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 Not all women perceived a stereotype threat. And such perceptions
did not affect the mental health of young women in non-surgical
specialties, the researchers found.
Perceiving that others have a negative stereotype about you “is a
general phenomenon that affects all sorts of people and
circumstances, including white men doing athletic activities and
ethnic minorities in academic achievement,” said lead author Dr.
Arghavan Salles of Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
“Stereotype threat is present in all fields, but the negative
consequences appear to be less in other specialties than in
surgery,” Salles told Reuters Health by phone.
In 2010 and 2011, the researchers surveyed male and female doctors
in 14 medical residency programs, nine of which were surgical
specialties. About 380 residents responded to the surveys, which
included measures of psychological general well being and of
professional burnout.
Some of the specialties, such as pediatrics, and obstetrics and
gynecology, tend to have more women. Others, such as radiology, tend
to be more male-dominated.
Women made up slightly more than half of the residents responding
from non-surgical programs but only accounted for about a third of
the surgeons who responded.
The residents answered three questions about stereotype threat,
assessing their opinions of the expectations of residents in their
program, faculty in their department, and the general public.
Optional answers included “they expect women to be much better than
men (at my profession),” “they expect men to be much better than
women (at my profession),” or a range of options in between.
Female surgical residents with higher degrees of stereotype
perception had poorer psychological health than those with lower
degrees. Among male surgical residents, and among men and women in
other specialties, there was no relationship between stereotype
perception and well being, the researchers reported in the Journal
of the American College of Surgeons.
The culture of medicine as a whole, particularly the training
environment, should take stereotype threat into account, said Dr.
Liselotte N. Dyrbye of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, who
was not part of the new study.
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Having more women in leadership positions who can serve as role
models for female medical students would have a positive impact, she
told Reuters Health by phone.
Feeling valued is important to everyone, Dyrbye added.
And, she pointed out, “Burnt out physicians are more likely to
deliver suboptimal care and have a higher risk of leaving the
profession.”
“It’s important for people to know that stereotype threat is a
phenomenon that has been found over and over again in other
contexts,” Salles said.
This study did not assess actual stereotypes that people hold, only
the extent to which people think others around them believe the
stereotype, she said.
“It affects the experience of training to become a physician,” she
said.
Researchers are working on interventions to “buffer” people against
stereotype threat and preserve their performance, but the problem
hasn’t been solved yet, she said.
In the meantime, she said, measuring actual stereotypes in the
population could be helpful, if the results find that fewer people
believe in them than some female surgeons think. Encouraging more
women to enter male-dominated medical professions would help as
well.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1Rin2eA The Journal of the American College of
Surgeons, online October 21, 2015
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