UNWANTED HELP: REACTIONS TO BENEVOLENT VS. HOSTILE AGEISM

Hostile and benevolent reactions toward pregnant women: complementary interpersonal punishments and rewards that maintain traditional roles.

A naturalistic field study investigated behavior toward pregnant (vs. nonpregnant) women in nontraditional (job applicant) and traditional (store customer) roles. Female confederates, who sometimes wore a pregnancy prosthesis, posed as job applicants or customers at retail stores. Store employees exhibited more hostile behavior (e.g., rudeness) toward pregnant (vs. nonpregnant) applicants and m...

Hedge Fund Activism vs. Hostile Takeover Bids⇤

We compare hedge fund activism and hostile tender offers in a unified framework where any investor who acquires an equity stake to improve firm value faces a dual free-rider problem: Neither do dispersed shareholders sell their shares unless the price fully reflects the anticipated value improvement nor do those who retain their shares participate in the costs. We show that activism and tender ...

Beyond prejudice as simple antipathy: hostile and benevolent sexism across cultures.

The authors argue that complementary hostile and benevolent components of sexism exist across cultures. Male dominance creates hostile sexism (HS), but men's dependence on women fosters benevolent sexism (BS)--subjectively positive attitudes that put women on a pedestal but reinforce their subordination. Research with 15,000 men and women in 19 nations showed that (a) HS and BS are coherent con...

Benevolent Agents

From compassionate ageism to intergenerational conflict?

During the 50 years in which The Gerontologist has been publishing, the politics of aging in the United States has undergone distinct changes. The political behavior of older individuals has remained largely the same even though different birth cohorts have succeeded each other in populating the ranks of older people. But the politics of policies on aging-the organized interest and advocacy gro...