Ben-Israel, Ady (9/14) The normality and interpersonal adaptivity of intra-individual gender variability (Kevin B. Meehan, Ph.D.;Nicole M. Cain, Ph.D.; Nicholas Papouchis, Ph.D.)
Recent decades have seen a shift in psychological literature toward conceptualizing the self as multifaceted, opening up questions about the multiplicity of gender and the optimal structure of a non-unitary self. Studying personality features in ecologically sound contexts over time captures the variability that underlies the multiplicity of the self. Utilizing an ecological momentary assessment of gender role, this study examined gender as a dynamic construct. It hypothesized that intra-individual gender variability would be normally distributed within the general population, and that an optimal degree of gender flux would positively correlate to subjects' interpersonal functioning.Participants (N = 115) completed baseline measures of gender role orientation, interpersonal functioning, identity diffusion, and self-differentiation as well as daily measures of gender role orientation and interpersonal behavior. As expected, gender flux was normally distributed throughout the sample and was not correlated to identity diffusion. Mid-range gender flux was correlated with psychological health only in males. Males' psychological health was most impacted by fluctuations in agentic behavior, whereas females' psychological health was most impacted by fluctuations in communal behavior. This study provides empirical support for the multiplicity of gender and demonstrates that gender flexibility is unwaveringly not a sign of identity diffusion.
