Feminist theory in Feminism & Psychology [Part I]: Dealing with differences and negotiating the biological

Abstract

Theory is an important preoccupation of articles published in Feminism & Psychology. This Virtual Special Issue includes 10 of those published since the journal’s inception that have a primary focus on theoretical issues related to two related topics – differences and the biological. The concern with differences includes the socially constructed categories sex and gender, as well as sexuality and social class. Those articles addressing the biological represent critical scholarship that is working to negotiate a place for the biology within feminist psychology and entails moving away from the view that the biological is natural and innate. This introductory article addresses how theory fits within feminist psychology and offers a brief history of debates concerning differences and the biological before offering summaries and observations related to each selected article. The featured articles can be located on the Feminism & Psychology website and are listed in Appendix 1 at the end of this article.

Keywords

theory sex differences gender differences intersectionality critical neuroscience feminist psychology

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Ahmed

(2000) Whose counting? Feminist Theory 1: 97–103.

American Psychological Association Task Force on Socioeconomic Status. (2007). Report of the APA Task Force on Socioeconomic Status. Retrieved from http://www.apa.org/pi/ses/resources/publications/task-force-2006.pdf.

Anthias

Yuval-Davis

(1983) Contextualizing feminism: Gender, ethnic and class divisions. Feminist Review 15: 62–75.

Baumeister

(1988) Should we stop studying sex differences all together? American Psychologist 43: 1092–1095.

Becker

(2010) Women’s work and the societal discourse of stress. Feminism & Psychology 20: 36–52.

Bem

S. L.

(1983) Gender schema theory and its implications for child development: Raising gender-aschematic children in a gender-schematic society. Signs 8: 598–616.

Birke

(2010) Structuring relationships: On science, feminism and non-human animals. Feminism & Psychology 20: 337–349.

Blackman

L. M.

(1996) The dangerous classes: Retelling the psychiatric story. Feminism & Psychology 6: 361–379.

Bleier

(1984) Science and gender: A critique of biology and its theories on women, Oxford, UK: Pergamon Press.

10.

Bluhm

Jacobson

A. J.

Maibom

H. L.

(2012) Introduction. In: Bluhm

Jacobson

A. J.

Maibom

H. L.

(eds) Neurofeminism: Issues at the intersection of feminist theory and cognitive science, Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 1–10.

11.

Burack

(1995) Mind-mending and theory building: Lesbian feminism and the psychology question. Feminism & Psychology 5: 495–510.

12.

Bussey

Bandura

(1999) Social cognitive theory of gender development and differentiation. Psychological Review 106: 676–713.

13.

Butler

(1990) Gender trouble: Feminism and the subversion of identity, New York, NY: Routledge.

14.

Butler

(1993) Bodies that matter, New York, NY: Pergamon Press.

15.

Code

(1991) What can she know? Feminist theory and the construction of knowledge, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

16.

Code

(2000) Epistemology, feminist. In: Code

(eds) Encyclopedia of feminist theories, London: Routledge, pp. 170–173.

17.

Cole

E. R.

(2009) Intersectionality and research in psychology. American Psychologist 64: 170–180.

18.

Collins

P. H.

(1990) Black feminist thought: Knowledge, consciousness, and politics of empowerment, Boston, MA: Unwin Hyman.

19.

Crenshaw

(1989) Demarginalizing the intersection of race and sex: A black feminist critique of antidiscrimination doctrine, feminist theory and antiracist politics. The University of Chicago Legal Forum 140: 139–168.

20.

Crenshaw

(1991) Mapping the margins: Intersectionality, identity politics, and violence against women of color. Stanford Law Review 43: 1241–1299.

21.

Daly

(1978) Gyn/Ecology: The metaethics of radical feminism, Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

22.

Deaux

Major

(1987) Putting gender into context: An interactive model of gender-related behavior. Psychological Review 94: 369–389.

23.

Eagly

A. H.

(1990) On the advantages of reporting sex comparisons. American Psychologist 45: 560–562.

24.

Eagly

A. H.

(1994) On comparing women and men. Feminism & Psychology 4: 513–522.

25.

Eagly

A. H.

Riger

(2014) Feminism and psychology: Critiques of methods and epistemology. American Psychologist 69: 684–702.

26.

Eagly

A. H.

Wood

(2012) Social role theory. In: van Lange

P. A. M.

Kruglanski

A. W.

Higgins

E. T.

(eds) Handbook of theories of social psychology, Los Angeles, CA: Sage, pp. 458–476.

27.

Ellis

S. J.

Peel

(2010) Lesbian feminisms: Historical and present possibilities. Feminism & Psychology 21: 198–204.

28.

Fausto-Sterling

(1992) Myths of gender: Biological theories about women and men, New York, NY: Basic Books.

29.

Fausto-Sterling

(1993, March/April) The five sexes: Why male and female are not enough. The Sciences20–25.

30.

Fausto-Sterling

(2000, July/August) The five sexes, revisited. The Sciences18–23.

31.

Fausto-Sterling

(2012) Sex/gender: Biology in a social world, New York, NY: Routledge.

32.

Febbraro

A. R.

(2003) Alpha bias and beta bias in research on labour and love: The case of enhancement versus scarcity. Feminism & Psychology 13: 201–223.

33.

Garcia

J. R.

Heywood

L. L.

(2016) Moving toward integrative feminist evolutionary behavioral sciences. Feminism & Psychology 26: 327–334.

34.

Gilligan

(1982) In a different voice: Psychological theory and women’s development, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

35.

Halpern

D. F.

(1994) Stereotypes, science, censorship and the study of sex differences. Feminism & Psychology 4: 523–530.

36.

Harding

(1986) The science question in feminism, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

37.

Hare-Mustin

R. T.

Marecek

(1990) Beyond difference. In: Hare-Mustin

R. T.

Marecek

(eds) Making a difference: Psychology and construction of difference, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, pp. 184–201.

38.

Hare-Mustin

R. T.

Marecek

(1994) Asking the right questions: Feminist psychology and sex differences. Feminism & Psychology 4: 531–537.

39.

Hegarty

(1997) Materializing the hypothalamus: A performative account of the ‘gay brain’. Feminism & Psychology 7: 355–372.

40.

Hekman

(2010) The material of knowledge: Feminist disclosures, Bloomington and Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.

41.

Hoagland

S. L.

(1988) Lesbian ethics: Toward new value, Palo Alto, CA: Institute of Lesbian Studies.

42.

Hollway

(1994) Beyond sex differences: A project for feminist psychology. Feminism & Psychology 4: 538–546.

43.

hooks

(1989) Talking back: Thinking feminist, thinking black, Boston, MA: Black Women’s Press.

44.

Hubbard

(1992) The politics of women’s biology, New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

45.

Hyde

J. S.

(1994) Should psychologists study gender differences? Yes, with some guidelines. Feminism & Psychology 4: 507–512.

46.

Jagose

(2009) Feminism’s Queer Theory. Feminism & Psychology 19: 157–174.

47.

Janeway

(1988) Powers of the weak, New York, NY: Random House.

48.

Joel

(2016) Captured in terminology: Sex, sex categories, and sex differences. Feminism & Psychology 26: 335–345.

49.

Joel

Fausto-Sterling

(2016) Beyond sex differences: New approaches for thinking about variation in brain structure and function. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B 371: 20150451.

50.

Jordan-Young

(2010) Brain storm: The flaws in the science of sex differences, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

51.

Kahn

A. S.

Yoder

J. D.

(1989) The psychology of women and conservatism: Rediscovering social change. Psychology of Women Quarterly 13: 417–432.

52.

Keller

E. F.

(1983) A feeling for the organism: The life and work of Barbara McClintock, New York, NY: W. H. Freeman.

53.

Kitzinger

(1991) Feminism, psychology and the paradox of power. Feminism & Psychology 1: 111–129.

54.

Kitzinger

(1994) Sex differences: Feminist perspectives. Feminism & Psychology 4: 501–506.

55.

Kitzinger

Perkins

(1993) Changing our minds: Lesbian feminism and psychology, New York: New York University Press.

56.

Kraus

M. W.

Piff

P. K.

Mendoza-Denton

Rheinschmidt

M. L.

Keltner

(2012) Social class, solipsism, and contextualism: How the rich are different from the poor. Psychological Review 119: 546–572.

57.

Lobb

(2013) The agony and the empathy: The ambivalence of empathy in feminist psychology. Feminism & Psychology 23: 426–441.

58.

Lott

(2012) The social psychology of class and classism. American Psychologist 67: 650–658.

59.

Macleod

Marecek

Capdevila

(2014) Feminism & Psychology going forward. Feminism & Psychology 24: 3–17.

60.

Magnusson

Marecek

(2012) Gender and culture in psychology: Theories and practices, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

61.

Mann

S. A.

(2012) Doing feminist theory: From modernity to postmodernity, Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

62.

Miller

J. B.

(1976) Toward a new psychology of women, Boston, MA: Beacon Press.

63.

Money

(1955) Hermaphroditism, gender and precocity in hyperadrenocorticism: Psychologic findings. Bulletin of the Johns Hopkins Hospital 10: 66–72.

64.

Morawski, J. G. (1994). Practicing feminisms, reconstructing psychology: Notes on a liminal science. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.

65.

Perkins

(1991) Therapy for lesbians: The case against. Feminism & Psychology 1: 325–338.

66.

Raymond

J. G.

(1986) A passion for friends: Toward a philosophy of female affection, Boston, MA: Beacon.

67.

Rich

(1980) Compulsory heterosexuality and lesbian existence. Signs 5: 631–660.

68.

Rose

(1983) Hand, brain and heart: A feminist epistemology for the natural sciences. Signs 9: 73–90.

69.

Ruddick

(1990) Maternal thinking: Towards a politics of peace, London, UK: Women’s Press.

70.

Shields

S. A.

(1975) Functionalism, Darwinism, and the psychology of women: A study in social myth. American Psychologist 30: 739–754.

71.

Shields

S. A.

(2016) Functionalism, Darwinism, and intersectionality: Using an intersectional perspective to reveal the appropriate of science to support the status quo. Feminism & Psychology 26: 353–365.

72.

Stam

H. J.

(2006, October) On the uses of theory. The General Psychologist 41(2): 30–32.

73.

Stam

H. J.

(2012a) Editor’s introduction. – Theoretical psychology in the twentieth century: Classic readings. In: Stam

H. J.

(eds) Theoretical psychology – Classic readings Vol. 1London, UK: Sage, pp. xix–xli.

74.

Stam

H. J.

(2012b) Editor’s introduction – Theoretical psychology and the multiple ways of being theoretical: Introduction to contemporary readings. In: Stam

H. J.

(eds) Theoretical psychology – Contemporary readings Vol. 1London, UK: Sage, pp. xix–xxxiii.

75.

Stephens

N. M.

Markus

H. R.

Phillips

L. T.

(2014) Social class culture cycles: How three gateway contexts shape selves and fuel inequality. Annual Review of Psychology 65: 611–634.

76.

Stoller

R. J.

(1968) Sex and gender: The development of masculinity and femininity, London, UK: Hogarth.

77.

Teo

(2015) Critical psychology: A geography of intellectual engagement and resistance. American Psychologist 70: 240–254.

78.

Unger, R. (1979). Toward a redefinition of sex and gender. American Psychologist, 34, 1085–1094.

79.

van Ommen

van Deventer

(2011) Goldberg’s brain and the sex/gender distinction. Feminism & Psychology 22: 145–161.

80.

Walkderdine

(1996) Subjectivity and social class: New directions for feminist psychology. Feminism & Psychology 6: 355–360.

81.

Weisstein

(1968/1993) Psychology constructs the female; or, the fantasy life of the male psychologist (with some attention to the fantasies of his friends, the male biologist and the male anthropologist). Feminism & Psychology 3: 195–210). Originally published as Kinder, Küche, Kirche as scientific law: Psychology constructs the female, by New England Free Press.].

82.

West

Zimmerman

D. H.

(1987) Doing gender. Gender & Society 1: 125–151.

83.

Becker

(2010) Women’s work and the societal discourse of stress. Feminism & Psychology 20: 36–52.

84.

Birke

(2010) Structuring relationships: On science, feminism and non-human animals. Feminism & Psychology 20: 337–349.

85.

Blackman

L. M.

(1996) The dangerous classes: Retelling the psychiatric story. Feminism & Psychology 6: 361–379.

86.

Burack

(1995) Mind-mending and theory building: Lesbian feminism and the psychology question. Feminism & Psychology 5: 495–510.

87.

Febbraro

A. R.

(2003) Alpha bias and beta bias in research on labour and love: The case of enhancement versus scarcity. Feminism & Psychology 13: 201–223.

88.

Hegarty

(1997) Materializing the hypothalamus: A performative account of the ‘gay brain’. Feminism & Psychology 7: 355–372.

89.

Jagose

(2009) Feminism’s queer theory. Feminism & Psychology 19: 157–174.

90.

Lobb

(2013) The agony and the empathy: The ambivalence of empathy in feminist psychology. Feminism & Psychology 23: 426–441.

91.

van Ommen

van Deventer

(2011) Goldberg’s brain and the sex/gender distinction. Feminism & Psychology 22: 145–161.