Gender disparities in the attribution of cardiac-related symptoms: contribution of common sense models of illness.
The role of common sense models of heart disease in the attribution of cardiac-related symptoms was examined in a sample of healthy young adults (N = 224). Participants were less likely to attribute symptoms to possible cardiac causes for female victims reporting stressful life events (M = 5.14) than for female victims without such stressors (M = 6.82) or for male victims with (M = 6.23) or without (M = 6.48) concurrent stressors. Cardiac attributions remained lowest for female/high-stress victims in additional samples of undergraduates (N = 194), community-residing adults (N = 48), and physicians (N = 45), although this outcome sometimes appeared to reflect additive, rather than interactive, effects. Two final experiments with undergraduate samples (Ns = 48 and 60, respectively) indicated that stereotypes associating heart disease with male gender may account for gender disparities in the attribution of cardiac-related symptoms.
Department of Psychology and Center on Aging, University of Iowa, Iowa City 52242, USA. rene-martin@uiowa.edu
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D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005783:Gender Identity; D006801:Humans; D007389:Internal-External Control; D008016:Life Change Events; D008297:Male; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000523:psychology; D012803:Sick Role; D013240:Stereotyping; D013334:Students / Q000523:psychology