to rate mathematics and language as either male or female domains and administered it to a sample of 984 elementary and high school French-speaking…

A feminist reading of four prominent literacy narratives--Mike Rose's "Lives on the Boundary," Richard Rodriguez's "Hunger of Memory," Victor Villanueva's "Bootstraps," and Keith Gilyard's "Voices of the Self"--shows that conflicts and anxieties about the consequences of schooling on working-class masculinity animate these texts. Each of these…

Through individual narratives, three adolescent males of colour reflect on their fluid masculinities in relation to ethnicity, spirituality and sexuality. The self-described gender benders examine their complex relationships and hybrid identities, which cross the various boundaries of heteronormativity routinely legitimatised through peer norms…

The short form of the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI) contains half as many items as the long form and yet has often demonstrated better reliability and validity. This study uses exploratory and confirmatory factor analytic methods to examine the structure of the short form of the BSRI. A structure noted elsewhere also emerged here, consisting of…

This paper draws on research on masculinities to examine poetry as a socially and culturally gendered genre. Situated in the context of the current "crisis" around boys' underachievement in school, attention is drawn to the problematic understanding of poetry as an unsuitable genre for boys. Attention is further drawn to the way in which poetry,…

Controversy currently exists on whether boys are in crises and, if so, what to do about it. Research is reviewed that indicates that boys have problems that affect their emotional and interpersonal functioning. Psychoeducational and preventive programs for boys are recommended as a call to action in schools. Thematic areas for boys' programming…

Current debates about the role of sports in boys' education are part of a larger discussion of men, boys and masculinities. In this paper I reflect on this debate and the research it has led to. I highlight questions of embodiment, of relations between different forms of masculinity, and questions of reproduction and change, in all of which the…

Background: A focus on male social pathologies may have evolved within parts of the intellectual disability research literature. This article explores this notion and makes some connections between mainstream gender theory about hegemonic masculinity and the current gendered discourse in intellectual disability research. Method: We conducted a…

In this article we investigate college-age women's body image issues in the context of dominant femininity and its polarization of the mind and body. We use original data collected through seven in-depth interviews and 32 qualitative written interviews with college-age women and men. We coded the data thematically applying feminist approaches to…

This study examines the peer relations and emotion practices of adolescent boys in light of their expectations and assumptions about masculinity. We carried out semistructured interviews with middle-class and upper-middle-class boys from an independent high school. The boys reported that they assiduously avoided displays of emotional or physical…

The biological basis for differences between the sexes has become increasingly clear in recent years. The nature-nurture debate has made way for the view that the individual is a product of the interaction between genes and environment. For the world of school leadership this means that instead of arguing about them, we should acknowledge the…

The underachievement of boys has been a focus of intense concern in Australia for over 15 years. Historical analyses suggest that male students' poor performance has traditionally been attributed to factors external to boys themselves (methods, teachers, texts), deflecting attention from the relationship between masculinity construction and…