Masculine and Feminine Gender Roles in Healthy Iranian PopulationAccording to Two Different Constructs:Bem Sex Role Inventory vs. GM and GF Scales of MMPI-2

The aim of the current study was to assess masculine and feminine gender roles in a group of healthy Iranian males and females, using two different instruments and to compare these findings. Eighty-one male and 89 female healthy individuals participated in this cross-sectional study. Gender roles were assessed using gender-masculine (GM) and gender-feminine (GF) scales derived from MMPI-2 and the Bem Sex Role Inventory (BSRI). Sex-typing was performed using median split-half method. Based on the normative data of Iranian population for GM-GF scales, 48.1% of normal males and 37.1% of normal females were undifferentiated on sex-typing and none of them was considered as androgynous. However, BSRI showed that the frequency of androgyny was 6.2% in male and 10.1% in female samples and the frequency of undifferentiated individuals was 39.5% in males and 36.0% in females. Pearson’s correlation coefficient was 0.530 between GM scale of MMPI-2 and masculinity traits in the BSRI and 0.528 between GF scale of MMPI-2 and femininity traits in the BSRI (for both: p<0.001). These two instruments showed moderate correlations. However, it seems that these two instruments measure different attributes of gender roles, though they have considerable overlap.