The effect of making the issue of 'violence against women' salient on the gender identity of women from the Western Cape : an experiment study

The idea for this dissertation emerged out of my interest in the identity of South Mrican women. A specific area of interest was which part of South Mrican women's identity was more salient- race or gender. Another specific area of interest, based on the proposition of social identity theory that different aspects of identity could be salient within different contexts, was which contexts, if any, would make gender identity more salient than race identity. (The was of interest particularly with regard to black women.) In an attempt to further explore the identity of South Mrican women, with particular reference to the above questions, Study 1 was conducted. Based on the literature (e.g. Davis, 1981; hooks, 1981, 1984 ), one expectation was that while gender might be more salient than race for white women, for black women, race would always be more salient than gender irrespective of context. A content-analysis of the focus group transcripts for Study 1 did not support this expectation. Both black and white women cited the issue of 'sexual violence against women', specifically rape, as the one factor that made the 'woman' aspect of their identity salient, and engendered a feeling of 'us' (women) versus ‘them' (men). In order to further investigate this result, a second study was conducted. In Study 2, a pretest post-test experimental control group design was used to examine the effect of the issue of 'sexual violence against women' on the gender identity of black, white and coloured women. Forty black women, 40 white women and 40 coloured women from the Western Cape participated in the study. Gender and race identity were explored using multidimensional scales, a social distance scale, a personality atttibutions measure, and an identity checklist. These measures were administered at both the pretest and the posttest. ‘Sexual violence against women' was operationalised as an article about rape which was presented to women in the experimental group while women in the control group received a neutral intervention. The hypothesis was that at the pretest, women (in particular black women) would perceive themselves as 'closer' to other members of their own race (including men) than to other women of different races. Thus race would be a more salient aspect of identity than gender. Based on the results of Study 1, it was further hypothesised that at the posttest women in the experimental group would perceive themselves as 'closer' to women of other races than to men of their own race.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Department of Psychology

Year dc:date.issued

1997

Author dc:creator

• Jeannot, Chantal

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Finchilescu, Gillian

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/13477

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/13477