Groupwork With Women/Groupwork With Men

An Overview of Gender Issues in Social Groupwork Practice

Beth Reed, Charles Garvin

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9781135849177
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Medical Theory, Practice & Reference

This important book focuses on the subject of gender as a factor to be considered in forming and managing groups in social work practice.

BASIC ISSUES

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GUEST EDITORIAL

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Gender Issues in Social Group Work: An Overview

Charles D. Garvin
Beth Glover Reed

ABSTRACT. This introductory essay outlines some of the reasons why a knowledge of gender is important for social group workers. We identify key concepts that are often confounded in our understanding of gender and discuss gender stereotypes and status differences between men and women and their implications for group work; we further discuss how disordered behaviors and social problems are related to these gender role stereotypes and status differences. Finally, we assert that many of the theories underlying social work practice reflect gender stereotypes, and that group work research and theory have largely ignored gender as a variable.

Each of the articles that follow in this journal address one or more ways that a knowledge of gender and its pervasive effects can inform our work in groups. The purpose of this introductory essay is to indicate why a knowledge of gender should be of central importance to everyone working with people today, and specifically, how this knowledge enters into the way we should work with groups. We will also indicate how particular articles in this journal issue seek to clarify these issues.

GENDER AND INDIVIDUAL IDENTITY

Gender is a fundamental component of individual identity. Usually, the first words uttered about a new infant are: “It's a boy!” or “It's a girl!” In social group work, we often work with people concerned with exploring identity and self-concept issues, and many aspects of behavior that are directly or indirectly related to their gender and societal assumptions about it.

Increasingly, theorists, researchers and practitioners (e.g., Sherif, 1982; Solomon, 1982b; Shively and DeCecco, 1977) are noting that both individually and within the larger culture, we confuse separable concepts of biological gender, gender identity, gender (or sex) role behaviors, and sexual orientation or preference. This confounding leads us to mislabel many types of gender-related issues, in ways that may perpetuate unhelpful and potentially harmful gender stereotypes.

Gender is one's biological sex and includes chromosomal and genetic factors, sex organs and various types of secondary sex characteristics (e.g., beard, breasts). As researchers struggle to determine what human behaviors are determined by biological gender (Maccoby and Jacklin, 1974; Money, 1980), many assumed biologically based explanations of masculine and feminine behaviors have been challenged. Many are now known to vary from situation to situation, and while there clearly are some biological imperatives (e.g., menstruation), in most cases, we cannot separate biological factors from culturally determined socialization patterns. In fact, we can influence biological events via socialization and conditioning.

Gender identity is the inner, subjective conviction that a person is a male or female. This core belief is a major component of personality and is believed by most theorists to be immutable by the age of two or three. In contributes to the development of other affective and cognitive personality components such as body image and self-esteem.

Gender or social sex role is the expectations, behaviors, characteristics, norms, and role sets defined by the larger culture, the family and the self as appropriately masculine, feminine, or as unrelated to gender. Cultural beliefs and values, of course, are integrated into the behavior and thought of everyone. Gender role development begins at birth and evolves through the integration of a multitude of experiences (psychosexual, social, cognitive, moral, relationship, etc.). Changes in gender role continue through the life course, but the core of the role is usually well integrated by early adulthood, and rarely undergoes spontaneous modification (Solomon, 1982a).

Gender role assumptions and behaviors are often so completely integrated into the behavior and thought of each individual, that components of gender role expectations have become an integral part of gender identity. The actual behaviors may be relatively easy to modify, but the related beliefs and moral judgements that underlie the behaviors are much more resistant to change. Thus, attempts to change, or pressure to change the role behaviors, even if they are unsatisfying or problematic, may induce identity-related distress or even panic.

Sexual object choice or sexual orientation refers to the gender of the person chosen as a sexual partner. These choices can also include being autosexual or asexual. Sexual object choice is not necessarily rigidly prescribed and may change through the life course. It is frequently mistaken to be part of gender identity and gender role, an assumption that can lead to the mistaken labeling of gender identity conflicts (e.g., transexuality) or gender role issues (e.g., an assertive self-assured woman) as forms of homosexual orientations. Such mislabeling makes it difficult to identify the real source of gender-related issues, and makes work with them unnecessarily confusing and anxiety-provoking.

Remaining sensitive to the differences in these definitions and our tendency to confuse them is an integral component in the development of gender-sensitivity in our work. These issues are addressed most directly in the articles by Morson and Mclnnis and Gambrill and Richey, but also arise in one form or another in almost every paper in this collection.

GENDER ROLE STEREOTYPES AND STATUS DIFFERENCES

Cultural Stereotypes about Appropriate Masculine and Feminine Role Behaviors

Many researchers have demonstrated the presence of widely shared conceptions of what this culture defines as appropriate masculine and feminine characteristics and behaviors (e.g., females are affectively and socioemotionally oriented; males are instrumentally and competitively oriented). Until fairly recently, masculinity and femininity were defined as bipolar concepts, i.e., as opposites. In fact, most people still talk about the “opposite sex.” Boys and girls are socialized to behave in ways consistent with these stereotypes.

The work of Bem (1974), Kaplan and Bean (1976), and others on androgeny challenges this bipolar conceptualization of gender roles. The concept is derived from the Greek andò (male) and gyn (female) to suggest a flexible integration in a single person, of characteristics usually associated with women or men, a person who has moved beyond scientific and cultural stereotypes for her or his gender. While some men and women perceive themselves and behave in accordance with traditional sex-role stereotypes, others are able to use the positive attributes associated with both masculine and feminine stereotypes. Thus, to increase many clients' coping and adaptive capacities, workers must help them to explore their gender socialization and the skills and orientations that were enhanced or inhibited by this socialization.

One of the consequences of having different views of what is appropriate behavior for each gender is that people then use different standards of judgement when they evaluate identical behaviors in women compared to men. Gambrill and Richey describe some of the ways that these different standards of judgement can influence social skills training—in assessment, identification of target behaviors, selecting intervention strategies and evaluating results.

Most of the articles in this issue address the consequences of polarized gender socialization, and many describe ways that people can explore its consequences and develop alternatives for themselves. Stein, Kaufman and Timmers, Currie, and Buckley et al. discuss some of the ways these issues can be explored in all-male groups while Gottlieb et al., Adolph, Haussmann and Halseth, Hagen and Hartman explore the issues as they arise in all-female groups as women work on relationship and autonomy issues and becoming more assertive. Reed and Bernardez address some of the ways that our gender role stereotypes and socialization influence the ways we react to women leaders in groups.

Status Differences between Women and Men

A sex role perspective alone emphasizes the complementarity of male and female roles, but ignores the process of power and prestige ordering that occurs when men and women interact. There is considerable evidence that women's and men's roles are not valued equally by society, that men's contributions are more valued than women's not only monetarily, but also in terms of status and prestige, and that these status differences influence male and female behaviors in group settings (Lockheed & Hall, 1976; Meeker & Weitzel-O'Neill, 1977). Several of the articles in this journal review this literature, notably Martin and Shanahan, Gambrill and Richey, and Reed. People who have more status display both verbal and non-verbal behaviors that indicate more dominance and power (they talk more often, address the entire group, are less personal); those with lower status are more deferent verbally and non-verbally. Those socialized for higher status positions often resist accepting this view of themselves and its possible consequences, and may fear that role change will lead to a loss of some advantages associated with the higher status. Those with lower status are likely to have incorporated some of the consequences of this position into their self-image and worldview. Self-esteem is often low, they may feel very isolated, and are more likely to blame themselves for their circumstances.

These behaviors and self-perceptions are also consistent with gender socialization practices and stereotypes, although Kanter (1977a, 1977b, 1977c) has demonstrated that even men, when placed in positions of low status without access to advancement and sources of power and influence, behave in ways defined as stereo-typically feminine. Thus, status-related behaviors and self-perceptions do not just arise from socialization but are also related to environmental factors and will change if the environment changes or if status variables (e.g., legitimization) are adjusted. Education about these relationships and the multiple origins of many gender-related perceptions and behaviors will be very important components of group work with both women and men.

Status differences between women and men must be considered in planning group composition and in working with both men and women in the same group (noted especially by Martin & Shanahan). They also influence what occurs in all-men and all-women groups. Nine of the articles in this collection discuss work primarily in single gender groups and all of them discuss different aspects of status-related dynamics and how they can be addressed. Reed and Bernardez present some of the ways that status and socialization interact to generate different reactions to women group leaders, and Gambrill and Richey describe status as a key characteristic to consider in social skills training groups.

GENDER-LINKED DISORDERS AND SOCIAL PROBLEMS

Behavioral disorders that occur most frequently in each gender are highly related to gender roles and socialization (e.g., Lewis, 1976; Gomberg & Franks, 1979). Those most common in women usually have major affective components (e.g., depression, anxiety, cyclic mood disorders, extreme dependency), or body-image distortions (e.g., anorexia). Those for men more often have major cognitive components (thought disorders, obsessive compulsive patterns) or involve taking action rather than facing problems (sexual disorders, alcoholism, violence). These patterns suggest the extremes of gender stereotyping, almost as if masculine and feminine socialization has been too successful. The types of problems that bring members of each gender to social workers are also often directly related to gender-linked circumstances—low income and child care responsibilities, gynecological problems, and as victims of violence for women; for men, vocational, criminal, or violence related problems, or particular health problems (e.g., heart).

Knowledge about gender differences, socialization, societal contributions to male and female-linked behaviors, and knowledge about how to change these assumptions and behaviors will be crucial in working with many of these disorders more effectively. Stein discusses some of these problems for men; Haussman and Halseth describe a group for depressed rural women while Adolph reports on use of feminist and consciousness-raising group techniques with women in a psychiatric day hospital. A cluster of articles by Hart-man, Currie, and Buckley et al. describe several modes of working with domestic violence—a group of women who have been battered and groups for men who have battered.

CHANGING GENDER ROLES

Our society is one of rapid changes and these have had profound consequences for sex roles. For women, many of these changes are due to the fact that they are “living longer, marrying later, and less often, remarrying less frequently, having and expecting to have fewer children, and more often than previously, planning to have no children” (Lipman-Blumen, 1976). This has led to an increase in women living alone as well as heading families as single parents.

While male domination of higher education, particularly at a graduate level, continues, the situation in the work force has been changing. The proportion of women employed continues to grow and a majority of wives are now employed. While women with young children are less likely to work than those without, even this category of women workers has been increasing. The type of employment secured by women has also been changing so that, while women are still more likely to be in certain blue and pink collar occupations as well as “traditional” fields such as teaching, nursing, and secretarial work, their entry into all other fields is on the increase. Nevertheless, they are severely underrepresented in most high status professions and occupatio...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Editors
• Editorial
• Basic Issues
• Practice with Women
• Practice with Men