A woman of some forty years enters my office. She moves very carefully and hesitantly, stopping at the door and waiting. Although she is just my height, she keeps her head lowered in such a way that she has to look up at me. She doesn’t seem sure whether to close the door behind her or wait for me to do it. She waits. She asks where she should sit and I indicate which chair is for my clients, although it is obvious from the configuration of the room. She sits down, removes her shoes, and tucks her legs under her body. She wraps her arms around her body as if to hold herself in and silently waits.
What do we understand about this client? What seems unusual? What seems usual “for a woman.” How would our evaluation of the client’s mental state change if we substituted “man” for “woman”? Would the male client have worse diagnosis than the woman? Would we be more likely to say that the man is depressed than that the woman is depressed?
Notice that all of the things we come to know about the situation depend on culturally acquired gender stereotypes or schemas. We unconsciously make a number of assumptions about the woman.
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