The Role Of Obstacles In The Oppression Of Women

As previously discussed, women face many obstacles both in making the decision to run for office and once they embark on a campaign. How do the obstacles that women face impact the women that eventually do run for and win office? Generally, given the fact that women have to overcome many obstacles including self-doubt, recruitment and institutional obstacles, and potential voter and media bias, women that run have to be better than their male counterparts to do as well as them. Women serving in elected office typically have more experience, bring back more money to their districts, and speak more in Congress (Pearson and McGhee, 2013; Anzia and Berry, 2011). Given the fact that women tend to underestimate their qualifications for office, it is reasonable to think that, generally, once women make the decision to run they may actually be more qualified than their male counterparts. Even in adolescence, “male students rate their mathematical abilities higher than female students do, despite no sex difference in objective indicators of competence…in language arts, male and female students offer comparable …show more content…
Social comparisons can take place intentionally and when they do people tend to compare to better performing same-sex others. Social comparisons can also happen unintentionally when individuals are subliminally primed with comparison information. Typically, downward comparisons lead to an increase in self-esteem and self-view where as upward comparisons lead to a decrease in self-esteem and self-view. While upward comparisons may eventually lead individuals to greater achievements that does not negate the negative impact it can initially have on conceptions of the self. Upward comparisons, especially when people are uncertain of their self-views, can have “powerful, and sometimes painful, contrast effects…in the self-evaluation of ability” (Pelham and Wachsmuth, 1995,