The Effects Of Performer's Gender And Empathy On Inferring Competence

Double standards theory argues that in some contexts where the two perf ormers differ with respect to characteristic s but com plete a va luable task at th e same level,double standards for the actual perform ance evaluations are influenced by consideration s of the different characteristics.This paper base d on Foschi' s relatedstudies within double standards theory,mainly focuses on the two e ffects of characteristics-based stand ards on inferring competence—gender and em pathy,and investigates the operating mechanism of double standards in the process.The study was conducted in three steps.Firstl y,the study would test the ef fects of gender on the double standards for com petence in Chinese culture from Foschi's theory.Then,combined with Driskell' s personal ch aracteristic theory,along with Foschi' s theoretical logic,empathy,a personal characteristic would be applied in the situations of double standards theory to test Foschi's hypothesis,that is empathy may affect the double standards for competence.Finally,based on th e two steps above,furt her studies would be that apart from the information on gender,when evaluatorshas empathy grounds used on which to form ideas about the two perform ers' relative competence,the impact of the two significant characteristics on competence.The experiment results show that when apart from the information on gender,empathy and the same performance evaluations,evaluators have no other grounds on which to for m ideas about the two perform ers' relative co mpetence,the effect from gender of the performers is not significant and it indicates no obviously gender bias by assessors.But the effect from empathy of the pe rformers is significant and wi th higher empathy persons are assigned more competence,whereas,the persons with lower em pathy will be judged by a stricter standard.The study also foundthe interaction effect between gender and empathy on standards for competence when the attributes,gender and empathy differentiates the persons is significant.The variable,gender of perform ers moderates the re lationship between empathy and inferring competence and when the performer is f emale,the m arginal moderate influence is more strong.