The Korea Local Administration Review

Ambivalent sexism(AS) is an social ideology composed of both a hostile andbenevolent prejudice toward women in social psychology. It is a veryinteresting area in terms of psychology. Hostile sexism(HS) is an antagonisticattitude toward women, who are often viewed as trying to control men throughfeminist ideology or sexual seduction. Benevolent sexism(BS) is a chivalrousattitude toward women that feels favorable but is actually sexist because itcasts women as weak creatures in need of men's protection. Ambivalent sexismrefers to a form of sexism characterized by attitudes about women that reflectboth negative, resentful beliefs and feelings and affectionate, chivalrous, butpotentially patronizing beliefs and feelings. So, ambivalent sexism in publicadministration was hypothesized to encompass three sources of ambivalence(paternalism, gender differentiation, and heterosexuality) and it was measuredwith public ambivalent sexism inventory(P-ASI). The purpose of this studywas to confirm that hostile sexism and benevolent sexism are notunidimensional but two-dimensional construct. The results of survey in localgovernments demonstrated that the HS scale was correlated with negativeattitudes toward and stereotypes about women, and the BS scale was correlatedwith positive attitudes toward and stereotypes about women. The theoreticaland the practical implications of these two types of sexism and the use of thescale were discussed.
□ Keywords: ambivalent sexism, hostile attitudes, benevolent attitudes, publicwoman, local government.