Alice Eagly
Photo: Annette Hornischer

Professor of Psychology, James Padilla Chair of Arts and Sciences, and Faculty Fellow, Institute for Policy Research, Northwestern University, Illinois

Metro Fellow - Class of Fall 2011

Alice Eagly is Professor of Psychology, James Padilla Chair of Arts and Sciences, Professor of Management & Organizations, and Faculty Fellow in the Institute for Policy Research, all at Northwestern University. She received her PhD in social psychology from the University of Michigan and has also held faculty positions at Michigan State University, University of Massachusetts in Amherst, and Purdue University. Her research interests include the study of leadership, gender, attitudes, prejudice, and stereotyping. She is the author or editor of several books: The Psychology of Gender (Guilford Press, 2004), The Social Psychology of Group Identity and Social Conflict: Theory, Application, and Practice (APA Books, 2004), The Psychology of Attitudes (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers, 1993), and Sex Differences in Social Behavior: A Social Role Interpretation (Erlbaum Associates, 1987), as well as numerous journal articles and chapters in edited books. Her book Through the Labyrinth: The Truth About How Women Become Leaders (Harvard Business School Press, 2007) was co-authored with Linda Carli. Eagly has won several awards, most recently the Gold Medal for Life Achievement in the Science of Psychology from the American Psychological Foundation and the Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award from the American Psychological Association.

Project Description

The Evolutionary Origins of the Psychology of Women and Men

At the American Academy, Eagly furthered her analysis of gender and leadership by examining the ultimate origins of men’s dominance of high-level leadership roles. Indeed, questions of ultimate origins are among the most important and controversial issues addressed by contemporary scholars. Eagly’s specific interest lies in developing evolutionary theory that takes into account constructive cultural processes whereby by social change and gender roles interact with inherited attributes to foster novel behavioral traits in women and men. Seen this way, patriarchal social organization in which men dominate leader roles is not a biological inevitability—evidenced, for one, in examples of societies with gender-equal social structures. Rather, patriarchy reflects, on the one hand, socioeconomic and ecological conditions and, on the other hand, the fundamental biological attributes of female reproductive activity and greater male size and strength. Eagly notes how recent social changes in the West, such as the rapid decline in birth rates and women’s broader education and employment opportunities, have produced shifts in male and female roles. In the home, there is greater sharing of domestic work, and in the economy, women now have many jobs once dominated by men and men more likely have jobs that emphasize brains over brawn. From these changes, Eagly has identified a convergence of many psychological traits of women and men that is evident in meta-analytic studies and that has consequences for national economies.

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