Anna Lindqvist

Introducing a gender-neutral pronoun in a natural gender language: the influence of time on attitudes and behavior

The implementation of gender fair language is often associated with negative reactions and hostile attacks on people who propose a change. This was also the case in Sweden in 2012 when a third gender-neutral pronoun hen was proposed as an addition to the already existing Swedish pronouns for she (hon) and he (han). The pronoun hen can be used both generically, when gender is unknown or irrelevant, and as a transgender pronoun for people who categorize themselves outside the gender dichotomy. In this article we review the process from 2012 to 2015. No other language has so far added a third gender-neutral pronoun, existing parallel with two gendered pronouns, that actually have reached the broader population of language users. This makes the situation in Sweden unique. We present data on attitudes toward hen during the past 4 years and analyze how time is associated with the attitudes in the process of introducing hen to the Swedish language. In 2012 the majority of the Swedish population was negative to the word, but already in 2014 there was a significant shift to more positive attitudes. Time was one of the strongest predictors for attitudes also when other relevant factors were controlled for. The actual use of the word also increased, although to a lesser extent than the attitudes shifted. We conclude that new words challenging the binary gender system evoke hostile and negative reactions, but also that attitudes can normalize rather quickly. We see this finding very positive and hope it could motivate language amendments and initiatives for gender-fair language, although the first responses may be negative.

Perfume Preferences and How They Are Related to Commercial Gender Classifications of Fragrances

Perfumes are claimed to be an important factor in human social communication. Previous research on perfumes has mainly considered masculinity and femininity as two opposite poles of the same scale, while in this study, 18 naive participants scaled the femininity and masculinity of 12 perfumes as two independent attributes. They also indicated if they wanted to use the perfumes themselves (self-preference), if they wanted their partners to use the perfumes (partner preference), and the perceived pleasantness. It was found that higher scores of pleasantness were assigned to fragrances for daytime wear. Based on the olfactory description of perfumes available on the web (www.fragrantica.com), a method is proposed to predict the perceived femininity. Predicted values were strongly correlated (r = 0.87, p = 0.0002) with femininity ratings obtained from the panel. The results show that self-preference and partner preference were positively correlated with each other (r = 0.84, p < 0.001) and with the pleasantness, indicating that if the participants liked a perfume, they both wanted to use it themselves and wanted their partner to use it. Nonetheless, the observed correlation is influenced by one perfume that was perceived as unpleasant, and further studies will be required to better understand the gender associations of perfumes and their impact on self-preference and partner preference.

The Role of Odour Quality in the Perception of Binary and Higher-Order Mixtures

Twenty participants scaled similarities in odour quality, odour intensity and pleasantness/unpleasantness of 10 binary and 5 higher-order mixtures of 5 odorous degradation products from the polymer Polyamide 6.6. The perceived odour qualities of all binary mixtures were represented well as intermediary vectors relative to their component-odour vectors in a three-component principal components analysis. The odour qualities of the “floral/fruity” 2-pentylcyclopentan-1-one and the “sharp/cheese-like” pentanoic acid contributed profoundly to their binary mixtures, as did the “minty” cyclopentanone, but in fewer cases. Conversely, the “ether-like” 2-methyl pyridine and “nutty” butanamide did not contribute much. Odour similarity was shown to be caused by odour quality, rather than odour intensity. Three out of five degradation products formed distinct clusters of odours and were therefore interpreted to be profound contributors to the odour quality of the binary mixtures. The higher-order mixtures created new odour qualities which were completely different and untraceable to their various parts as perceived alone. These results demonstrate that it is critical to research the perception of natural mixtures in order to be able to understand the human olfactory code.

The perception of the poor: Capturing stereotype content with different measures

Abstract Even though Sweden stands out in many ways, with for example a well-developed welfare system, there are some indications that Swedish egalitarianism does not include tolerance for people with low income. The present research concerns the content of the Swedish stereotype of poor people, and examines whether the poor are associated with just as negative traits as they are in other countries. Three different measurement methods were employed to investigate the contents and strength of the stereotype. In Study 1, participants freely associated on the perceived characteristics of Swedish citizens who receive welfare benefits. They also provided ratings of this group on traits related to warmth and competence. Study 2 employed both trait ratings and implicit measures (Single Category-IATs) in order to estimate the strength of the associations between the poor and warmth/competence, respectively. Across the different measures, the poor were associated with low competence and low–medium warmth. This corroborates the findings from previous research related to the Stereotype Content Model in other countries.

How predictions of economic behavior are affected by the socio-economic status of the target person

ABSTRACT We investigate how the stereotype of the poor (vs. middle class) influences behavioral predictions. In Study 1, participants made predictions regarding another person’s economic behavior in scenarios pertaining to rate of time preferences (loss, gain of smaller and larger amount). We find that participants, across scenarios, expect individuals with low SES to show more short-sightedness—i.e., steeper temporal discounting. This pattern persisted until strong diagnostic information about previous economic behavior was provided. These results are novel but consistent with previous work on stereotype application. Study 2 probed stereotype accuracy. Participants with lower vs. higher SES reported how they would act in scenarios matching those of Study 1. We find that they respond very similarly, which is in contrast to the stereotype that poor people are more short-sighted and may possibly be taken to suggest that the association between low SES and short-sightedness is biased.

Contemporary Arguments Against Gender-Neutral Language

In 2015, a gender-neutral pronoun (‘hen’) was introduced in Swedish as a complement to ‘hon’ (she) and ‘han’ (he). Adding a gender-neutral pronoun differs from previous gender-fair language reforms ...