Research finds a Gender Bias in Perceptions of Creativity

An article in the most recent issue of Psychological Science finds that people tend to perceive men as more creative than women.

Here's a quote from the article:

"Five studies provide converging evidence that lay conceptions of creative cognition (i.e., beliefs regarding what it takes to “think creatively”) overlap substantially with the unique content of male stereotypes, engendering systematic bias in the way that men’s and women’s creativity is evaluated. We found that creativity is strongly associated with stereotypically masculine-agentic qualities (Study 1), and both experimental and archival data indicated that men are judged as more creative than women (Studies 2–4). Finally, we found that attributions of agency mediate differential judgments of men’s and women’s creativity (Study 5)."  (page 1759)

They did NOT find that men are more creative than women. Indeed, they cite other research that has found no difference in creativity between the sexes.

This research adds further emphases regarding gender bias — highlighting that creative potency may be inaccurately judged based on stereotypes that work at an unconscious level. We must all beware of bias in hiring, recruiting, promotions, rewards, and task assignments.