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The Effect of Social Role on Gender Specific Emotion Perception
Carrie Camp, Patti Cuddeback, and Jillian Taylor Guilford College
Abstract
Social roles and emotions were examined with a female model. The purpose of the study was to examine the effects of social role on gender specific facial expressions. It was predicted that women’s facial expressions connected with supervisory position will be rated as more masculine and women’s facial expression connected with subordinate or employee status will be rated as more feminine. Sixty nine individuals participated in our study. They were randomly assigned to read a scenario about either CEO, department manager or an entry level female and rate the female facial expression provided. Seven different emotions were rated which included disgust, anger, fear, happiness, neutral, sadness and surprise, on a seven-point Likert-type scale. After data was collected, perceived emotional intensity was measured and analyzed using a total feminine emotion score. Results showed that there was no difference in perceived emotional intensity based occupation level or gender of participant. These findings suggest that social roles are not a factor in perceived emotion level within a target; however future research should use a measure that equally describes both masculine stereotyped emotions and feminine stereotyped emotions.
Keywords: perception, facial expressions, stereotypes, emotional expressions.

The Effect of Social Role on Gender Specific Emotion Perception Facial expressions and the emotions they incite are the most powerful form of nonverbal communication (Algoe, Buswell & DeLameter, 2000). Emotions such as happiness, sadness, fear, anger and disgust are interpreted through our facial expressions and relate to others our degree of approachability, confidence, and nurturance. Research suggests

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