Are some stereotypes hard to die? Need for Cognitive Closure and Attitudes Toward Woman as Managers

Women are historically underrepresented in a series of employment fields (e.g., finance and banking) and in some job roles (e.g., leadership and management that are typically associated with men) (for a review, see Burton, 2015). The aim of this research is to verify if an epistemic motivation, namely Need for Cognitive Closure (NFCC) can be associated with negative attitudes toward female leaders, regardless to the gender of the followers (Hypothesis 1). Furthermore, we investigated the mechanisms and the conditions under which this relationship can been exacerbated. Our hypotheses are that hostile sexism (i.e., negative stereotypes about nontraditional women) can explain the relationship between NFCC and attitude toward women as managers (Hypothesis 2); and that quality of interactions with female leaders moderates the NFCC-prejudice against female leaders’ relationship (Hypothesis 3). Thus, followers with high NFCC who experienced satisficed interactions with female leaders and high score on NFCC decrease the effect of NFCC on negative attitudes towards women as managers. In two studies with heterogeneous samples (Study: N= 99 students and Study 2: N =197 employees,) the results give support to our hypotheses. This research has theoretical and practical implications by suggesting that NFCC, can lead people to be more sensitive to positive contact with female leaders and determines more positive attitudes towards women as managers.