The Content of Gender Stereotypes Embedded in Language Use

Gender stereotypes have endured despite substantial change in gender roles. Previous work has assessed how affect language production particular interactional contexts. Here, we communication biases where context was less specified: written texts to diffuse audiences. We used Latent Semantic Analysis (LSA) computationally quantify the similarity meaning between gendered names and stereotype-linked terms these communications. This revealed that female were more similar proscriptive (undesirable) masculine terms, such as emotional.