德克萨斯大学心理学论文：导师对学生评价的性别效应研究 THE EFFECT OF GENDER ON STUDENT WRITERS’ EVALUATIONS OF PEER TUTORS.doc

THE EFFECT OF GENDER ON STUDENT WRITERS’ EVALUATIONS OF PEER TUTORS A Senior Honors Thesis by JODI WHITAKER Submitted to the Office of Honors Programs Academic Scholarships Texas AM University In partial fulfillment for the designation of UNIVERSITY UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH FELLOWS Approved as to style and content by: Valerie Balester Edward A. Funkhouser (Fellows Advisor) (Executive Director) April 2006 Major: Psychology ABSTRACT The Effect of Gender on Student Writers’ Evaluations of Peer Tutors (April 2006) Jodi Whitaker Department of Psychology Texas AM University Fellows Advisor: Dr. Valerie Balester Department of English This study examines how the genders of both student writers and their peer tutors affect the dynamics of writing tutoring sessions and influence the student writers’ subsequent evaluations of their peer tutors. Even though peer tutors employed the same non-directive, facilitative approach with all students, students judged female tutors to exhibit stereotypically feminine characteristics and male tutors to exhibit stereotypically masculine characteristics. Students also more highly evaluated the peer tutor whose sex matched their own. Students who were more highly sex-typed (masculine males and feminine females) more highly evaluated the same-sex peer tutor than did less sex-typed students of the same gender, though feminine female students more strongly exerted this preference than did masculine male students. Evidence gathered from post-session Likert surveys, paired observations, and semi-structured telephone interviews supported all three hypotheses. Reasons concerning why sex stereotypes still shape tutoring sessions as well as implications for altering tutor training policy are explored.  DEDICATION To my loving husband, Joey, for his endless amounts of encouragement and support – and for all the coffee runs, chauffeuring services, and not-so-subtle reminders to go to sleep that he provided along the way. To my m