Implicit Association Test – Gender Based Identities: (Gender Science X Gender Careers)

The Implicit Association Tests are designed to measure the connection between an individual’s affiliation and how well it agrees/disagrees with certain global ideas based on their evaluations and response to several questions. Personally, I feel that I carry a huge interest towards gender based claims across the world and I felt encouraged to take both the Gender Careers test as well as the Gender Science test. I believe that if we combine both test results together, it will give a sense of what a Middle Eastern woman is destined to perform in her life based on tradition and myths that have been passed down across generations.

To begin with, I started by taking the Gender Career test which is designed to identify whether the test taker has a personal association with the idea of men being at work and women destined to stay at home and take care of their families. Meanwhile, my responses suggested that I tend to have a slight association for male with career and females with family. Personally, I tend to agree with the test results for several reasons. To begin with, I have been raised all my life seeing my father being the only individual responsible for the household income and my mother being strictly focused on taking care of the family. As a result, I have grown to believe that this is the way most Middle Eastern families choose to pursue their lives hoping that this would form the equilibrium in all families. In that regard, I think this is why I had a “slight” association in the first place. History and tradition tends to play an essential role in what we are okay with, yet it does not necessarily mean that this is the way I choose to personally build my future. Accordingly, this is another way to observe my “slight affiliation” and compare it to who I would rather be.

Frankly, I believe that this generation is based on more equal roles and depends on both parties in the household activities as a whole. The male is expected to contribute to the family just as much as a female is encouraged to seek her individual identity and pursue a job that makes her feel both engaged and independent in the community. 

Furthermore, I took the Gender Science test in order to allow me to build an overall argument by the end of this experience about gender, their expected interest and what they will tend to be in the end. To start with, the Gender Science test is designed to identify whether the test taker believes that a link exists between liberal arts and females and between science and males.  Surprisingly, my results suggested that I have a moderate automatic association for males with science and females with liberal arts. Personally, I believe that this test result does not match my personal opinion regarding this matter to a great extent.

Ironically, I do believe that females tend to perform in sciences much better than males at a younger age. This is why I always feel that it does not do them justice to claim that they are destined to pursue liberal arts because this is where they will perform best. To make things clearer, I consider myself more fond of science than literature; this is why I chose to become an Architect in the first place.On the other hand, I tend to agree with the results in one aspect. Meanwhile, I believe that males are less associated to liberal arts and would not seem to be as expressive as women might be in this field. However, this does not by any means cross out a female’s abilities to perform in sciences in a less professional manner. 

In that regard, I think my final conclusion would be that the test complies to the stereotype in the way it was designed. This is due to the fact that it presupposed a comparative argument in the favor of one of the parties. If I was to redesign this test, I would divide the research into two segments; one that assesses men’s ability to perform well in liberal arts and another separate entity that observes women’s interest in science majors.

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