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Perceived Choices: Perceptions Of Mothers’ Devotion To “Family Or Work” Or "Family And Work", Stefanie Mockler

College of Science and Health Theses and Dissertations

The role of motherhood is culturally associated with reduced performance expectations and lower performance evaluations. This is referred to as the motherhood penalty. Social role theory (Eagly, 1984), the stereotype content model (Fiske, Cuddy, Glick, & Xu, 2002) and the lack of fit model (Heilman, 1984, 2001) suggest that stereotypes regarding how women are and how they should be drive these perceptions. When mothers express strong devotion to work over family (i.e., devotion orientation) the motherhood penalty appears to be minimized. However, having to claim that work is central to their lives (i.e., work-­‐devotion) to avoid being penalized can impede …