Sexism in University Teaching: Differences in the Evaluations of Male and Female Professors

Abstract

this research’s objective was to investigate whether the evaluation of the professional performance of university professors (variable operationalized as perceived fairness of the grade received) is influenced by the independent variables: (a) participant’s gender, (b) professor’s gender, (c) type of major that they teach, and (d) and the grade given to the students by professors. Two studies were conducted. Study 1 (N = 384), with a predictive-correlational design, and Study 2 (N = 376), with an experimental design. Both studies had university students as participants. Taken together, the results indicate that gender is related to perceived fairness of grades given by professors, and this effect varies depending on the type of professional context. These results point to gender inequality in university teaching and indicate that women are still perceived as different from men, especially in contexts considered “male.”