Robert F. Priest

Reliability of the Attitudes Toward Women Scale (AWS) and the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ).

The stability and internal consistency of Spence and Helmreichs Attitudes Toward Women Scale (AWS) and Personal Attributes Questionnaire (PAQ) are reported. An entire first-year class of 1,007 male and 78 female cadets at the U.S. Military Academy were given a battery of psychological tests before and after cadet basic training, a 2 1/2-month period. The AWS and PAQ proved to be highly reliable, comparable to other frequently used psychological tests. This psychometric information encourages researchers to make further use of these gender-related instruments.

To Teach is to Learn: Overcoming Tokenism with Mentors.

Active mentors, persons who are not simply role models, have been shown to facilitate and enhance career growth, yet the token role of women entering traditionally masculine professions was shown to inhibit sponsorships. An analysis of a sample of exit interviews from the first women cadets to graduate from West Point revealed that the marginal peer acceptance of tokens within a competitive, somewhat constrained atmosphere discouraged the development of these sponsorships. If women plan to play sustained roles in the professions, they must actively sponsor other women. A first step in this process is to be aware of the situational pressures, noted in the present paper, that are directed against sponsorships within a token group.

ACHIEVEMENT MOTIVE: ANALYZING THE VALIDITY OF THE WOFO

Spence and Helmreich developed the Work and Family Orientation (WOFO) Questionnaire as a multidimensional measure of achievement motivation and attitudes toward family and career because they believed that a unitary construct of achievement motivation was not sufficient to account for broad patterns of behavior in varied situations. This article reviews the evidence for the construct validity of the WOFO questionnaire based on data from a large group (N = 3,727) of men and women with high educational and career aspirations. Evidence presented includes factor analysis of the WOFO subscale dimensions, subscale reliabilities, and an analysis of the effect of gender and masculinity-femininity on achievement motives. The research confirms new insights regarding the relationship between achievement motives and sex roles for women and men.

Leadership Ratings for Male and Female Military Cadets.

Ratings of leadership ability for 1096 male and 91 female cadets at the U.S. Military Academy (West Point) were examined for gender differences. Males were rated significantly higher than females for two of the three rating periods. Correlates of these ratings were examined in an effort to explore the meaning of such ratings for males and females. For both male and female cadets, situationally specific correlates of leadership ratings were identified. Physical ability and performance were most highly correlated with leadership ratings during summer training camp, while academic ability and performance were most highly correlated with these ratings during the academic year. These correlations were generally higher for females than for males. The value of such information to organizational newcomers and the means by which such information might be transmitted to them were discussed.

Value Changes in Four Cohorts at the U.S. Military Academy

This article deals with values and value changes at three levels: (1) What values do cadets at the U.S. Military Academy (USMA) hold at entrance, and do they hold the same values as other college students? (2) How do USMA cadet values change during their four years at West Point? (3) How consistent is the pattern of change from cohort to cohort? Using the Scott Values Inventory (SVI) and the Army Year of Values Survey (AYVS), cadets entering the United States Military Academy were found to have higher scores than students entering a nonmilitary four-year public university. Using the SVI, four cohorts of cadets at the Academy provided repeated measures of their values from entrance to graduation. The pattern of changes in values for all four classes was similar; the similarities of how each class changed were remarkable in view of changes in the curriculum and student body during the seventeen years of this study. Using the AYVS, two cohorts of cadets showed that values recognized as appropriate for Army leaders were high at entrance and remained so over their four years in higher education.