I took the Gender-Career implicit bias test. This test is designed to see whether people associate female with family and male with career.
What did you discover about yourself?
My results showed that I moderately associate women with families and men with careers. This is not too surprising to me. I was raised in a two-parent household where my mother was the primary care giver. Both of my parents worked, but my mother was still the caregiver for me and my brothers. My father took on a secondary role. I think I associate women with family and men with careers because of the structure of the family I was raised in.
I am also very convinced that popular culture and media had an effect on how on view gender roles. It starts early, children are 2-3 years old when they start to notice gender roles (Eagly et al., 2018) I think back to all the toys I played with, baby dolls, Barbie dolls, kitchen playsets. These all play a role in a child’s development of gender norms. Both my family and the culture I was raised in had an influence on my perception of male and female roles.
Were you aware of the implicit bias you had toward the characteristic you selected?
No, I really was not aware. I have never associated myself with ideas of family. I am in my 30’s, I do not have any children, nor do I think I will end up having children. I have always been more focused on planning my career than with planning for a family.
How will you use this information to guide your nursing practice?
More than anything, I need to remember that if I have an implicit bias about gender roles, then I probably have implicit biases about other things too. Things like race, sexuality, age, and class. I feel the best way to deal with biases is to admit that you have them in the first place. When I am nursing, I will do my best not to immediately pass judgment on others and make sure I acknowledge and deal with my biases.
