Role of gender norms and group identification on hypothetical and experimental pain tolerance

Gregory J. Pool · Andria F. Schwegler · Brian R. Theodore · Perry N. Fuchs

116 citations0/0 files storedPain

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Gender Roles and Identity Studies Gender and Feminist Studies Social and Intergroup Psychology

Abstract

Previous research indicates that men typically tolerate more pain in experimental settings than women. One likely explanation for these group differences in pain tolerance is conformity to traditional, gender group social norms (i.e., the ideal man is masculine and tolerates more pain; the ideal woman is feminine and tolerates less pain). According to self-categorization theory, norms guide behavior to the degree that group members adopt the group identity. Therefore, high-identifying men are expected to conform to gender norms and tolerate more pain than high-identifying women who conform to different gender norms as a guide for their behavior. We conducted two studies to investigate whether gender group identification moderates individuals' conformity to pain tolerance and reporting norms. In the first study, participants indicated their gender identification and expected tolerance of a hypothetical painful stimulus. As anticipated, high-identifying men reported significantly greater pain tolerance than high-identifying women. No differences existed between low-identifying men and women. To determine if self-reported pain tolerance in a role-playing scenario corresponds to actual pain tolerance in an experimental setting, the second study examined pain tolerance to a noxious stimulus induced by electrical stimulation of the index finger. The experimental outcome revealed that high-identifying men tolerated more painful stimulation than high-identifying women. Further, high-identifying men tolerated more pain than low-identifying men. These results highlight the influence of social norms on behavior and suggest the need to further explore the role of norms in pain reporting behaviors.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 116 citations exist upstream.

References

2013Handbook of Social Psychology 1998Social influence: Social norms, conformity and compliance.1996Group Norms and the Attitude-Behavior Relationship: A Role for Group Identification 2002Gender role expectations of pain: relationship to experimental pain perception 1985Sex Differences and Personality Factors in Responsivity to Pain 2003Altering gender role expectations: effects on pain tolerance, pain threshold, and pain ratings

Cited by

2008Sex differences in perceptions of pain coping strategy usage 2020Gender role in pain perception and expression: an integrative review 2011Interactions Among Sex, Ethnicity, Religion, and Gender Role Expectations of Pain 2018The Role of Sex, Gender, Health Factors, and Job Context in Workplace Accommodation Use Among Men and Women with Arthritis 2020Chronic Pain and Friendship Among Middle-Aged and Older U.S. Adults 2011Gender role expectations of pain mediate sex differences in cold pain responses in healthy Libyans 2018Influence of biological sex, trait gender, and state gender on pain threshold, pain tolerance, and ratings of pain severity

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.