I What Is Feminist Psychology?

What is Feminist Psychology? A Community Structure of Psychology of Women Quarterly and Feminism & Psychology by Sonia Baron A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of The Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts with a Concentration in Psychology & Women’s Studies Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University Jupiter, Florida December 2019 i What is Feminist Psychology? A Community Structure of Psychology of Women Quarterly and Feminism & Psychology by Sonia Baron This thesis was prepared under the direction of the candidate’s thesis advisor, Dr. Kevin Lanning and Dr. Dr. Wairimũ Njambi, and has been approved by members of her supervisory committee. It was submitted to the faculty of The Honors College and was accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences. SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE: ___________________________ Dr. Kevin Lanning ___________________________ Dr. Wairimũ Njambi ___________________________ Dean Timothy Steigenga, Wilkes Honors College ___________ Date ii Acknowledgements My most profound appreciation goes to the entire Honors College staff. They are all dedicated to make this campus the unique place that it is. I would like to thank my thesis advisors, Dr. Kevin Lanning and Dr. Wairimũ Njambi, for all their support and compassion that they have shown these past few years. I have grown into a better person and scholar in their classes. This thesis is a product of finding myself between two fields that never cease to fascinate me. I would also like to acknowledge the friends I've met during these years. To Miles, Dacia, Melannie, Stessie, Erica, Hannah, and Cassidy: thank you! Finally, I would like to thank Dr. Vernon and Dr. Earles for being great professors and mentors. I would not have made out of my first year at the Honors College without their guidance. iii ABSTRACT Author: Sonia Baron Title: What is Feminist Psychology? A Community Structure of Psychology of Women Quarterly and Feminism & Psychology Institution: Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University Thesis Advisor: Dr. Kevin Lanning Degree: Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts and Sciences Concentration: Psychology & Women’s Studies Year: 2019 Women’s studies is an interdisciplinary field that had continued to evolve since it was introduced to academic spaces in the ‘70s. Feminist psychology unites the psychology of women and the psychological study of women’s social issues. Using community structure of the scholarship of the journals Psychology of Women Quarterly (PWQ) and Feminism & Psychology, we examine and seek to understand the empirical structure of feminist psychology. An analysis of these two journals by decade will help determine whether the scholarship of feminist psychology has changed as much as women’s studies. In doing so, one can also address the question of how psychological is women’s studies (and vice versa). iv Para Diana, Gema, y Vivianne Table of Contents 1. Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 1 2. Chapter 1: Foundations of Feminist Psychology................................................................. 5 A brief history of women in psychology.....................................................................5 Three theoretical divides ............................................................................................12 3. Chapter 2: Bibliometric Analyses of Feminist Psychology................................................18 4. Chapter 3: Methods.............................................................................................................23 5. Chapter 4: Results...............................................................................................................24 6: Chapter 5: Discussion.........................................................................................................32 7. References...........................................................................................................................42 8. Appendices..........................................................................................................................46 Appendix 1 ................................................................................................................47 Appendix 2 ................................................................................................................52 Appendix 3 ................................................................................................................57 Appendix 4 ................................................................................................................65 Appendix 5 ................................................................................................................72 vi What is Feminist Psychology? A Community Structure of Psychology of Women Quarterly and Feminism & Psychology Introduction Women’s studies and psychology intersect with the field of feminist psychology, which emerged in 1970. The psychology of women, the psychology of sex and gender, and the psychology of sexuality have foundations in the field of women’s studies. A network and community structure analysis of the journals Psychology of Women Quarterly and Feminism & Psychology can provide insight as to the structure of the scholarly work of feminist psychology, and, more specifically, address the question of how psychological women’s studies is (and vice versa). The history of the intersection between psychology and feminism is long and complicated and has been described as an empirical debate between a political/academic movement and scientific discipline (Burman, 1997; Teo, 2005; Rutherford & Pettit, 2015; Granek, 2010; Radtke & Stan, 2016). Given the unstable place of feminist thought on the psychological studies of women, Rutherford and Pettit (2015) place a distinction between feminist psychology and the psychology of women. The latter refers to the research on women’s nature and experiences; feminist psychology refers to the application of feminist theories and practices in psychological research. “‘Feminist psychology’ names a strategic space between feminism and psychology; it is not a stable topic area, but rather identifies a site of the contest (over what counts as knowledge, who defines this, and how it is arrived at)” (Burman, 1997, 3). Nancy Henley (1985) conducted a review of feminist psychology to develop three separate frameworks that are parallel to those of Rutherford and Pettit (2015), whose work provided the theoretical framework for this thesis. The first category, called the psychology of women, studies the empirical study of sex differences and sex roles. Second, psychology against 1 women refers to the psychological literature that has stigmatized and pathologized women and makes suggestions for new research. Lastly, psychology for women is the scholars who are both feminists and psychologists who take elements from both fields to theorize the experiences of women and other marginalized communities. Rutherford and Pettit (2015) divide the relationship between feminism and psychology into three separate frameworks. First, psychology and feminism are seen as two separate fields that debate each other. The second relationship looks at the critique and work of feminist psychologists on the study of gender and psychology overall. The changes that have been adopted by psychology are part of the third type of relationship between feminism and psychology. This thesis uses community structure to study the intersection of psychology and feminism/ women’s studies, as depicted in the journal Psychology of Women Quarterly. This journal was part of the countless efforts from women psychologists to promote feminist scholarship and advance their careers in psychology, even if not all of them were self-identified feminists (Rutherford & Granek, 2010). Michelle Barrett and Anne Phillips point out that there is a difference that is substantially different from the feminist scholarship in the 19’70s with that of its two subsequent decades. Destabilizing Theory lays out the main topics that emerge in women’s studies during 1980 and 1990, which are seen as reactionary criticism of the topics that centered feminist theory of the 1970s. The present project questions if the field of psychology and feminism (interchangeably referred to as feminist psychology) had a trajectory similar to feminist scholarship. While Destabilizing Theory pertains to a historical debate within the field of women’s studies, there is a possibility that this shift could inform the studies of the psychology of women and the psychological study of women’s issues. This thesis places the psychology and/in/of women in the decades of the ‘70s and ‘90s. These two decades are conversely compared with the last 2 decade so that it can be established which topics are being centered today in comparison to these two previous decades. While there is substantive literature aimed at reframing psychological theories with a broader female sample, discounting sex and gender differences, and proposing a feminist critique of the history of psychology, most of this work has been at the periphery of psychology before the 1970s (Denmark & Fernandez, 2008). The scholarship that women created needs to be contextualized within their professional experiences of women in psychology (Bohan, 1990). The systematic

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